Unpacking a dialogic speech event that took place in an ESOL teacher education class, this article explores an instance of struggle over ascribed, commonsense meanings that include some U.S. Americans and exclude others. The incident--what Fairclough (1992) has called a "moment of crisis"--turned out to be a powerful, transformative experience in…

While children in a classroom of 4-year-olds are actively engaged during center-based learning, a small group begins constructing a tower using blocks of all sizes. Jose, Cindy, and Thomas are all at different stages of language development. Jose is a dual language learner (DLL) in the early stages of English language acquisition; Cindy is a DLL…

English as a Second Language programs have historically focused on Spanish-speaking students, but the ESL map is undergoing a dramatic transformation that is challenging K12 schools to cope with a burgeoning number of different native languages--more than 100 in some locations--as new immigrants arrive in districts across the country. The number…

This is a naturalistic study of the development of language in Hebrew-speaking children with Williams syndrome (WS) and children with Down syndrome (DS), whose MLU extended from 1[multiplied by]0 to 4[multiplied by]4. Developmental curves over the entire span of data collection revealed minor differences between children with WS, children with DS,…

This dissertation examines the phenomenon of ethical datives (EDs) in two Slavic languages, Russian and Macedonian. EDs are defined through a pragmatic lens as discourse licensed perspective markers in which a dative form expresses a speaker's decision to signal someone's emotional attitude--real or perceived--toward the action. Owing to…

Murphy provides a comprehensive overview of teaching pronunciation with a focus on thought groups and prominence. Understanding thought groups, or how speakers use clusters of words to best fit the communicative situation, is essential for clearer understanding of most components of English pronunciation that are teachable in ESL/EFL classrooms.…

This dissertation provides a description of aspects of the phonology, morphology, and morphosyntax of Bangime. Bangime is a language isolate spoken in the Dogon language speaking area of Central Eastern Mali. Although the Bangande, the speakers of Bangime, self-identify with the Dogon, their language bears practically no resemblance to the…

This article presents an analysis of the relationship between sign structure and iconicity in American Sign Language. Historically, linguists have been pressured to downplay the role of form-meaning relationships (iconicity) in signed languages. However, recent inquiries into the role of traditional phonological parameters of signs (handshape,…

The connections among language, writing system, and reading are part of what confronts a child in learning to read. We examine these connections in addressing how reading processes adapt to the variety of written language and how writing adapts to language. The first adaptation (reading to writing), as evidenced in behavioral and neuroscience…

This study examined abstract syntactic categorization in infants, using the case of grammatical gender. Ninety-six French-learning 14-, 17-, 20-, and 30-month-olds completed the study. In a preferential looking procedure infants were tested on their generalized knowledge of grammatical gender involving pseudonouns and gender-marking determiners.…

A major open question in natural language research is the role of communicative efficiency in the origin and on-line processing of language structures. Here, we use word pairs like "chimp/chimpanzee", which differ in length but have nearly identical meanings, to investigate the communicative properties of lexical systems and the communicative…

This dissertation is an attempt to state what is known at present about the grammar of Mungbam (ISO 693-3 [mij]). Mungbam is a Niger-Congo language spoken in the Northwest Region of Cameroon. The dissertation is a descriptive grammar, covering the phonetics, phonology morphology and syntax of the language. Source data are texts and elicited data…

Classifier languages are often described as lacking genuine number morphology and treating all common nouns, including those conceptually count, as an unindividuated mass. This study argues that neither of these popular assumptions is true, and presents new generalizations and analyses gained by abandoning them. I claim that no difference exists…

The Early Childhood Development Manager in Mpumalanga is faced with the problem of providing evidence-based guidance of the best facilitation approach in the Grade R context. An investigation on the effect of facilitation, i.e. play-based or formal instruction, on Grade R performance scores in English Additional Language (EAL) learning was…

This article presents and analyses a classroom-based assessment method to test students' speaking skills in a variety of professional settings in tourism. The assessment system has been implemented in the Communication in English for Tourism course, as part of the Tourism Management degree programme, at Florida Universitaria (affiliated to the…