Doctoral Degrees (General Linguistics)
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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (General Linguistics) by browse.metadata.advisor "Oosthuizen, Johan"
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- ItemThe acquisition of (in)definiteness in English as a foreign language by Tanzanian L1 Swahili secondary school learners(2016-12) Kimambo, Gerald Eliniongoze; Conradie, Simone; Oosthuizen, Johan; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.AFRIKAANS OPSOMMING: Die studie waaroor in hierdie proefskrif gerapporteer word, het ondersoek ingestel na die verwerwing van (on)bepaaldheid in Engels as Vreemde Taal (EVT) deur hoërskoolleerders met Swahili as eerstetaal (T1) in Tanzanië. Dit het gefokus op (i) die anaforiese, assosiatiewe en ensiklopediese kontekste (vir bepaaldheid), (ii) die eerste-verwysing, ondeursigtige en deursigtige kontekste (vir onbepaaldheid), en (iii) die gebruik van lidwoorde in spesifieke en nie-spesifieke kontekste, in geskrewe sowel as gesproke taal. Alhoewel Engels in Tanzanië die onderrigmedium is vanaf hoërskoolvlak, is dit steeds ‘n vreemde taal. Gevolglik ontvang meeste leerders slegs blootstelling aan Engels in die EVTklaskamer, en sukkel meeste EVT-onderwysers self met Engels (Qorro, 2006). Dit is dus nie verbasend dat hierdie leerders (onder andere) Engelse lidwoorde op nie-teikenagtige wyses gebruik nie. Die studie het ten doel gehad om vas te stel watter kontekste van die Engelse lidwoordstelsel op nie-teikenagtige wyses gebruik word deur Swahili-sprekende EVTleerders en om, gebasseer op die bevindings, voorstelle te maak aan EVT-onderwysers in Tanzanië aangaande watter kontekste spesiale pedagogiese aandag benodig. Terwyl Engels grammatikale bepaaldheid aandui deur sy lidwoordstelsel, dui Swahili semanties-pragmatiese bepaaldheid aan deur die konteks van interaksie. Om hierdie rede kon data van Swahili-sprekende EVT-leerders gebruik word om in die huidige studie die Lidwoordkeuse Parameter (Ionin, Ko & Wexler, 2004), die Fluktuasie Hipotese (ibid.), die Sintaktiese Misanalise Verklaring (Trenkic, 2007) en die Ontbrekende Oppervlaksinfleksie Hipotese (Prévost & White, 2000) aan te spreek. Gebaseer op ‘n kruislinguistiese analise van Engels en Swahili, was die spesifieke voorspellings dat Swahili-sprekende EVT-leerders lidwoorde sou weglaat op die elementêre vaardigheidsvlak, en dat hulle sou fluktueer tussen bepaaldheid en spesifiekheid op die intermediêre vaardigheidsvlak. Die gemengde-metodes studie waaroor gerapporteer word in hierdie proefskrif het die insameling behels van (i) kwantitatiewe data van 163 Swahilisprekende EVT-leerders deur middel van ‘n aanvaarbaarheidsoordeletaak, ‘n geforseerdekeuse-ontlokkingstaak en ‘n prentjie-beskrywingstaak, en (ii) kwalitatiewe data van 10 EVTonderwysers deur middel van semi-gestruktureerde onderhoude. ‘n Analise van die kwantitatiewe data het aangedui dat die leerders die blotenaamwoordfrase-struktuur van hul T1 Swahili oorgedra het en ‘naamwoord+voornaamwoord’-afparings gebruik het om bepaaldheid aan te dui in Engels, Stellenbosch University https://scholar.sun.ac.za v meestal op die elementêre vaardigheidsvlak. Hulle het ook gefluktueer tussen bepaaldheid en spesifiekheid. Wat die bogenoemde kontekste betref, het nie-teikenagtige taalgebruik meer voorgekom by die gebruik van die onbepaalde lidwoord, die anaforiese gebruik van die bepaalde lidwoord en die nie-deursigtige gebruik van die onbepaalde lidwoord, as by ander kontekste. Die onderhoud-data het gewys dat meeste van die onderwysers nie ‘n voldoende vlak van vaardigheid gehad het in Engels nie, en ook nie voldoende opleiding in die implementering van die huidige kurrikulum of kundigheid in die onderrig van die lidwoordstelsel op ‘n kommunikatiewe wyse nie. Die bevindings van die huidige studie dui op die noodsaaklikheid daarvan om die taal-in-onderrig beleid te hersien en om te verseker dat onderwysers opleiding ontvang in die implementering van die kurrikulum en in die gebruik van die Fokusop-Vorm benadering. Die studie sluit af met ‘n paar spesifieke voorstelle vir EVT-onderwysers in Tanzanië aangaande die onderrig van die Engelse lidwoordstelsel aan hulle Swahili-sprekende leerders.
- ItemInterrogating China’s approach to relations with sub-Saharan Africa in official documents (2000-2010) through critical discourse analysis(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2013-12) Ndenguino-Mpira, Hermanno; Oosthuizen, Johan; Anthonissen, Christine; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: China‘s rise as an economic superpower has had important consequences for its relations with African countries over the past 10-15 years. Not only were these relations thoroughly reviewed and significantly increased, but China also adopted a new cooperation policy that its administration describes as being based on mutual benefits and win-win economic collaboration. However, there is a sceptical public opinion in Africa and also in some developed countries about China‘s current engagement with African countries, and in particular with countries from the sub-Saharan region. In fact, China is frequently accused of acting as a new colonizing power and of increasing its relations with African countries simply as a strategy to achieve higher power-politics status and to structure a new global economic order. The present study addresses the question of whether China‘s official discourse about its relations with sub-Saharan African countries from 2000 to 2010 contains any grounds for the sceptical public opinion mentioned above. In more concrete terms, the main objective of the study is to determine from a linguistic perspective, and more specifically from a critical discourse analysis point of view, whether there are any overt or covert messages of power and ideology in China‘s discourse to sub-Saharan African countries which could justify the sceptical public opinion about China‘s current engagement in this part of the continent . The texts representing China‘s discourse about its relations with sub-Saharan African countries that are examined for this study comprise official speeches, statements, and other related official documents delivered by Chinese officials in the period 2000-2010, and published in English on the websites of various institutions, including China‘s official websites. These texts are examined from within the framework of the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA) as set out by, specifically, Wodak (2001a). The texts are analysed using the DHA three-dimensional procedure consisting of (i) identifying the Content(s) and Topic(s) of the specific discourse, (ii) investigating the discursive strategies used in the specific texts, and (iii) analysing the linguistic means and the specific context-dependent linguistic realizations. On the one hand, the analysis of the Discourse Topics indicates that the relations between China and sub-Saharan African countries are grounded in China‘s pluralist approach to international affairs. From this perspective, then, it could be argued that China‘s current engagement in sub-Saharan Africa does not warrant the sceptical public opinion mentioned earlier. On the other hand, however, the analysis of the discursive strategies used to represent China and sub-Saharan African countries, indicates that such sceptisism is likely warranted. The relations between China and African countries have predominantly been investigated from economic and political perspectives. However, the manner in which these relations are expressed, implied, negotiated, interpreted, distributed, etc. in discourse has not yet received any systematic attention. The present study was therefore undertaken to contribute, from a linguistic perspective, to the knowledge of and the debate about China‘s current engagement in Africa.
- ItemThe role of input in the early trilingual acquisition of English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2014-12) Potgieter, Anneke Perold; Conradie, Simone; Gruter, T.; Oosthuizen, Johan; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General LinguisticsENGLISH ABSTRACT: The study investigates the acquisition of vocabulary and passive constructions by 11 four-year-old children simultaneously acquiring South African English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa in low socio-economic status areas in South Africa, with specific focus on the role that input plays in this process. Input is measured in terms of quantity of exposure (at the time of testing and cumulatively over time) and in terms of quality (as determined by the proficiency levels of the speaker(s) providing the input). Results revealed a significant positive correlation between input and proficiency levels in the case of all three the trilinguals’ languages. The interaction between these variables seems to be narrower at lower levels of input, and the effect of reduced quantity of exposure stronger in the case of lexical development than in grammatical development. The proficiency levels of the early developing trilinguals are furthermore compared to those of 10 age-matched monolingual controls for each language. Trilinguals are found to be monolingual-like in their lexical development in the language to which, on average, they have been exposed most over time, i.e. isiXhosa. Thus, as previously found for bilingual development, necessarily reduced quantity of exposure does not hinder lexical development in the input dominant language. Whilst the trilinguals lag behind monolinguals significantly in terms of lexical development in their languages of less exposure, no developmental delay is found in their acquisition of the passive, regardless of the language of testing. This is despite their lower lexical proficiency in English and Afrikaans and their lesser amount of exposure to all three their languages. Although the passive is considered a typically later-developing construction type across languages, research has shown it to be acquired earlier in Bantu languages (of which isiXhosa is an example) than in Germanic languages such as English and Dutch (from which Afrikaans stems). Consequently, the fact that the trilinguals do not exhibit delay in their acquisition of the passive, despite sometimes drastically reduced levels of input, is interpreted as evidence of cross-linguistic bootstrapping: trilinguals seem to be transferring their knowledge of the passive in isiXhosa to English and Afrikaans, enabling the earlier acquisition of this construction in the latter two languages. The study is the first on the trilingual acquisition of English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa by young children, and will hopefully encourage additional research on multilingual language acquisition within the African context.
- ItemSpelling out P: a unified syntax of Afrikaans adpositions and V-particles(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2017-12) Pretorius, Erin; Biberauer, Theresa; Corver, Norbert; Oosthuizen, Johan; Van Koppen, Marjo; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Elements of language that are typically considered to have P (i.e. adpositional) category status frequently exhibit divergent morphosyntactic properties, and it is often the case that one and the same element exhibits divergent morphosyntactic properties. Such elements are syncretic. An important fact about syncretism is that it poses a challenge to the ontologically primitive syntactic category. With a concentrated focus on the Afrikaans spatial P domain, this dissertation develops a system in which observed patterns of syncretism fall out naturally from (i) the fine-grained cartographic structure of the non-primitive P domain, (ii) the “shape” of the formal featural specification on particular (classes of) P elements, and (iii) a theory of how lexical material is matched and inserted to express syntactic structure. In this system, syntactic categories are not ontologically primitive but are composite syntactic objects consisting of (overlapping) sets of hierarchically structured formal features. Category effects – all the morphosyntactic characteristics associated with a particular category – arise as epiphenomena of the particular set of features that an element lexicalises at a particular insertion site. As the book progresses, it is demonstrated how all the language-internal variation in expressions containing P elements – simplex and complex prepositional phrases, circumpositional phrases, doubling adpositional phrases, and particle verbs with P-based particles – can be derived from the same basic structure. On the proposed analysis, category boundaries are non-discreet and may be spanned by individual lexical items, accounting for the multiple macro-category membership of some P elements using precisely the same mechanisms that account for multiple micro-category membership.
- ItemThe use of multilingual glossaries in enhancing the academic achievement of Extended Degree Programme students in a mainstream subject(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2016-12) Jonker, Anita; Oosthuizen, Johan; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: One of the explanations for South African students’ poor performance at university, is the apparent mismatch or discontinuity between the exit level of secondary education and the entry level of higher education – the so-called articulation gap. In addition to the articulation gap that has to be bridged, South African universities are faced with the specific challenge that students increasingly have to learn through the medium of English, which is often not their first language or a language in which they are sufficiently proficient. While students’ poor performance at university cannot be attributed to learning in an additional language as such, it becomes an aggravating factor when these students also come from educationally, socially and/or historically disadvantaged backgrounds. The current study was done in the Extended Degree Programme (EDP) in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Stellenbosch University which makes provision inter alia for students from disadvantaged backgrounds, who often have to learn in an additional language. The research problem that gave rise to this specific study was the marked discrepancy over an extended period between EDP students’ pass rates in their mainstream subjects compared to their mainstream peers in the same period. A limited set of data indicated that students performed better in their EDP support subject, Introduction to the Humanities, when they were explicitly taught and assessed on the technical terminology of a new subject field. The current study aimed to establish through a formal empirical investigation whether systematic exposure to the multilingual subject-specific terminology of a mainstream discipline can also help to improve EDP students’ pass rates in that discipline. In addition, it aimed to identify strategies to enhance these students’ experience of success. The study was done within the critical realist paradigm which acknowledges that there are events and discourses that generate the reality of the social world. In terms of this epistemology we can only change the social world if we identify the structures that gave rise to dominant events and discourses. Once we identify these structures and change them, we can counteract inequality and injustice. Before the formal study was done in two Political Science mainstream modules, the English glossaries of the two prescribed textbooks were translated into Afrikaans and isiXhosa. EDP students with Political Science as mainstream subject were invited to attend weekly technical terminology tutorials for two terms. The teaching was aligned with the teaching and learning frameworks of the two separate Political Science modules and was based on the translated trilingual Political Science glossaries. After the intervention the EDP focus group module averages were on a par with those of mainstream students and the EDP focus group’s pass rates in both Political Science modules not only surpassed those of the control group of the same year, but were also higher than the pass rates of the mainstream students in 2013. It therefore seemed from the results of the quantitative analysis that the technical terminology intervention based on the trilingual Political Science glossaries had a positive result on EDP students’ pass rates. The qualitative study analysed the two Political Science module frameworks, semi-structured interviews with the lecturers; student questionnaires before and after the technical terminology intervention, EDP students’ written essays, as well as the test and examination papers of the two Political Science modules to establish whether students’ improved pass rates were also reflected in their experience of success. The triangulation of the results of the quantitative and qualitative analyses, showed that the qualitative analyses seemed to corroborate the results of the quantitative study. The findings of the current study thus support the hypothesis that multilingual technical (subject-specific) terminological interventions can play a significant role in improving EDP students’ pass rates in their mainstream subjects, as well as their experience of success, especially when it forms an integral part of the mainstream curriculum.