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In everyday communication, speakers go beyond words to synchronize speech sounds and gestures, adding nuanced meanings. For instance, in Colombian Spanish, recounting the distant past involves elongating words, modulating pitch, and using expressive hand movements. This dissertation explores this phenomenon, termed Multimodal Iconic Expressions (MMIEs), using Cognitive Linguistics and Cognitive Grammar. The quantitative study uncovers correlations between verb aspect, nominal quantification, and speech duration, revealing phono-iconic connections. The qualitative study examines construal operations giving rise to MMIEs across semantic domains. MMIEs predominantly appear in discourse Focus, with durative events and mass-like quantities exhibiting pronounced phono-iconic associations. Patterns include stress and beat-like gestures, while more elaborate expressions involve pitch, intensity, duration, and voice-type modulations, elevating iconicity levels. This research advances our understanding of iconicity in language, emphasizing profound conceptual meanings encoded in phonological elements. This research extends the boundaries of our understanding of iconicity in conceptualization and language use, underscoring the capacity of phonological elements to carry profound conceptual meaning.

This dissertation reviews the results from an online survey created to identify and compare how second language (L2) learners and heritage language (HL) learners of Spanish, enrolled in beginning-level coursework at the college level, acquired and built vocabulary. A total of 451 participants completed the survey. The purpose of the online survey was to serve as a baseline for pedagogical purposes, since it provided information about participants’ language profiles and the way they build vocabulary based on sematic relatedness. Overall, the findings from the survey showed that HL and L2 learners differ in the way they build semantic neighborhoods and, in their meaning-making processes. HL participants produced a higher number of Spanish semantic associations for the provided Spanish categories, whereas L2 learners produced a higher number of English semantic associations for both the Spanish and English categories. Additionally, HL learners left more responses blank in both the Spanish and English categories. The findings support the idea that tailored vocabulary pedagogical practices and interventions will benefit and enhance students’ vocabulary development and learning in the Spanish language classroom.

This dissertation reviews the results from an online survey created to identify and compare how second language (L2) learners and heritage language (HL) learners of Spanish, enrolled in beginning-level coursework at the college level, acquired and built vocabulary. A total of 451 participants completed the survey. The purpose of the online survey was to serve as a baseline for pedagogical purposes, since it provided information about participants’ language profiles and the way they build vocabulary based on sematic relatedness. Overall, the findings from the survey showed that HL and L2 learners differ in the way they build semantic neighborhoods and, in their meaning-making processes. HL participants produced a higher number of Spanish semantic associations for the provided Spanish categories, whereas L2 learners produced a higher number of English semantic associations for both the Spanish and English categories. Additionally, HL learners left more responses blank in both the Spanish and English categories. The findings support the idea that tailored vocabulary pedagogical practices and interventions will benefit and enhance students’ vocabulary development and learning in the Spanish language classroom.

This dissertation reviews the results from an online survey created to identify and compare how second language (L2) learners and heritage language (HL) learners of Spanish, enrolled in beginning-level coursework at the college level, acquired and built vocabulary. A total of 451 participants completed the survey. The purpose of the online survey was to serve as a baseline for pedagogical purposes, since it provided information about participants’ language profiles and the way they build vocabulary based on sematic relatedness. Overall, the findings from the survey showed that HL and L2 learners differ in the way they build semantic neighborhoods and, in their meaning-making processes. HL participants produced a higher number of Spanish semantic associations for the provided Spanish categories, whereas L2 learners produced a higher number of English semantic associations for both the Spanish and English categories. Additionally, HL learners left more responses blank in both the Spanish and English categories. The findings support the idea that tailored vocabulary pedagogical practices and interventions will benefit and enhance students’ vocabulary development and learning in the Spanish language classroom.

This thesis presents a study of final vowel devoicing in Blackfoot, an indigenous language of Montana and Alberta. Previous research on final vowel devoicing in Blackfoot variously suggests word-final, phrase-final, and utterance-final vowel devoicing processes (e.g. Taylor 1965, Bliss & Gick 2009, Frantz 2017), though, the conditioning environment for this phenomenon had not been a research focus prior to this study. The present study investigates intonation units (IUs) as the conditioning domain for final vowel devoicing in Blackfoot. Final vowel devoicing in Blackfoot is investigated here by examining the common word-final suffixes –wa (3SG.AN) and –yi (4SG) in two recordings of connected speech. Each recording features a different native speaker of Blackfoot. Speakers were asked to generate a narrative to go along with illustrations in a picture book. These recordings are interlinearized using ELAN annotation software. Next, tokens of –wa and –yi are analyzed acoustically using Praat phonetic software. Then, –wa and –yi tokens are analyzed in terms of their position within the intonation unit (IU-medial or IU-final). Finally, the data are collated, giving the frequencies of different phonetic variants as well as the distribution of phonetic variants across IU-medial and IU-final environments. The findings of this study are that fully-audible variants of –wa and –yi almost always occur IU-medially, while devoiced variants are most frequently found in IU-final position. Based on these findings, this thesis proposes an IU-final vowel devoicing rule to describe the phonetic variation and distribution of –wa and –yi in connected speech. The analysis put forth in this thesis has implications for the theoretical classification of vowel devoicing phenomena, for linguistic research methodologies, and for the typology of intonation units cross-linguistically. Furthermore, the findings of this work bear on language documentation, revitalization, and pedagogy.

This thesis presents an analysis of the internal structure of semelfactive predicates. I propose that the lexical aspect class of semelfactives consists of three sub-categories: (i) semelfactive predicates with internal plurality, (ii) semelfactive predicates which are uni-directional and (iii) semelfactive predicates with plurality of participants. Based on these sub-categories, I further propose that the feature of instantaneity attributed to semelfactives (Smith 1997), should not be used, as semelfactives are in actuality not instantaneous events. Furthermore, I propose that an additional feature of atomicity, which distinguishes between events with plurality and those without, should be added to the binary features of lexical aspectual classes in order to mark a distinction between semelfactives and activities. In order to arrive at these proposals this thesis examines data collected from native English speakers across a range of predicates (including predicates which have been classified as semelfactives in the literature as well as predicates which have not been analyzed in the literature). A series of tests were applied to these predicates in order to determine their potential internal structure. This thesis has several implications. First, it provides a better understanding of the feature of single occurrence which is often attributed to semelfactives (Smith, 1997). Second, it provides a means of accounting for some variation within the class of semelfactives. It has implications for the relation between semelfactives and other lexical aspect classes. Finally, it provides a series of tests which can be used both on English predicates as well as cross-linguistically to examine the internal structure of semelfactives.

Many have considered Linguistics a science for decades, though linguists themselves have debated the accuracy of this characterization of the study of language. These conversations about linguistics as a science reveal a discipline intent on securing scientific status, often through rigorous methodology and theoretical frameworks mirroring the traditional sciences. If successful, however, linguistics inherits the authority of modern science, which maintains an epistemically hierarchical relationship with non-scientists. By examining and representing the epistemic relationships between expertise, authority, and science, I ask us to think of all linguistics not as a socially neutral endeavor, but as perpetuating the juxtaposition of scientific and popular understanding. To practice science responsibly, I claim, linguists must justify not only their own practice, but the practice of science itself through philosophical analysis and epistemic justification that requires us to ask: Why is my way of knowing better than theirs? Answering this question will help us both research responsibly and engage in productive conversations about the discipline’s place in the larger, often skeptical, world of academia.

Many have considered Linguistics a science for decades, though linguists themselves have debated the accuracy of this characterization of the study of language. These conversations about linguistics as a science reveal a discipline intent on securing scientific status, often through rigorous methodology and theoretical frameworks mirroring the traditional sciences. If successful, however, linguistics inherits the authority of modern science, which maintains an epistemically hierarchical relationship with non-scientists. By examining and representing the epistemic relationships between expertise, authority, and science, I ask us to think of all linguistics not as a socially neutral endeavor, but as perpetuating the juxtaposition of scientific and popular understanding. To practice science responsibly, I claim, linguists must justify not only their own practice, but the practice of science itself through philosophical analysis and epistemic justification that requires us to ask: Why is my way of knowing better than theirs? Answering this question will help us both research responsibly and engage in productive conversations about the discipline’s place in the larger, often skeptical, world of academia.

Do adult L2 English bilingual speakers have difficulty with cognate words whose meanings are distinct across their two languages? This study explored the extent to which variations in meaning in cross-language cognates affect translation performance in a translation task by L2 English (L1 Spanish) speakers who learned English as adults. A prep-phase experiment was conducted to test native English-speakers’ predicted completions of the study’s stimuli sentences, in order to choose the optimal stimuli for the primary experiment. The method for the primary experiment of this study consisted of a web-based translation task of 120 sentences from Spanish to English, while controlling for polysemy and frequency. The results showed that adult L2 learners of English did experience difficulty when translating cognates in sentences from their L1 to their L2. The interaction of the Spanish word’s polysemous nature, Spanish word frequency, English target frequency and English cognate frequency played a role in the participants’ performance.

The goal of this dissertation is to study the intrapersonal and symbolic function of gesture by a very specific type of population: hearing speakers of Spanish who, having been born to deaf parents, grew up developing a bimodal (Spanish and Spain’s Sign Language) linguistic interface, which borrows elements from the manual and spoken modalities. In the ordering of gestures devised by Kendon (1988) and cited by McNeill (1992), gesticulation and sign languages are placed at opposite ends of a continuum. At one end, gesticulation is formed by idiosyncratic spontaneous gestures lacking any conventional linguistic proprieties, which are produced in combination with speech in a global and synthetic semiosis. At the other end, sign languages are fully-fledged languages formed by conventionalized signs, which are produced in the absence of speech in a segmented and analytic semiosis. Some previous L2 studies (Brown and Gullberg, 2008; Choi and Lantolf, 2008; Negueruela, Lantolf, Jordan, and Gelabert, 2004; Stam, 2001) have addressed the relationship between speech and gestures in order to investigate whether second lan- guage speakers, even at advanced, near-native proficiency levels, shift their thinking- for-speaking patterns. Data in this study come from the spoken depiction of motion events (Talmy, 2000) of four bimodal participants and are compared with those of four Spanish unimodal counterparts. Data was gathered by video recording participants co-constructing and individually retelling a series of narratives in signing, oral and written modalities, although, the analysis for this study focuses almost exclusively on the oral modality, with some references to the signing when it is deemed appropriate. Results show how, in the construction of spoken narratives, bimodal participants display a particular sign-like gesticulation which, while co-occurring with speech, maintains linguistic properties and is, at least, partly conventionalized. Future re- search, whether in t

This thesis compares the failures of the creolization movement with the success of the language revitalization movement and seeks to determine which elements are missing from the former to make it as successful as the latter. Education policy, identity, and language ideology are all examined as contributors to the future success of creole inclusivity in education and society, as well as the potential benefits such a movement would include. Specifically examined are Siegel’s research on creole education and Armstrong’s work on language ideology.

In this article, I examine the conduct and coordination of two activities that are relevant in the Dutch police interrogation: talking and typing. By taking a closer look at these activities, I can see how the police record is mutually constructed by officers and suspects and begin to understand what kind of orientation is required for these dual activities. Additionally, I explore how participants orient to and coordinate talking and typing during interrogations and explicate what this tells us about the ways institutional tasks are carried out in this specific environment. I have found that police officers not only structure talk during interrogations, but that their typing activities function as institutional, controlling actions when talk is transformed to text during the interrogations.

In this article, I examine the conduct and coordination of two activities that are relevant in the Dutch police interrogation: talking and typing. By taking a closer look at these activities, I can see how the police record is mutually constructed by officers and suspects and begin to understand what kind of orientation is required for these dual activities. Additionally, I explore how participants orient to and coordinate talking and typing during interrogations and explicate what this tells us about the ways institutional tasks are carried out in this specific environment. I have found that police officers not only structure talk during interrogations, but that their typing activities function as institutional, controlling actions when talk is transformed to text during the interrogations.

Bringing conceptual blending into foreign language classroom discussions of cultural narratives can lead to critical language awareness and a deeper and broader understanding of cultural narratives, which the MLA promotes in its (2007) conceptualization of transcultural and translingual awareness. Using the fall of the Berlin Wall and German unification as example narratives, this paper seeks to show how political humor can unpack and illuminate complex, blended narratives that infuse everyday linguistic expressions and ways of making meaning. It will then offer suggestions for using conceptual blending to analyze cultural narratives in the classroom.

Bringing conceptual blending into foreign language classroom discussions of cultural narratives can lead to critical language awareness and a deeper and broader understanding of cultural narratives, which the MLA promotes in its (2007) conceptualization of transcultural and translingual awareness. Using the fall of the Berlin Wall and German unification as example narratives, this paper seeks to show how political humor can unpack and illuminate complex, blended narratives that infuse everyday linguistic expressions and ways of making meaning. It will then offer suggestions for using conceptual blending to analyze cultural narratives in the classroom.

This paper outlines an approach to educating multimedia practitioners utilizing Lego MindStorms® which evolved out of a desire to bridge the technical and aesthetic worldviews. The approach focuses on three aspects of the development process. First, it examines the linguistic model of code production. In order to convey the act of writing code as a linguistic task, the students are introduced to several aspects of linguistic theory, with examples illustrating their application in spoken, programmed and Lego MindStorms® based languages. The second area of focus is object theory. Adopting a similar approach to the previous section, but giving only Lego based examples. Finally, the focus shifts to prototyping, discussing how Lego MindStorms® can be used to nurture an iterative development style. The conclusion then discusses the results of this approach, as it was applied at the Hypermedia Research Centre (HRC) in the University of Westminster between 1999 and 2002.

This paper outlines an approach to educating multimedia practitioners utilizing Lego MindStorms® which evolved out of a desire to bridge the technical and aesthetic worldviews. The approach focuses on three aspects of the development process. First, it examines the linguistic model of code production. In order to convey the act of writing code as a linguistic task, the students are introduced to several aspects of linguistic theory, with examples illustrating their application in spoken, programmed and Lego MindStorms® based languages. The second area of focus is object theory. Adopting a similar approach to the previous section, but giving only Lego based examples. Finally, the focus shifts to prototyping, discussing how Lego MindStorms® can be used to nurture an iterative development style. The conclusion then discusses the results of this approach, as it was applied at the Hypermedia Research Centre (HRC) in the University of Westminster between 1999 and 2002.

This article discusses threat assessment via linguistic analysis.

This article discusses threat assessment via linguistic analysis.

The editor discusses political issues connected by linguistic and communicative discord and controversy.