Troy McConachy: Developing Intercultural Perspectives on Language Use: Exploring Pragmatics and Culture in Foreign Language Learning

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 437-443
Author(s):  
Qin Zhou ◽  
Liang Chen
Pragmatics ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-227
Author(s):  
Chad Nilep

Ethnographic study of Hippo Family Club, a foreign language learning club in Japan with chapters elsewhere, reveals a critique of foreign language teaching in Japanese schools and in the commercial English conversation industry. Club members contrast their own learning methods, which they view as “natural language acquisition”, with the formal study of grammar, which they see as uninteresting and ineffective. Rather than evaluating either the Hippo approach to learning or the teaching methods they criticize, however, this paper considers the ways of thinking about language that club members come to share. Members view the club as a transnational organization that transcends the boundaries of the nation-state. Language learning connects the club members to a cosmopolitan world beyond the club, even before they interact with speakers of the languages they are learning. The analysis of club members’ ideologies of language and language learning illuminates not only the pragmatics of language use, but practices and outcomes of socialization and shared social structures.


Author(s):  
Edit H. Kontra ◽  
Kata Csizér

Abstract The aim of this study is to point out the relationship between foreign language learning motivation and sign language use among hearing impaired Hungarians. In the article we concentrate on two main issues: first, to what extent hearing impaired people are motivated to learn foreign languages in a European context; second, to what extent sign language use in the classroom as well as outside school shapes their level of motivation. The participants in our research were 331 Deaf and hard of hearing people from all over Hungary. The instrument of data collection was a standardized questionnaire. Our results support the notion that sign language use helps foreign language learning. Based on the findings, we can conclude that there is indeed no justification for further neglecting the needs of Deaf and hard of hearing people as foreign language learners and that their claim for equal opportunities in language learning is substantiated.


2018 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicola McLelland

Abstract Foreign language learning manuals can be valuable sources for the history of pragmatics and historical pragmatics. They may contain explicit guidance on pragmatics not found in native-speaker grammars. For example, accounts of German forms of address in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English–German manuals provide evidence of changing views on the appropriateness of ihr and Sie earlier than does the “native” grammatical tradition. The bilingual model dialogues that are typical of such manuals may also implicitly model appropriate linguistic behaviour, demonstrated here by examining the communicative genre of bargaining in a series of three related English–Dutch language manuals of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Furthermore, the dialogues may provide metalinguistic comment on linguistic behaviour – for example, by criticizing the culture of excessive negative politeness. Such sources can enrich our knowledge of language use and attitudes to language use in the area of politeness, complementing the evidence to be gleaned from mainstream native grammars, civility manuals, merchants’ guides, and the like.


2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 463
Author(s):  
Cathrine Norberg ◽  
Marie Nordlund

Despite the fact that textbooks are central in foreign language learning, only limited research has explored to what extent L2 textbooks support language learning and whether the content in them is relevant from a vocabulary perspective. This study investigates the vocabulary in seven English textbooks used in Swedish primary schools. A corpus has been constructed based on the words in the textbooks. By means of a concordancing software tool, the material has been analyzed by comparing the vocabulary between the books and to words on the New General Service List and in the VP-Kids corpus. The analysis shows that many words in the textbooks occur only occasionally in common everyday language use. It also demonstrates that there is great variation in the number and selection of words across the books indicating that there does not seem to be a common thought behind word selection in textbooks used in Swedish schools.


Author(s):  
Zulfadli Abdul Aziz ◽  
Bukhari Daud ◽  
Syafira Yunidar

There have been many studies on first language interference towards learners’ second or foreign language learning, but not many on the otherwise. This study investigates the effects of learning Japanese as a foreign language towards learners’ first language use, Indonesian. The data for this qualitative study were obtained from five Japanese learners who had different backgrounds of Japanese learning. Observation and interview were used as the research instruments to collect the data in this study. The results were found that the learners showed foreign language effects; grammatical aspects and borrowing. In short, learning a foreign language (FL) influences learners’ first language (L1), which means that learning Japanese language had affected the learners’ first language, Indonesian. It can be concluded that learning a second or foreign language may interfere a learner’s first language.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chad Nilep

preprint version ofNilep, Chad. 2015. Ideologies of Language at Hippo Family Club. Pragmatics 25, 2: 205-227.Ethnographic study of Hippo Family Club, a foreign language learning club in Japan with chapters elsewhere, reveals a critique of foreign language teaching in Japanese schools and in the commercial English conversation industry. Club members contrast their own learning methods, which they view as “natural language acquisition”, with the formal study of grammar, which they see as uninteresting and ineffective. Rather than evaluating either the Hippo approach to learning or the teaching methods they criticize, however, this paper considers the ways of thinking about language that club members come to share. Members view the club as a transnational organization that transcends the boundaries of the nation-state. Language learning connects the club members to a cosmopolitan world beyond the club, even before they interact with speakers of the languages they are learning. The analysis of club members’ ideologies of language and language learning illuminates not only the pragmatics of language use, but practices and outcomes of socialization and shared social structures.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 98-102
Author(s):  
Bui Phu Hung

This paper attempts to make an argument for meaningful learning as an essential factor in the teaching of English as a foreign language. Meaningful learning rests its theories against cognitive processing. While contemporary literature shows knowledge of language in general is essential for second language use, this research is mainly concerned with ways of improving students’ language use. It has proved that meaningful learning facilitates the retention of knowledge as it makes learners organize their knowledge logically. In the classroom, the teacher should offer activities that relate the new input to learners’ existing knowledge, for which cognitive engagement is required. In English language teaching, it is important for teachers to know that learner-centeredness should be applied because they are the ones who process knowledge. This paper begins with an overview of different approaches of foreign language teaching, then presents theories in which meaningful learning is grounded and rooted. The discussion of how one’s knowledge of a first language is essential for foreign language learning is given prior to giving implications of meaningful learning in the Vietnamese context.


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