This article examines phonological development and its relationship to input statistics. Using novel data from a longitudinal corpus of spontaneous child speech in Polish, we evaluate and compare the predictions of a variety of input-based phonotactic models for syllable structure acquisition. We find that many commonly examined input statistics…

Based on Robinson's Triadic Componential Framework and the definition of task planning by Ellis (2005), this study was carried out to find out the effects of task planning and rhetorical mode on lexical and syntactic complexity, and overall writing quality of writing production of EFL learners. Following a repeated-measures design, the present…

Unlike linguistic fossilization, pragmatic fossilization has received scant attention in fossilization research. To bridge this gap, the present study adopted a typical-error method of fossilization research to identify the most frequent errors in pragmatic routines committed by Persian-speaking learners of L2 English and explore the sources of…

This article reports on a study that examined the personal employment paths of six international academics at a British university. To complement previous accounts of difficult migration, it focuses on the successful experiences of such academics, in particular how proficiency in English facilitated their move into employment in higher education…

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) require students to read and comprehend complex content texts. They specify three dimensions of a text that simultaneously contribute to text complexity across the curriculum: qualitative dimensions, quantitative dimensions, and reader and task considerations. In literacy instruction, recognizing and…

Massive Open Online Courses and e-learning represent the future of the teaching-learning processes through the development of Information and Communication Technologies. They are the response to the new education needs of society. However, this future also presents many challenges such as the processing of online forums when a huge number of…

Research on the acquisition of foreign languages by at-risk students has primarily focused on the Linguistic Coding Deficit Hypothesis (Horwitz, 2000). Recently, there has been a growing discussion regarding the effects of learning style rigidity (Castro, 2006; Castro and Peck, 2005; Corbitt, 2011; Sparks, 2006) and metacognitive awareness…

This investigation examines how students responded to the content and critical approach in an undergraduate course in Hispanic linguistics titled "Bilingualism in the Spanish-Speaking World." To enhance learning, students participated in one of two high-impact practices (HIPs)--service-learning or a research investigation--as their final…

This study reports on the analysis of a widely used "General English" textbook to explore the relationship between lexical bundles included in the text and lexical bundles identified in relevant corpora to determine the appropriateness of the text's vocabulary in relation to its stated objective. Appropriateness is examined through the…

This dissertation explores the way Kotiria/Wanano (E. Tukanoan, Kotiria hereafter) women of the Brazilian "Alto Rio Negro" (ARN) contrive (McDowell 1990) "kaya basa" "sad songs" using linguistic and musical resources to construct songs that express loneliness and other private emotions, while also creating alliances…

Producing a sensible utterance requires speakers to select conceptual content, lexical items, and syntactic structures almost instantaneously during speech planning. Each language offers its speakers flexibility in the selection of lexical and syntactic options to talk about the same scenarios involving movement. Languages also vary typologically…

Creating a timeline for formulaic language is far from simple, because several partially independent lines of research have contributed to the emerging picture. Each exhibits cycles of innovation and consolidation over time: domains take a leading role in developing new knowledge and then fall back, while another area comes to the fore. Thus, some…

A founding concept in second language acquisition (SLA) research, fossilization has been fundamental to understanding second language (L2) development. The Fossilization Hypothesis, introduced in Selinker's seminal text (1972), has thus been one of the most influential theories, guiding a significant bulk of SLA research for four decades; 2012…

The dissertation presents a new account of how direct discourse works in natural language. After presenting preliminary discussions of the views of quotation given by Tarski, Quine, and Davidson in Chapter 1, Chapter 2 is devoted to historical investigations into Frege's theory of quotation and direct discourse. Although Frege's theory is often…

Focus structure has a profound effect on language production and processing. Yet, despite that focus has so much influence on an utterance, it still remains unclear what the meaning of focus is. Some theories consider focus to be entirely pragmatic, having no influence on the truth conditions or presuppositions of a focused sentence. Other…