30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
This study is a continuation and extension of the author’s ongoing analysis of the nature of linguistic data as found in a theoretical linguistics corpus. Earlier stages in this work have been reported in other articles by the author (Coleman 1997, 1999, and 2000). Patterns of lexical usage identifying ‘data’ as something physical (having objective existence) or not (existing subjectively only) will reveal significant differences between… TL [theoretical linguistic] and LS [life sciences] corpora. The LS corpus is very consistent in regard to the identification of DATA as something observable in terms of objects and events that exist apart from the observer, not strictly ‘objects’ created by the viewpoint of the observer (and existing only in that observer’s subjective experience) — to paraphrase Saussure (1959:8) on the ‘objects of language’. As a whole, the TL corpus is very unlike the LS corpus in this regard.
Coleman, Douglas W. 2002. A corpus study on the (non-)physicality of linguistic observations. LACUS Forum 28:43-50. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2002_lacus_2843-50.pdf
30July2008
Posted by bsypniewski under: Sypniewski.
We wish to test whether Austin’s claim that the words of a performative utterance are sufficient, by themselves, to perform an act. Austin (ibid:6) cited the utterance (‘I do’) of a bride and a groom in response to the traditional question ‘Do you take X to be your lawfully wedded husband/wife?’ as a performative utterance. To test Austin’s claim, we hypothesize that when any two people (the couple) appear before a person societally empowered to perform marriages (the celebrant), with witnesses and other societally mandated accompaniments (e.g. a marriage license) and utter Austin’s wedding performative, that they are married, i.e. the wedding act has been performed. If this hypothesis proves true, we say that the utterance of Austin’s wedding performative is sufficient to perform the act of wedding. If it proves false, we say that the utterance of Austin’s wedding performative is, by itself, insufficient to perform the act of wedding.
Sypniewski, Bernard. 2006. Austin and same-sex marriage. LACUS Forum 33.249-256. Click here for the PDF: sypniewski_2005_lacus_33249-256.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman; Postica.
This paper looks at input-related issues in regard to second language acquisition (SLA) both from a traditional and from a human linguistics perspective, before presenting an experiment that focuses on one aspect of real-world input. In the initial training phase in both experiments, subjects viewed the written text of a short, three-part dialogue between two characters named Ava and Gova. The corresponding auditory input was played three times in a row, at five second intervals. A 5 minute study phase followed. Half of the subjects were then given a memory test to evaluate their ability to recall the same dialogue (memory test); the others were given a comprehension test to evaluate their ability to understand novel variations of what they had seen and heard. The only predictor of successful performance on the memory test was years of prior foreign language study. In contrast, on the comprehension test, while years of prior foreign language study was a significant predictor, a subject’s use of mental imagery during the study period was by far the strongest predictor of success.
Postica, Adina & Douglas W. Coleman. 2007. The role of mental imagery in SLA. LACUS Forum 33. Pagination unknown, see published version to cite. Click here for the PDF: postica-coleman_2007_lacus_33nopag.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
It has long been assumed that input for language learning consists of language. This seems so self-evident that any challenge is usually dismissed out of hand. However, the assumption is demonstrably false. Further, it underlies failures in the kind of input the language teaching profession provides to students. Supporting evidence for the latter comes from a wide range of foreign language textbooks, with particular attention to how those books use illustrations to support target language textual matter.
Coleman, Douglas W. 2007. Required variability in input. LACUS Forum 33.119-131. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2007_lacus_33119-131.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
In the present study I show how the interconnectedness of the various sensory-motor modalities is key to understanding how people actually learn to communicate via the neural mechanism of associative learning. In doing so, I show why certain input-based approaches in foreign language learning in fact provide adequate input while others do not. Language-focused approaches to understanding how people communicate formalize only the mental objects of grammar (grammar in the broad sense), which exist only in the logical domain. …[T]here are real-world (physical-domain) events and properties of people relevant to our understanding of the situation. Because people and the communicative events they are involved in exist in the physical domain, traditional language-based approaches (which confine themselves to the logical domain) permit only vague and imprecise appeals to extra-linguistic context. …[W]e must turn away from the logical domain and accept that it is not language, but what we marginalize as context (people communicating in their surroundings) that properly concerns a science of linguistics.
Coleman, Douglas W. 2006. A formal integrated view of speech, gesture, gaze and its implications for learning. LACUS Forum 32.163-172. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2006_lacus_32163-172.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
When we frame learning how to communicate in terms of acquiring grammar, we are attempting to deal with a real-world issue in the mental, rather than the physical, domain. The unlearnability problem [what Chomsky calls "Plato's Problem, the result of a purported "Poverty of Stimulus"] is a direct result. We are then faced with a choice between Scylla and Charybdis (Chomsky’s position of assuming everything is already known and Krashen’s self-contradictory position). To avoid such lose-lose options, we should chart a course into the physical domain. Fortunately,
we can do this and bring much of value in Krashen’s insights along with us.
Coleman, Douglas W. 2005. Language learning input and input for learning to communicate. LACUS Forum 31.203-213. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2005_lacus_31203-213.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
In language, Bloomfield uses the example of Jack and Jill walking down a lane, Jill speaking, and Jack fetching an apple to propose dealing with meaning within a framework considering only phenomena that are available to scientific scrutiny (1933:22 ff.). He argues that linguists should consider only the people involved, their physiological states, relevant physical objects (e.g. the apple), and dynamic physical events (e.g. sound waves). In staking out this territory, he asserts that the data of linguistics should be obtained via observations limited to the physical domain, anticipating in this regard the position of Yngve (1986)—by more than half a century. Confusingly, Bloomfield retreats from this position …. [This paper shows that] Bloomfield (and the other Structuralists) did so in large part because of the constraints imposed by their serious misunderstanding of the nature of the objects of study available to science. [An example in this paper shows] that we can place linguistic meaning in the physical domain, as Bloomfield originally hoped to.
Coleman, Douglas W. 2004. Linguistic meaning in the physical domain. LACUS Forum 30:331-341. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2004_lacus_30331-341.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
“I have investigated occurrences of certain key concepts in a broad range of introductory textbooks in linguistics, in the process looking at some of the same concepts as those subsumed under lexical analyses in my earlier research on theoretical and applied linguistics corpora drawn from professional journals (Coleman 1997, 1999, 2000). I focus on three major aspects in the texts: (1) what they have to say about the status of linguistics as a science, (2) what constitute(s) the object(s) of study in linguistics, and (3) what constitute the data to be used by linguistics in its examination of this object. ”
Coleman, Douglas W. 2001. DATA and SCIENCE in introductory linguistics textbooks. LACUS Forum 27.75-85. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2001_lacus_2775-85.pdf
30July2008
Posted by admin under: Coleman.
“[Just before this review was published], I went looking for reviews of Yngve’s From Grammar to Science and found that, although it has been out for about five years, it had been reviewed only once, and then only electronically on the Linguist List (Hacken 1997). Considering the book’s potentially enormous impact on the field of linguistics, I was surprised, to say the least. Further, when I read Hacken’s review, I was quite taken aback. It has several major errors of fact with regard to the book’s contents—but more about that [in the review].”
Coleman, Douglas W. 2001. Is linguistics a science? Review of From Grammar to Science, by Victor H. Yngve. American Speech 76:2.204-207. Click here for the PDF: coleman_2001_amspeech_762204-207.pdf
1May2008
Posted by lburazer under: Burazer.
The article begins:
Reference is a concept which has been defined from different perspectives in philosophy as well as in linguistics. Most existing definitions of reference are based in the philosophy of language and revolve around words being used to refer to things in reality. Words are defined as items that name the things in the external or imagined external reality.
But the paper quickly comes to this key point:
In HL, it is people who refer, not words (Burazer 2004b:ch. 8), therefore we speak of referring behavior of people rather than of words referring to objects.
Burazer, Lara. 2006. Human linguistics and referring in the real world. LACUS Forum 32:155-161.
Click here to see: Human Linguistics and Referring in the Real World