5Dec 2021
00:00 UTC
#linguistweets
#abralin

Program

5Dec 2021 21:00 UTC Local time *

O contato linguístico entre o português e o nheengatu

A pesquisa investiga os efeitos do contato linguístico entre o português e o nheengatú na cidade de São Gabriel da Cachoeira (AM). A partir de dados históricos e linguísticos, mostramos como tal contato pode ter transformado estruturas do português falado na Amazônia.

Esta pesquisa de mestrado, cujo projeto acaba de ser publicado pela revista Cadernos de Linguística, pretende investigar os efeitos do contato linguístico entre o nheengatu, língua indígena da família Tupi-Guarani, e o português brasileiro falado na cidade de São Gabriel da Cachoeira (AM). Com base na teoria da evolução linguística, da ecologia do contato e da seleção e competição de traços desenvolvida por Mufwene (2001, 2008) e da coleta de dados por meio de trabalho de campo, a intenção é identificar mudanças nas estruturas morfossintáticas do Português L1 ou L2 falado pelos habitantes da região, bilíngues em português e nheengatu. Versão moderna da língua geral amazônica, o nheengatu foi a língua franca e majoritária da província do Amazonas até o final do século XIX, sendo amplamente utilizado por todos os membros do sistema colonial. Hoje, é restrito a algumas comunidades amazônicas – como as da região de São Gabriel da Cachoeira, no Alto Rio Negro – e falado principalmente pelos povos Baré, Baniwa e Warekena, em substituição ou junto às suas línguas tradicionais. A atual situação de contato entre o nheengatu e o português e a ecologia multilíngue da região de São Gabriel não se dissociam da história de formação, expansão e retração da língua geral amazônica durante a colonização do Brasil – motivo pelo qual também propomos, além da análise linguística per se dos dados sincrônicos, lançar um olhar para essa história.

During centuries an indigenous language called Língua Geral Amazônica was the main language of the Amazon region, despite Portuguese colonization. The history of LGA is also a history of contact between those two languages. Follow me on #linguistweets #TW2100 to learn more 🧵👇
5Dec 2021 21:15 UTC Local time *

Shifting clause-type distributions in Turkishes

Onur Özsoy (Leibniz-ZAS)

Langs combine clauses via subordination and coordination. Turkey Turkishes prefer non-finite subordination. However heritage Turkishes in Germany and the US prioritize finite coordination. Why? Because of lang-internal socioling factors opposed to lang-external contact factors.

Clause-combining mechanisms structure narrations and make them comprehensible to other interlocutors. More precisely, languages usually have a dominant clause-combining strategy, either hypotaxis via subordination or parataxis via coordination. Within Turkishes, monolinguals and heritage speakers seem to prefer different clause-combining strategies, with hypotaxis for monolingual Turkishes and parataxis for heritage Turkishes. We try to understand the driving factors behind changing clause-combining strategies in Turkishes. Generally, these changes are attributed to factors which can be language-internal (e.g., grammar) or language-external (e.g., language contact). We test if language-internal factors, specifically sociolinguistic variables and grammatical aspect, affect the use of parataxis. One way to achieve parataxis in Turkishes is by means of temporal connectors like o anda ‘that moment’ and ondan sonra ‘that after’. Therefore, we investigate the use of temporal connectors in a mid-sized systematic corpus of semi-naturalistic narrations of Turkish in Germany, the U.S., and Turkey; the RUEG corpus. Our results show that the (heritage) variety of Turkish (USA vs. Germany), age (adolescents vs. adults), register (informal vs. formal), and mode (spoken vs. written) all have a significant effect on the use of temporal connectors. We conclude that heritage speakers in Germany and the USA use temporal connectors more frequently, because they mostly communicate in informal, spoken settings, compared to monolinguals who use Turkish in written, formal settings too. These findings support the claim that the preference for parataxis in heritage Turkish is based on language-internal dynamics in Turkish, and not on language contact with German and English. Our study backs up other studies which observed shifts in clause-type preference in other heritage languages, and provides insights into the dynamics of and behind language change.

#linguistweets #TW2115. Hoşgeldin! 2 questions: 1. How do you combine sentences/clauses? (answer posts ⬇️) 2. Where is Turkish spoken? Mainly in 🇹🇷 (~80 mio people)! Where else? Most of the Global North has some Turkish speakers! We focus on 🇩🇪 (>2 mio) and 🇺🇸 (>300k) ✨   1/6 https://t.co/N8HLhRW9d1
5Dec 2021 21:30 UTC Local time *

Are facial gestures relevant to infer meanings?

Paloma Cardoso (UFS)

Co-author: Raquel Freitag (UFS)

“Eu acho que” can indicate certainty, doubt, and uncertainty. The data we present suggest that, besides its linguistic and acoustic properties, the meanings indicated by “eu acho que” also have gestural particularities: certainty is defined by a neutral facial expression, doubt and uncertainty, by the contraction of eyebrows and mouth.

In Brazilian Portuguese, “(eu) acho que” is a construction grammaticalized as a discourse marker with a range of epistemic meanings which may indicate certainty, doubt and uncertainty. Certain linguistic features are associated with each one of them, such as the kind of complement introduced by “(eu) acho que” and the engagement of the speaker (direct, indirect) with what is said. From an acoustic point of view, sentences that indicate doubt and uncertainty have higher values fundamental frequency (F0), intensity, duration, presence of silent or filled pauses, unlike those that indicate certainty. These meanings are also differentiated by body gestures: certainty is characterized by a neutral facial expression, while uncertainty is characterized by the contraction of eyebrows and mouth. We propose an integrative approach among linguistic, prosodic and gestural features, seeking association between these features and the meanings indicated by “(eu) acho que” in Brazilian Portuguese. The effect of linguistic features (type of occurrence, scope, presence of another modal particle, discursive topic, type of experience), acoustic parameters (fundamental frequency, intensity, duration, presence of silent and filled pauses) and facial gestures (movements that indicate anger, mockery, disgust, fear, happiness, neutrality, sadness and surprise) were correlated to the meanings indicated by “(eu) acho que”. Data sample is constituted by 30 sociolinguistic interviews with undergraduates from Sergipe, Brazil (n = 1038). Chi-square tests suggested association between the meaning of “(eu) acho que”, type of occurrence, scope, discursive topic and the engagement of the speakers. For the acoustic variables, analysis of variance indicated a significant effect of intensity and duration: to demonstrate doubt and uncertainty, the pronunciation of “(eu) acho que” was stronger and longer. These two meanings presented gestural correlates: when doubtful and uncertain, the speakers contracted their eyebrows and mouth (movements of expressions of surprise and sadness), results that suggest the potential of studies that include facial gestures in the analysis of inference of meanings.

Facial gestures are relevant to infer meanings. During an interaction, we manipulate prosodic features (fundamental frequency (f0), intensity, duration) and facial gestures to infer meanings indicated by ambiguous constructions like (eu) acho que. 1/6 #linguistweets #TW2130 https://t.co/3TLzuL8dLy
5Dec 2021 21:45 UTC Local time *

‘Consider’, Subjectivity, and Ideal Disagreement

Anthony Nguyen (University of Southern California)

After presenting some data, I argue against the three proposed semantics for ‘consider’ in the literature. I will then argue that a semantics that appeals to the metaphysical notion of grounding can capture the data while avoiding the problems faced by the existing proposals.

The subjective attitude verb ‘consider’ has been understudied. But its semantics can illuminate the semantics of ‘find’, the nature of subjective belief, and the phenomenon of faultless disagreement.

‘Consider’ requires belief in the prejacent, but also requires it to be subjective. However, ‘consider’ tracks a broader form of subjectivity than the subjective attitude verb ‘find’:

(1) a. I believe 2 is even.
b. #I consider 2 (to be) even.
c. #I find 2 (to be) even.

(2) a. I believe mushrooms are tasty.
b. I consider mushrooms (to be) tasty.
c. I find mushrooms (to be) tasty.

(3) a. I believe racehorses are athletes.
b. I consider racehorses (to be) athletes.
c. #I find racehorses (to be) athletes.

I argue that the notion of subjectivity that ‘consider’ tracks is idealized disagreement. Intuitively, a sentence or small clause S displays idealized disagreement arises when two agents with “the right kind” of evidence can rationally disagree over whether S is true. I call this right kind of evidence ‘canonical evidence’. For any particular sentence, I diagnose its canonical evidence using familiarity inferences, inferences that the relevant attitude holder has certain evidence when it is embedded under ‘consider’. For example, ‘Mushrooms are tasty’ has the familiarity inference in (4a). This result is evidenced by the infelicity (4b):

(4) a. I have tasted mushrooms before.
b. #I consider mushrooms tasty, but I have never tasted mushrooms before.

On my view, ‘consider’ therefore tracks an intuitive notion of subjectivity, on which the (canonical) evidence underdetermines a unique rational position on whether a sentence is true.

My formal account of the semantics of ‘consider’ is one on which ‘consider’ has the at-issue/truth-conditional meaning meaning of ‘believe’ but presupposes two things. First, it presupposes that its prejacent displays idealized disagreement. Second, it presupposes that the relevant agent, the type e argument of ‘consider’, has canonical evidence on the prejacent.

‘Consider’ is a subjective attitude verb. It is stronger than ‘believe’ but weaker than ‘find’: (1) a. I believe 2 is even. b. # I consider 2 even. c. # I find 2 even. (2) a. I believe fish is tasty. b. I consider fish tasty. c. I find fish tasty. #linguistweets #TW2145
5Dec 2021 22:00 UTC Local time *

Reflexive anaphors in Turkish aphasia

Seçkin Arslan (University of Groningen)

Co-authors: Seckin, Arslan (University of Groningen), Semra, Selvi Balo (Anadolu Universitesi), İlknur, Maviş (Anadolu Universitesi)

Turkish has two types of reflexive pronouns: kendi and kendisi (oneself), which show a flexible binding relationship referring to local and non-local referents. This study looks at how reflexives are processed in Turkish aphasia (an acquired language disorder) using an eye-tracking experiment.

Aphasia is an acquired language impairment. People with aphasia (PWA) are often impaired in processing pronouns (i.e. he/she). Unlike many languages, Turkish has two types of reflexives: kendi and kendisi (both ‘oneself’), which show a flexible binding relationship referring to local and non-local referents. In this study, a group of Turkish speaking PWA and a control group were recruited for an eye-movement monitoring experiment. The participants listened to a set of sentences with kendi and kendisi in local and non-local conditions while they gazed at visually depicted portrays of potential referents. The results have shown that the PWA strongly considered non-local referents for both the reflexive conditions while controls preferred a local reading for kendi but not for kendisi. For kendi reflexives, PWA’ s target fixations to both local and non-local referents were reduced as compared to the controls. For kendisi reflexives, however, controls fixated on the non-local referents more often than PWA. It seems as though locality constraints on Turkish reflexive anaphors are loosely applied in aphasic sentence comprehension.

#linguistweets #TW2200 Reflexive anaphors in Turkish aphasia 1/6 🧵 @ilknurmavis @semra_selvi Aphasia is an acquired language impairment. People with aphasia (PWA) are often impaired in comprehnding and producing pronouns (he/she/it etc). (Resarch funded by @MSCActions)👇 https://t.co/uylFynN4g3
5Dec 2021 22:30 UTC Local time *

La argumentación en redes sociales durante la pandemia

Ana Slimovich (CONICET-UBA-IIGG)

The objective is to investigate, from a socio-semiotic perspective, the mediatization of the discourse of the Argentine president, Alberto Fernández, on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, in 2020 and 2021.

El objetivo es indagar en la mediatización del discurso del presidente argentino, Alberto Fernández, en Twitter, Facebook e Instagram desde su asunción en diciembre de 2019 hasta fines de 2020—con el marco de la expansión de la pandemia por COVID-19— . Utilizando herramental sociosemiótico, de las teorías de la argumentación y de la mediatización de la política, se realiza un análisis de variantes e invariantes en las formas de la argumentación y mediatización, antes y durante el brote.

1/6 ¿Hay argumentación en las redes sociales? ¿Cómo se despliegan en Twitter, Facebook, Instagram hoy en las redes presidenciales? “La mediatización política durante la pandemia por COVID-19” https://t.co/rkb5w5u8kW #linguistweets #TW2230 #argumentacionenredes
5Dec 2021 22:45 UTC Local time *

How Tourism Students Respond to Online Complaints

Rebeca Company Almagro (US/Leuphana Universität Lüneburg)

This preliminary study analyzes how a group of students taking the course of English I for the Tourism Industry at Universidad de Sevilla give a reply to two online complaints from TripAdvisor (Vásquez 2011; Zhang & Vásquez 2014; Ho 2017a, 2019b).

As future professionals of the service sector, students majoring in Tourism will be in contact with people from all over the world during their career. As a result, they need to be able to adequately perform in their L2 English in very specific professional settings. One of these settings is that of mediated service encounters in the hospitality industry. In the recent years, there has been a tendency on the part of hotels to handle customers’ complaints online, instead of orally and on-site (Gu & Ye 2014). This is due to the fact that platforms such as TripAdvisor have gained popularity over the last twenty years. For this, students of English for the Tourism Industry need to master how to handle complaints online.

This preliminary study analyzes how a group of students taking the course of English I for the Tourism Industry at Universidad de Sevilla give a reply to two online complaints from TripAdvisor (Vásquez 2011; Zhang & Vásquez 2014; Ho 2017a, 2019b). In order to collect the necessary data, a simulation of this type of mediated service encounter was designed. The simulation included two types of negative complaints from TripAdvisor and a space for the participants’ responses. The analysis centers on the moves selected (Davidow 2003; Levy et al. 2013; Sparks & Bradley 2014) and the sequence in which they are used (Ho 2017a; 2017b), and ultimately compares results with previous research on the review response genre (Ho 2017a).

As future professionals of the sector, Tourism students need to adequately perform in their #L2English in very specific professional settings. This study examines how Spanish Tourism students reply to #OnlineComplaints. How will they do so? Let’s find out! #Linguistweets #TW2245
5Dec 2021 23:00 UTC Local time *

Predicate order and coherence in copredication

Elliot Murphy (UTHealth)

I argue that predicate order and coherence relations are the two major determining factors in copredication licensing, resolving a long-standing puzzle over the criteria for constructing acceptable copredications.

The effects of predicate ordering are claimed to be anchored around semantic complexity, such that copredications with semantically Simple–Complex predicate orderings are more acceptable than the reverse. This motivates a parsing bias, termed Incremental Semantic Complexity. The effect of predicate coherence is claimed to be anchored around a sense of causality and featural commonality.

#linguistweets #TW2300 Predicate order impacts copredication acceptability. 1/8🧵 Consider: a. The White House is being repainted and issued a statement concerning taxes. b. # The White House issued a statement concerning taxes and is being repainted. (Research funded by @ESRC) https://t.co/QSqidT8o9g
5Dec 2021 23:15 UTC Local time *

Innovative copular sentences in American Spanish

Norberto Moreno (Universidad de Alcalá-UAH)

Co-authors: Isabel, Pérez-Jiménez (Universidad de Alcalá), Silvia, Gumiel-Molina (Universidad de Alcalá)

Aesthetic adjectives in predications with estar («el poema está bello»/’The poem is(ESTAR) beautiful’) are an innovative feature of American Spanish. A geographically conditioned argument augmentation of certain classes of adjectives explains this perspectivized copula use.

Spanish has a bicopular system, where the copula ser (‘be-ser’) expresses individual-level predications (1), whereas the copula estar (‘be-estar’) expresses stage-level predications, where stages of the subject are compared with respect to the property (2). Examples includes aesthetic adjectives: (1) …y eso no cambia, Cuba es bella naturalmente, sus culturas, sus creencias, su tradición, sus comidas típicas… (CU, blogcip.cu) (2) …planificado para 7 meses, se ejecutó en 8 meses, una espera que realmente valió la pena porque nuestra Plaza Bolívar está más bella que nunca, para darle una mejor cara a la ciudad… (VE, alcaldiadevalencia.gob.ve) In American Spanish varieties (except in the Rioplatense area) estar-sentences have an additional ‘innovative’ use, (3). In innovative examples, stages of the subject are not compared. These examples express a perspectivized assertion: the attribution of the property to the subject at the speech-time is presented as a subjective judgment of the speaker. (3) el poema que más le gustó fue El cuarteto de Pompeya que habla del amor carnal entre un hombre y una mujer, porque está sumamente bello el poema, amén de erótico, pero a lo que me refiero es a la belleza con que Morábito trata una cuestión erótica… (Mx, diarioavanzada.com.mx) Aesthetic adjectives are considered to be the third most frequently found class in this context (behind age and size adjectives), however, they have not received a specific study. The talk offers brand-new data comparing the frequency and extension of aesthetic adjectives in standard vs. innovative estar sentences in the different varieties of American Spanish. Naturalistic data including the adjectives bello, bonito, feo, guapo, hermoso, horrible, precioso (‘beautiful, pretty, ugly, good-looking, handsome, beautiful, horrible, beautiful’) has been obtained from the American Spanish Web 2011 (esamTenTen11) corpus using the Sketch Engine tool. From the theoretical point of view, the paper aims to explain the occurrence of aesthetic adjectives in standard vs. innovative predications with estar, as well as the relevance found of the semantic type of subject of predication in obtaining a perspectivized judgment, on the grounds of the proposal developed in Gumiel-Molina, Moreno-Quibén and Pérez-Jiménez (2020), according to which, innovative estar sentences contain adjectives with an experiencer in their argument structure. The geographically conditioned argument augmentation of certain classes of adjectives results in perspectivized predications with estar, since the experiencer is the entity that provides stages to be compared, as required by the copula.

You have to describe the impact that a portrait has made on you. If you speak a certain American variety of Spanish, you will describe it as «El cuadro está bello» ("It ESTÁ/is very nice") in the perspectivized/innovative use of estar @SilviaGumiel 1/6 #linguistweets #TW2315
5Dec 2021 23:30 UTC Local time *

Entre tempo e modo: escolhas motivadas em uma narrativa escolar

Mafalda Mendes (CELGA-ILTEC (UC))

Co-author: Mário Martins (UFERSA)

Analisamos as escolhas dêiticas modais e temporais em textos de alunos do quarto ano de escolaridade. Os resultados atestam hesitação entre modalidade hipotética e padrões mistos (temporal/hipotético). A hesitação dos alunos parece não se dever à falta de recursos linguísticos, mas à estranheza da tarefa proposta.

Este artigo pretende apresentar uma pesquisa sobre as escolhas dêiticas modais e temporais em textos produzidos por alunos do quarto ano da escolaridade básica numa prova de avaliação de Língua Portuguesa, de âmbito nacional, no ano de 2008, em Portugal. Todos os textos foram obtidos a partir de provas classificadas com nota máxima. Os textos foram produzidos em resposta a uma tarefa escrita subordinada ao título “Se eu fosse um … por um dia”, que orientou os alunos para a produção de narrativas hipotéticas. Na literatura especializada sobre o desenvolvimento linguístico de crianças e adolescentes em idade escolar, as construções linguísticas que realizam a referência hipotética são descritas como indicadores de um estádio de maturidade da escrita normalmente atingido nos últimos anos de escolaridade. Adota-se para o estudo o quadro teórico da linguística sistémico-funcional, que entende a língua como um sistema sociossemiótico para a realização do sistema sociossemiótico da cultura. As gramáticas descritivas do português são utilizadas para a descrição do sistema verbal. O corpus é constituído por cinquenta textos, anotados com informação de morfologia verbal e de escolhas dêiticas. Os resultados atestam diferentes padrões de escolhas dêiticas nos textos dos alunos, variando entre textos inteiramente construídos no eixo da temporalidade; textos inteiramente construídos no eixo da modalidade hipotética; e textos que apresentam padrões mistos no que concerne a estas escolhas. Já que os alunos evidenciam ser capazes de utilizar com correção os recursos lexicogramaticais adequados à construção da modalidade hipotética, os resultados sugerem que a dificuldade encontrada por esses alunos no desenvolvimento coerente dos textos pode dever-se não tanto à indisponibilidade de recursos linguísticos, mas à falta de exposição das crianças a esse tipo de atividade sociossemiótica, razão por que não se encontra disponível no potencial de significação desenvolvido pelas crianças do quarto ano.

Quando usamos a língua para referir eventos, temos 2 escolhas na deixis interpessoal: localizá-los no tempo ou no espaço de modalidade subjetiva. O que escolheram fazer os alunos do 4.ºano na tarefa de escrita no exame de português “Se eu fosse um...”? #linguistweets #TW2330 https://t.co/C5UVXcuNfm
5Dec 2021 23:45 UTC Local time *

PEDAGOGIA DA REBELDIA E O ENLEITURAMENTO

Rosemary Lapa (PPGEDUC-UNEB)

Uma Pedagogia da Rebeldia é capaz de dar conta de formar leitores críticos. Toda essa discussão se funda em pesquisa realizada em estudos de doutoramento e refletem numa educação para a cidadania de forma crítica e autônoma, ampliando conhecimento de mundo.

Esse modo de ver a leitura e a práxis pedagógica, a qual estamos chamando de rebelde, tensiona tratar quem lê como sujeito e a leitura como interação, provocando a autonomia pregada por Freire, considerando que a leitura é o caminho privilegiado da formação cidadã. Para o alcance de tal situação, a leitura precisa ser pensada para além da decodificação, ou seja, o conhecimento das letras, da relação sonora que estabelecem para reproduzir palavras. É preciso, então, tratar a leitura como forma de apreensão do mundo, no entanto, essa interação necessita de uma mediação intencional, que podemos chamar de enleituramento, em que se emprega pequeno esforço na decifração e que supõe um leitor crítico e texto otimizado, pois engloba questões linguístico-gramaticais perceptíveis na materialidade do texto escrito e que geram ampliação de atribuições de sentidos aos textos e intertextualidades ampliadas. Tal concepção é baseada nas afirmações de Bakhtin sobre a língua e sua natureza social, portanto, ideológica, não existindo fora do contexto social, produto da interação de indivíduos socialmente organizados, pois qualquer enunciado sobre um objeto relaciona-se com enunciados anteriores produzidos sobre esse mesmo objeto. Considerando que todo discurso é fundamentalmente diálogo, defende-se, neste texto, que uma Pedagogia da Rebeldia seja capaz de dar conta do processo de enleituramento do indivíduo que aprende, fomentando as características que lhe dão ancoragem. Toda essa discussão se ancora em pesquisa realizada em estudos de doutoramento e refletem na elaboração do livro Pedagogia da Rebeldia e o Enleituramento.

1.A práxis pedagógica da rebeldia (PR) tenciona tratar quem lê como sujeito e a leitura como interação, provocando a autonomia pregada por Paulo Freire, considerando que a leitura é o caminho privilegiado da formação cidadã. #linguistweets, #tw2345