Browsing Research Articles (General Linguistics) by Title
Now showing items 1-20 of 86
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Afrikaans as an index of identity among Western Cape Coloured Communities
(Department of General Linguistics, Stellenbosch University, 2011)In South Africa, reports on language shift have focused on instances of language shift from indigenous African languages to English. There is, however, also research that suggests that language shift is taking place from ... -
An alternative to the Lewisian view of conventions
(University of Stellenbosch, Department of General Linguistics, 2016)Lewis (1969) characterises conventions as regularities that arise from recurrent coordination games. I argue, contra Lewis, that conventions are rules that promote a relevant goal in virtue of coordinating our behaviour. ... -
Analysing Afrikaans-English bilingual children's conversational code switching
(Deptartment of General Linguistics, Stellenbosch University, 2012)It has been observed that children mix languages more often if they have been exposed to mixed speech, especially if they are in bilingual company. Very little research, however, exists on the code switching (CS) of children ... -
Assessing spoken-language educational interpreting : measuring up and measuring right
(University of Stellenbosch, Department of General Linguistics, 2017)This article, primarily, presents a critical evaluation of the development and refinement of the assessment instrument used to assess formally the spoken-language educational interpreters at Stellenbosch University (SU). ... -
Aviation English in South African airspace
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2013)A lack of English proficiency and failure to use standard phraseology played a role in the world’s largest aviation disaster which occurred in Tenerife in 1977 (Tenerife Information Center 2009). As a result, the crucial ... -
A bidirectional optimality theoretic analysis of multiple negative indefinites in Afrikaans
(Stellenbosch University, Department of Linguistics, 2014)In the literature on negation, Afrikaans is generally categorised as a negative concord language. Unlike most other negative concord languages though, utterances containing multiple indefinites in the scope of negation are ... -
Bilingualism and language shift in Western Cape communities
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2009)This paper considers a number of pertinent sociolinguistic aspects of a distinct process of language shift recently noted in some historically Afrikaans first language (L1) communities established in the Cape Metropolitan ... -
The challenge of linguistic and cultural diversity : does length of experience affect South African speech-language therapists’ management of children with language impairment
(AOSIS Publishing, 2015-02)Background: South African speech-language therapists (SLTs) currently do not reflect the country’s linguistic and cultural diversity. The question arises as to who might be better equipped currently to provide services to ... -
Child language assessment and intervention in multilingual and multicultural South Africa : findings of a national survey
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2013)Research world-wide suggests that service delivery by speech-language therapists (SLTs) to bilingual children is problematic and largely unsatisfactory. In multicultural South Africa, the majority of SLTs speak either only ... -
Collapse of genitive and benefactive case in Ecuadorian Quechua?
(Stellenbosch University, Department of Linguistics, 2017)In Ecuadorian Quechua the markers for genitive and benefactive case have become indistinguishable in form: both are basically -pak. This squib discusses the issue whether there has also been a merger in the underlying ... -
A comparison of the responses to three comprehension and three production tasks assessing the morpho-syntactic abilities of Afrikaans-speaking preschoolers
(Stellenbosch University, 2005)The lack of standardised assessment instruments for assessing the morpho-syntactic abilities of Afrikaans-speaking children often leads to the use of informal assessment tools and/or spontaneous language samples. The ... -
The comprehension and production of plural forms of nouns by 6-year-old Afrikaans-speaking children with and without specific language impairment
(Stellenbosch University, 2006)In Afrikaans, plurality is indicated phonetically in several ways. The large number of pluralisation rules and the many exceptions to these rules cause acquirers of Afrikaans to make some use of rote learning. The question ... -
The comprehension and production of quantifiers in isiXhosa-speaking Grade 1 learners
(AOSIS Publishing, 2016)Background: Quantifiers form part of the discourse-internal linguistic devices that children need to access and produce narratives and other classroom discourse. Little is known about the development - especially the ... -
Constraints on South African English-Afrikaans intrasentential code switching : a Minimalist approach
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2002)Since the 1970s, the phenomenon of code switching has been studied from a variety of theoretical perspectives. From a structuralist perspective, the most important question arising from this extensive study of code switching ... -
Critical discourse analysis as queer linguistics : religious pro- and anti-LGBT equality framing and counterframing in two letters to the editor in the City Press
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2016)This article is situated at the intersection of the applied linguistic fields of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), Collective Action Framing (CAF) and a sociolinguistic field recently referred to as “queer linguistics” ... -
The damaging effects of romantic mythopoeia on Khoesan linguistics
(Taylor & Francis, 2014-06)The article outlines some basic guidelines that should inform studies in comparative linguistics, and notes a tendency in contemporary Khoesan linguistics for these to be neglected, while pre-theoretical assumptions of ... -
The discourse of liberation : frames used in characterising the gay liberation movement in two South African newspapers
(Stellenbosch University, Department of Linguistics, 2015)This article reports on the quantitative findings of a study that straddles the applied linguistic field of critical discourse analysis and a sociolinguistic field recently referred to as “queer linguistics”. Drawing on a ... -
The discursive construction of foundation programmes in South African media texts
(UNISA Press, 2015)This article reports on research that investigated public perceptions of transformation within South African universities, with a particular focus on the incorporation of foundation programmes into university curricula. ... -
Does socioeconomic level have an effect on school-age language skills in a developed country?
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2016)Socioeconomic status (SES) has been reported in several contexts as a predictor of child language skills. This study questions whether this holds true for New Zealand, a developed country in which government provides funding ... -
Die effek van direkte instruksie oor voegwoordgebruik op die sintaktiese kompleksiteit van narratiewe
(Stellenbosch University, Department of General Linguistics, 2003)Blootstelling aan narratiewe vanaf 'n jong ouderdom bevorder geletterdheid en akademiese prestasie (Rollins, McCabe, en Bliss 2000:223). Die vermoë om 'n narratief te produseer behels die gebruik van gevorderde taal- en ...