Evolving Models of Language: Papers from the Annual Meeting of the British Association for Applied Linguistics Held at the University of Wales, Swansea, ... (British Studies in Applied Linguistics, 12)

249 Pages·1997·0.92 MB·English

by  Ann Ryan

Evolving Models of Language : Papers
From the Annual Meeting of the British
Association for Applied Linguistics Held At
title:
the University of Wales, Swansea,
September 1996 British Studies in Applied
Linguistics ; 12
author: Ryan, Ann
publisher: Multilingual Matters
isbn10 | asin: 1853593982
print isbn13: 9781853593987
ebook isbn13: 9780585126036
language: English
subject Applied linguistics--Congresses.
publication date: 1997
lcc: P129.B75 1996eb
ddc: 418
subject: Applied linguistics--Congresses.
Page i
Evolving Models of Language
Papers from the
Annual Meeting of the British Association for Applied Linguistics
held at the University of Wales, Swansea, September 1996
Edited by
Ann Ryan and Alison Wray
BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR APPLIED LINGUISTICS
in association with
MULTILINGUAL MATTERS LTD
Clevedon · Philadelphia · Toronto · Sydney · Johannesburg
Page ii
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library.
ISBN 1-85359-398-2 (pbk)
Multilingual Matters Ltd
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England BS21 7HH.
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Africa.
Copyright © 1997 British Association for Applied Linguistics.
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any
form or by any means without permission in writing from the
publisher.
Typeset by Wayside Books, Clevedon.
Printed and bound in Great Britain by Short Run Press, Exeter.
Page iii
Contents
Introduction iv
Ann Ryan And Alison Wray
1 1
Models of Language? Whose? What for? What Use?
J. Charles Alderson
2 23
A Study of Arabic, Chinese and Malay First and Second
Language
Jonathan Charteris-Black
3 41
The Epigenesis of Language: Acquisition as a Sequence
Learning Problem
Nick Ellis
4 58
A New Measure of Lexical Diversity
David D. Malvern and Brian J. Richards
5 72
Applying a Lexical Profiling System to Technical English
James Milton and Tom Hales
6 84
Politeness in Scientific Research Articles Revisited: The
use of ethnography and corpus
Akiko Okamura
7 100
Whorf's Children: Critical comments on Critical
Discourse Analysis (CDA)
Michael Stubbs
Contributors 117
Page iv
Introduction
Ann Ryan and Alison Wray
University of Wales, Swansea
Evolving Models of Language, the deliberately ambiguous theme title
for the 1996 BAAL Annual meeting, offered an opportunity for
different interpretations, including models of language that evolve,
how models of language are developed and models of how language
evolves. Papers taking all three of these perspectives were
forthcoming, and many stimulating discussions resulted.
Models in applied linguistics can operate at four major levels:
language processing, language learning, linguistic analysis and
language testing. Each of these levels is the focus of at least one paper
in this collection and in several it is possible to see how
interdependent these four levels are.
Two papers focus on practical issues in language testing. Malvern &
Richards provide a solution to a weakness inherent in the calculation
of lexical diversity in the output of learners and the language
impaired. The Type-Token-Ratio (TTR) calculation and its many
variations either suffer from unavoidable weightings of the score
according to other variables, including the size of the sample and the
length of individual utterances within the sample, or, conversely, they
are limited by calculations that do not allow the full dataset to be
exploited. Malvern & Richards' solution is a procedure which uses
increasingly large samples from the data to match the profile predicted
by the model to the individual's actual performance.
Milton & Hales also tackle an empirical problem head-on. They are
interested in assessing the extent to which text difficulty (for L2
learners) is independent of text technicality. Using a model of
difficulty based on the distribution of frequent and infrequent words,
they are able to demonstrate that their technical text, the Nissan car
technical manual, is both difficult and also, independently, technical,
displaying lexical and grammatical features that cannot be picked up
by word-frequency counts. They conclude that a diagnostic for text
technicality needs to be based on a model with specific additional
features.
Page v
Charles Alderson's paper is a critical evaluation of Pit Corder's and
others' models of language learning. He argues that formal, external
models are of only limited value, and that more account needs to be
taken of the internal models of the learners and teachers (whether
explicit or implicit), as these will inevitably filter or distort the way in
which any external model is interpreted and applied. He warns that
linguists may make assumptions about language teaching and learning
that are borne of their own enthusiasms and perspective, neither of
which are necessarily shared by the average learner or teacher.
Nick Ellis' model of language acquisition and learning challenges the
very heart of the Chomskian account of processing, namely, that
language is the product of somewhat complex innate mechanisms.
Rather, he argues, 'its complexity emerges from simple developmental
processes being exposed to a massive and complex environment'. Not
only does this paper present an alternative account for how language
'evolves' in the individual, and with significant implications for its
actual evolution in our species, it is also a significant contribution to
the current evolution of linguists' models of language. These are
identifying many of the weaknesses inherent in the Chomskian
paradigm that has been dominant in linguistics for so long, and are
creating accounts of language processing and learning that are
fundamentally different in kind.
Mike Stubbs challenges the integrity and systematicity of Critical
Discourse Analysis (CDA) as currently practised, arguing that there is
an inherent subjectivity and circularity which could be avoided by
using tools such as corpus analysis to demonstrate and justify its
claims. He is thus proposing a substantive addition to this analytical
model, changing its nature from purely qualitative to qualitative and
quantitative.
The remaining two papers in this collection represent the many in the
conference itself that were independent of the annual theme. It has
always been BAAL's policy to select the best papers on offer, using
the theme as a focus but not a strait-jacket, and acknowledging that
important research should be presented irrespective of whether it
happens to coincide with the chosen theme. Both the papers included
here relate to the analysis of academic writing, but in quite different
ways. Okamura's study of politeness and hedging in academic articles,
supported by interviews with the writers about their intentions and
attitudes, reveals subtleties in the relationship between the academic
writer and his expert audience. Charteris-Black reports on the use of
punctuation by native and nonnative speakers of English, and
demonstrates that it is the Malay and Chinese learners, rather than the
native speakers, who provide the closest match to the prescriptive
model.
Linguistics is not an old enough discipline to have developed too
many traditions and ingrained paradigms. Symptomatic of a
comparatively young field is that its models can be fundamentally
challenged and that they can be seen to change and developto
evolvewithin a relatively short time. Linguistics is