Lexical Acquisition
Discuss lexical acquisition in terms of principles and constraints which have been argued to facilitate the acquisition of the lexicon. . Introduction Children learn new words at an impressive speed. The rate of acquisition seems to increase exponentially during the first years of life: the exact figures vary from study to study, but Nelson (1973) showed that children could produce ten words by the age of 15 months; 50 words by the age of 20 months, and 186 words by the age of 24 months (Barrett 1995). Then, it stabilises, and children learn ten new words a day until they are approximately six years old (Clark 1995). For most children, lexical acquisition is easy; for researchers, it is a puzzle that must be solved. How can children learn so many words so quickly? What helps them through the task of building up a vocabulary? In this essay, I will try to answer these questions, by discussing principles and constraints that have been claimed to facilitate the acquisition of the lexicon. 2. Preverbal knowledge and lexical acquisition The behaviourist approach dictates that an infant's mind is like a blank slate (tabula rasa), and that children learn only language through their environment. Behaviourists are not concerned with the preverbal stage: they would argue that before infants utter their first word, only speculations can be made about whether they reflect on
Case Study of Three Counselling Sessions.
CASE STUDY OF THREE COUNSELLING SESSIONS Introduction: This is the first of three sessions with Val. Val is a married lady, in her early fifties, she has one son. Val has agreed to take part in this counselling case study and understands it will entail three counselling sessions. She is aware that it will involve the use of videotapes for my training and that the tapes will be seen by my tutor, Val has given her permission for this. The sessions will be weekly and will take place within the college. The issue that Val wanted to talk about, was a burglary that had happened to her about a year ago. SESSION ONE EVALUATION At the beginning of the session with Val, I explained confidentiality and how certain disclosures might affect her. I also explained that this was the first of three sessions and the amount of time we would have for the session. I tried to put her at ease by asking was that okay after explaining what confidentiality was. I opened the session by say" what ever you want to talk about". Val had come to talk about a burglary, which had happened to her last year. As Val started talking in the early part of the session I was able to pickup her emotions of shock and disbelief that this had happened to her. I clarified early on in the session which burglary she was talking about as she disclosed she had, had another burglary the previous year. I feel I
A continuation of the short story ‘Samphire’ by Patrick O’Brian
English Coursework: A continuation of the short story 'Samphire' by Patrick O'Brian Hideous, hideous, the blue corpse lying, as if straight from hell, so far past death that the eyes were nothing but empty sockets in the calm of that expressionless void. The smell too, burning into their noses the morbid destruction of death. There was number three, and the man was indeed dead. Molly was afraid to be there - the mutation of number three was far more disturbing than any of the previous two murders. She felt feint and reached for her husbands arm whilst he peered over the crowd to see the sick spectacle, pulling her arm yet further closer to the scene. The murders were continuing, dark, unscrupulous deathly pangs through the nights. This was the third of a series of gruesome mutilations, which were concentrated in the dingy and damp area of Whitechapel, London. Lacey was so entranced by what he was seeing that he even asked one of the nearby officers what had happened, the policemen had ignored his query outright. Lacey recoiled from the scene, his face an icy plain, brows furrowed in concentration, but eyes betraying his fright at the body. They hardly spoke, and when did so with monosyllabic preoccupation, as if something was stopping them from opening their mouths. The man was looking considerably greener whilst Molly was seemingly captivated by the scenery drifting
The Power of Naming- Place Names in England
The Power of Naming: Place Names in England Historically speaking toponymy – the study of place-names – has focused on etymology as opposed to power discourse (Cameron 1996; Culpeper 2005; Diaz Vera 1996; Gelling 1995; Gelling 2007; Hough 1997; Kadmon 2004; Paisey & Paisey 2011; Scott 2003). However, in recent years, scholars have turned instead to the consideration of the power relationships implicit in the act of naming a geographic location (Radding & Western 2010; Rose-Redwood, Alderman, & Azaryahu 2010;). Particularly in the case of England, the power of naming becomes a key insight into the history of conquest from foreign powers that the island has experienced in its long life. These conquerors understood the act of naming as the linguistic equivalent of driving a flag into the soil of the vanquished foe’s garden – a means of solidifying and extending the message of their invasion and subsequent occupation throughout time. Such is the power expressed through names and naming processes. As Rose-Redwood, Alderman and Azaryahu (2010, p. 454) note, “the naming of places is one of the primary means of attempting to construct clearly demarcated spatial identities”. For the purpose of the following essay, these spatial identities are to be thought of as political identities as well. “As a place-name becomes opaque and the original meaning is lost over time, the
Analysis of creativity in a computer-mediated-conversation
E301THE ART OF ENGLISH: TUTOR MARKED ASSIGNMENT 02 Swann (2006, p12), writing in The art of English: everyday creativity states that the term creativity can be used to "refer to the way that people use literary-like features in everyday discourse". In Reading 1A, "Extracts from 'Common language: corpus, creativity and cognition'" (2006), Carter states that "the inherent creativity of significant proportions of language use" cannot be ignored. Whilst carrying out research for the CANCODE project, he says that researchers found that examples of creativity in the language were very obvious. I am going to consider the three approaches to creativity in language proposed by Carter, and then examine how far these are obvious in part of a chat log that I have obtained. I propose to use a text that was made available to me by a friend who is an English graduate and therefore has an interest in what I am studying. It is the transcript of part of an online conversation that she had with a man who she was dating at the time. Both participants are middle-aged and work in jobs where they routinely use academic English. In the chat, they are arranging their date for the following week. The names of the participants have been altered to maintain anonymity. Carter proposes three models of creativity: an inherency model, a sociocultural model and a cognitive model. (Carter, 1999, cited by
Prepositional and Phrasal Verbs
LS2EG English Grammar Assessment What are the rules for distinguishing between Prepositional and Phrasal verbs? Can both categories of verb be both transitive and intransitive? Using a selected range of data, evaluate how well a commercially-available grammar checker handles the evaluation of grammaticality with respect to: a) Tests that distinguish between Prepositional and Phrasal verbs b) Transitive and non-transitive clauses using Prepositional and Phrasal verbs compared with single-word verbs. The difference between phrasal verbs and prepositional verbs is not always easy to outline. Their definition is often ambiguous and differs from one textbook to another. In this essay, I will discuss how one can distinguish between prepositional and phrasal verbs. I will also look at whether both verb types can be transitive and intransitive. Then, I will find out if the Grammar Checker in Microsoft Word 2003 knows the difference between prepositional and phrasal verbs, using tests that distinguish between them. Finally, I will see if the Grammar Checker lets me build transitive and non-transitive clauses with both verb types. First, it is important to define what a phrasal verb is, and what a prepositional verb is. According to Downing and Locke (2002) and Greenbaum and Nelson (2002), both types of verb are multi-word verbs. A phrasal verb is a lexical verb followed by an
Code-Switching
What is meant by code-switching? Discuss the main types and functions of code-switching that have been identified. In many societies, people use several different languages in conversations. In Montreal, Canada, it is not uncommon to hear two people speaking English and French to each other in an effortless way. Even in a country that is mostly monolingual, such as England, people must choose which language variety they will use. People from the north of England will often decide to speak in a manner that is closer to RP English when they move south. These phenomena are examples of code-switching. In this essay, I will explain what code-switching is. I will also discuss the main types and functions of code-switching. First, it is important to establish what a code is. A code is a neutral term that is used to talk about language varieties. According to Wardhaugh, the term 'code' "can be used to refer to any kind of system that two or more people employ for communication" (Wardhaugh 1998: 86). It is not easy to outline the difference between a language and a dialect. The mainland Scandinavian languages, Swedish, Norwegian and Danish, are very closely related and often mutually intelligible. Norwegian has several different dialects, and some of them are extremely hard to understand for most Norwegians. A Norwegian that speaks the dialect used in Oslo would find it easier to
Wheel of Surya by Jamila Gavin. Examine the difficulties faced by Marvinder and Jaspal when they travel to Britain to find their father.
Wheel of Surya by Jamila Gavin Examine the difficulties faced by Marvinder and Jaspal when they travel to Britain to find their father. In 'Wheel of Surya', two young Indians called Jaspal and Marvinder struggle to make their way to England to look for their father, Govind, who went there to move further on with his studies in university to claim a second degree. Unfortunately Govind got caught up in a war and joined the British army to fight against the Nazis. Jaspal and Marvinder were violently separated from their mother, Jhoti, who got left behind in the train station in India with her mother, leaving Jaspal and Marvinder no other choice but to get to England themselves. Luckily Jaspal and Marvinder get to their first destination, Bombay, with the help of an old man, who is a Muslim and agrees to help them with their journey. Jaspal and Marvinder stopped in Bombay because that was the only route they new that would get them to England. The problems Jaspal and Marvinder face on their way to England start here, as they have to find a way to get out of Bombay. They come across many physical problems. Firstly the old man tells Jaspal and Marvinder that their mother's bundle full of her precious belongs, jewels, aren't worth much in Bombay or England and that they will suffer if they don't find a way to raise more money quickly. Marvinder and Jaspal agree to look for a job,
Looking Through Different Lenses
Derek Gwinn 3/17/03 Hefner Adv. Writing Looking Through Different Lenses The subway: it is a place full of mystery and unknown things. Thousands of people flock in and out of the subways everyday, and each one has a different story that explains their life. Whenever I ride the subway I question the people that surround me: has the guy sitting next to me ever committed a crime before? Has he ever hurt or dismantled someone? Does he have any beliefs or morals? Or, is he that guy that goes through the same basic routine everyday: goes to work, goes home, and then goes to sleep? There are infinite amounts of questions that you could ask that would define each person's life. We all resemble spectators in our own sense by questioning the people around us. The mysterious life that each and every one of us leads heightens the sense of interest from "us" surrounding spectators. His raggedy clothes were darkened from the amount of dirtiness, along with his overall appearance. He walked with a certain type of stagger: His right foot would drag along the ground every time he tried to step forward. He was the standout passenger among everyone else on the train. His eyes were bloodshot red, predictably from drugs or alcohol, and his arm was in a cast. He stuttered and slobbered on himself whenever he talked. He struggled over to each and every person on the moving locomotive and
corpus and concordance in comparing grammar in both speech and writing
Introduction: The following essay is about the corpus and concordance in comparing grammar in both speech and writing. This essay mainly divided in to three tasks. First task, is a data preparation, second task is a comparison of (play) in speech and writing, using data collected in task one, the final task is task three, which is a comparison of wider lexicogrammatical patterns. Task one: (Data Preparation) This task is about including the number of concordance lines which (play) occurred in, as a verb and noun in both spoken and written corpora, also it include the most frequent collocates occurred in several positions, as a last step in this task; various examples will be attached from the corpus. a) Occurrences of the singular verb form of the word (play) in the whole BNC-OU speech corpus are 64, and in one third of the BNC-OU written corpus of the same verb are 20. b) Occurrences of the singular noun form of the word (play) in the whole BNC-OU speech corpus are 39, and in one third of the BNC-OU written corpus are 62. c) What are the five most frequent collocates in first and second positions to the right and left of the noun and verb forms of (play) in both your speech and written corpora? Word Corpora 2-left - left - right 2-right Play (v.) Speech 4 when 4 go 3 no 3 they 4 you 2 they 7 I 5 we 5 and 4 all 2 it 1 with