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Processing of preverbal scrambling in Turkish
This psycholinguistic study aims to find out the effects of scrambling in processing and perception of congruency in Turkish sentences. In line with this aim, another purpose of the present study is to find out whether scrambling focused arguments, question-answer orientation, and position of focused argument affect processing and perception of congruency in Turkish. The material used in the study is composed of 32 main question-answer pairs, which are scrambled according to the aforementioned three factors to make up 256 pairs, and are administered to 50 native Turkish speakers as a self-paced reading test and the participants are asked to evaluate the congruency relationship between each question-answer pair. The reading time for each linguistic element in the answers, as well as the judgment calls (perceived congruency) and the response time for each judgment call concerning question-answer pairs (congruency response time), are recorded and the mean scores of reading time, judgment calls, and the duration of judgment calls are compared via three-factor ANOVA. Data analyses show that scrambling and scrambling focused arguments, question-answer orientation, and position of focused argument cause differences in sentence processing and the perception of congruency to varying degrees. To be more precise, it is found that object-focused pairs, congruent pairs and focused arguments in the immediate preverbal position require lower processing time than subject-focused sentences, incongruent sentences and focused arguments in the clause-initial position. In terms of the effects of scrambling on the perception of congruency, it is seen that question-answer orientation leads to a difference in the perception of congruency while the focused argument causes a difference in the duration of the grammatical judgment calls, similar to the results obtained concerning reading time data. In the end, it can be concluded that scrambling the focused arguments, the position of the focused arguments, as well as the question word and the focused argument in question-answer pairs, have an important role to cause differences in sentence processing and the perception of congruency in Turkish.
A diachronic and gender-based analysis of Turkish MA theses: The use of metadiscourse markers
Metadiscourse has been particularly valuable in written discourse as they help organizing and producing persuasive texts with textual and interpersonal functions. This study aims to reveal how the authors of Turkish master's theses construct metadiscourse in the conclusion sections and how these rhetorical devices are manifested from gender-based and diachronic perspectives. To this end, the corpus of this study is comprised of a total of 80 conclusion sections of Turkish master's theses in social science and humanities published in 2004 and 2019. Hyland's (2005) Interpersonal Model of Metadiscourse was used as the analytical framework. Frequency analysis and Log-likelihood analysis were carried out to disclose the metadiscourse use in the corpus. Results revealed that metadiscourse categories have similar distributional patterns both across gender and across years of publication. Specifically, the authors employed more transitions, frame markers, code-glosses and less metadiscoursal evidentials and endophoric markers to guide the readers through the text. In regard to the use of interactional categories, both female and male authors used more boosters, hedges, attitude markers to interact with their readers and less engagement markers and self-mentions. In addition, interactional devices accounted for a greater proportion of metadiscourse resources in master's theses' conclusions and also in corpora of both genders and years of publication. Comparative analysis revealed that there is no statistically significant difference between the corpus of female and male authors in regard to the overall use of metadiscourse markers. All these similarities can be ascribed to the evaluative, interpretative, interpersonal and subjective nature of social science and humanities and the master's theses conclusions as an educational genre in which the authors need metadiscourse to persuade their readers about the results of their studies. On the other hand, the use of metadiscourse markers increased significantly in 2019, and also both in corpus of female and male authors. This difference may prove to be the evolutionary nature of academic genre and increasing awareness of discourse communities regarding the essential use of metadiscourse markers in master's theses conclusions for more persuasive, more reader-friendly and more coherent texts.
Cumulative and collective readings in the sentences containing plural ambiguity in Turkish: A priming study
Some sentences, which contain more than one plural expression, namely numerical expressions, bring about lexical ambiguities. For example, the sentence 'İki çocuk üç kitap taşıdı.' (Two boys carried three books) contains more than one meaning. This sentence can be read as there are two boys and one of the boys keeps one of the books and the other boy keeps two books (cumulative reading). The other interpretation of the sentence is that there are two boys and three books, and three books were carried by those two boys at the same time (collective reading). In this study, the results of three experiments were reported. These results indicate that whether priming can affect the participants' choice, regarding cumulative/collective contrast. Sentence-picture matching tests were used to investigate whether native speakers of Turkish are influenced by priming one of the interpretations. In the prime trials, participants carried out a sentence-picture matching task which gives rise to a strong bias against one of the two types of readings to different participants, in experiment 1 collective prime, in experiment 2 cumulative prime and in experiment 3 (control experiment) no prime. In the target trials, participants' preferences were analysed to see whether there is a relation between collective/cumulative prime and collective/cumulative responses. Results of three experiments show that there is a symmetrical relation between collective prime and collective responses while there is an asymmetrical relation between cumulative prime and cumulative responses. It seems that native speakers of Turkish are prone to choose collective interpretation of the ambiguous sentences that contain more than one plural expression.
Motion predicates in Turkish: A morpho-syntactic treatment
Research on space and language has had fruitful outcomes in the last decades. One of the related domains of study is motion itself, which is central to our experience. Although the work on the semantic analysis of motion events have had a fruitful outcome in typological attempts to motion event encoding, a more recent approach to the field support the idea that motion independent properties which govern the morphological, lexical, and syntactic resources available to languages may determine the selection or tendency in motion framing of languages. The present study sets off to question this recent approach and focuses on actual motion events in Turkish from a structural point of view and investigates motion expressions in relation to subordination and case marking. It aims to understand what kind of case markings and subordinate expressions are used to encode motion events and to describe the relations, if any, between these structural elements and motion expressions. Apart from the structural investigation of motion expressions, the present study also addresses a preliminary analysis of fictive motion in Turkish, which is a totally different travel from the structural analysis. Two tasks were employed for the analysis of actual motion expressions and one task for the description of fictive motion expressions. Due to the nature of the content, no verbal expressions on it, and easy operability, The Pear film was taken as the first task of the study. A follow-up narrational experiment via a set of animated video clips was organized as the second task of the study. In the final section, a drawing task was administered to participants in order to account for the extent to which fictive motion is observable from the drawings. All the tasks are based on language production in their nature. The tasks were carried out online with individual participants (n=60), who are all native Turkish speakers. The findings of the study taken from both tasks found out that participants made use of certain subordinate constructions to elaborate their narrations of motion expressions. Three subordinate types were described from the frequently used ones to the least. Their relations with motion expressions were explained as encoding mainly the manner of motion; modifying the figure and/or ground elements of motion expressions. In regard to the use of case markings, three types of cases were observed in participants' descriptions. The functions of these cases were linked to the translocational dynamics of motion expressions. The findings are in line with similar studies of its kind (e.g. Jackendoff 1990, 1996; Croft et al., 2010; Ibarretxe Antuñano, 2009 and Beavers et al., 2010) which suggest a flexible classification or continuum of motion typology since languages may exhibit more varied motion constructions than they are expected or proposed to in just two- or three-way typology. In terms of the fictive motion analysis, judging from the differences shown in drawings of fictive and non-fictive pairs, the present study suggests that there may be traces of fictive motion as if there was some form of motion effect, but further analyses are needed to make sure about that. Overall, apart from being the first investigation of fictive motion in Turkish, the present study can be regarded to contribute to the studies within the domain of motion in general and in Turkish in two ways: First, the present study tested the use of framework (by Beavers et al., 2010) which highlights the place of linguistic resources in encoding motion events in a language and as the findings suggest, that framework can be really beneficial in using linguistic resources for the analysis of motion events. Second, using tools rich of motion for the analysis of motion events, the present study can shed light on new insights which emphasize the clausal patterns in description of motion events in Turkish where path and manner verbs are used and even supported via additional uses of subordinate clauses for extended motion events and descriptions via case markings.
Plant-themed metaphors in Turkish proverbs: A cognitive approach
Plants play an unneglectable role in human-life; therefore, they are among the most used concrete items that the human mind takes advantage of while understanding abstract concepts. The aim is to find out how Turkish people conceptualize plant-themed metaphors in Turkish proverbs. To this end, the Conceptual Metaphor Theory developed by Lakoff & Johnson (1980) was adopted. 2.298 proverbs contain plant-themed concepts. Based on the data, the plant-themed concepts are listed in a Table with their English translations. The most frequent concepts are found to be AĞAÇ (TREE), BAĞ (VINEYARD), GÜL (ROSE), HARMAN (THRESHING), OT (WEED); hence, these concepts were chosen. First, possible socio-economical and culture-specific justifications for the salience of each concept were investigated. For each metaphorical concept, twenty proverbs were used for target domain detection. In total, one hundred proverbs were examined. The proverbs were also analyzed by an interrater. Using the Miles-Hubermann reliability coefficient (1994), the source-target match's reliability was calculated. At this stage, the Cohen's Kappa Test (1960) was employed to analyze the reliability. Kappa values are found to be 0.73. The attributes denoted to each plant-themed concept were classified as negative, positive or neutral. The conceptual metaphors identified through the analysis are as follows: AĞAÇ İNSANDIR (TREE IS HUMAN), BAĞ MÜLKTÜR (VINEYARD IS PROPERTY), BAĞ EMEKTİR (VINEYARD IS WORK), BAĞ İSTENDİK SONUÇTUR (VINEYARD IS FAVORABLE OUTCOME), BAĞ AİLEDİR (VINEYARD IS FAMILY), GÜL GÜZELLİKTİR (ROSE IS BEAUTY), HARMAN DEĞERLİ VARLIKTIR (THRESHING IS VALUABLE POSSESSION), HARMAN ZAMANDIR (THRESHING IS TIME), HARMAN BOLLUKTUR (THRESHING IS ABUNDANCY), HARMAN EMEKTİR (THRESHING IS WORK) , OT GÜZELLİKTİR (WEED IS BEAUTY), OT İSTENMEYENDİR (WEED IS UNWANTED). The attributes classified as follows: AĞAÇ (TREE) is highly neutral, BAĞ (VINEYARD) is neutral or positive, GÜL (ROSE) is positive, HARMAN (THRESHING) is neutral or positive, and OT (WEED) is mostly positive.
Boosting and hedges in Turkish research articles
Stance refers to "different kinds of personal feelings and assessments, including attitudes that a speaker has about certain information" (Biber, 2006b: 99). Using appropriate linguistic conventions helps the author convey his stance. Metadiscourse is one of them. Among the metadiscourse markers, hedges and boosters are the noteworthy tools allowing the writers to present their stance in their texts (Hyland, 2009a). Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to examine the use of hedges and boosters in the results and discussion sections of research articles (RAs) produced in natural sciences (NS) and social sciences (SS). In the study, a total of forty RAs published in peer-reviewed journals in 2017 and 2018 were chosen from four academic disciplines: biology, chemistry, linguistics and psychological counseling and guidance and the selected RAs were analyzed quantitatively by adopting Hyland's (2005) interactional metadiscourse taxonomy. The occurrences of hedges and boosters in the sample were identified manually. Then, they were reanalyzed by an interrater to obtain more reliable results. The frequencies of hedges and boosters were calculated by a non-parametric test, Mann-Whitney U. The findings of the study revealed that the possibility structures have the highest frequencies in NS and SS. Passives are also found to occur frequently in NS and SS. Adverbial phrases and conditional clauses are the least frequent hedges in the sample. Regarding boosters, the study indicated that the private verbs and suasive verbs are the most common boosters. It was also found out that necessity/obligation modals are the second most frequent boosters. Adjectival phrases are also quite frequent in both fields. However, nominal sentences are found to be the least preferred boosters in both fields. Regarding the statistical differences in frequencies within the scope of fields, no significant difference was observed in the frequency of hedges and boosters.
The acquisition of null and overt subjects in L2 Turkish at the syntax discourse interface across different languages
This study investigates the acquisition of null and overt subjects at the syntax-discourse interface across discourse null subject and non-null subject languages in L2 Turkish and focuses on L1 transfer effects. Considering this, the study aims to understand whether discursive constraints residing at this interface is problematic to acquire as predicted by the Interface Hypothesis in contrast to Full Transfer / Full Access Hypothesis. Framed within the Syntax before Discourse Hypothesis considerations, it also inquires whether syntactic features are acquiered earlier than discursive principles regarding the use of null and overt subject distribution. The participants of the study consist of two learner groups and a control group. Intermediate and advanced L2 Turkish speakers of Korean and Japanese (n=42, intermediate=15, advanced=27) constitute the discourse null subject group. English and German L2 Turkish speakers at the intermediate and advanced level (n=26, intermediate=11, advanced=15) form the non-null subject group. The control group of the study is composed of native Turkish speakers (n=26). Three tasks were employed to fetch data. The Overt Pronoun Constraint Task was designed to assess the syntactic knowledge of the L2 Turkish speakers on the formal distribution of null and overt subjects in complex sentences with quantified/wh-word or referential DP antecedent contexts. As for the latter two tasks, the Contextualized Grammaticality Judgement Task and Question-Answer Task were framed to evaluate the acquisition of discursive constraints regulating the null and overt subject distribution at the syntax-discourse interface. For each task in the study, descriptive analysis and three statistical analyses were carried out. With respect to the findings of the study, the data taken from the the Contextualized Grammaticality Judgement Task and Question-Answer Task found that the L2 speakers of both learner groups and proficiency levels had problems in acquiring discursive constraints (topic continuity and topic shift) which govern the use of null and overt subjects. This finding is in line with the assertions of the Interface Hypothesis. Since the interface between syntax and discourse presents learnability problems, features residing at this interface cannot be fully acquired. Drawing on the languages with different typologies, the study also suggested that L1 transfer does not hold at the syntax-discourse interface since no difference was observed between two learner groups even though the speakers of discourse null subject group have the same discursive rules in their mother tongues as in Turkish, which necessarily refutes the claims of the Full Transfer models. This study also found that topic continuity and topic shift constructions were not violated equally by the L2 Turkish speakers. Since overt subjects are more salient to perceive and carry more information than null subjects in discourse, violating overt subject constructions in topic-shift contexts is less tolerable than using redundant (overt) subjects in topic-continuity contexts. Finally, the results of the Overt Pronoun Constraint Task found that the formal constraints that govern the co-indexation between subjects of the embedded and matrix clause were acquired by the advanced speakers of both groups despite some target deviant performances in the context of overt subjects. Since the L2 participants were more successful in this task than the discourse-bound tasks, this finding is in line with the Syntax before Discourse Hypothesis. Keywords Syntax-discourse interface, null subject parameter, null and overt subjects, co-reference interpretation, discursive constraints, topic continuity and topic shift
Figurative language competence of Turkish young adults with down syndrome: An analysis of idiom comprehension and interpretation
With a particular emphasis on idiom interpretation, the present dissertation aims at explaining the figurative comprehension of Turkish young adults with mild-level Down syndrome, comparing them with their typically developing chronological and mental age peers. Based on the two main hypotheses, i.e., Global Elaboration Model by Levorato and Cacciari (1995, 1999) and the Language Experience Hypothesis by Ortony et al. (1985), the study focuses on the performances of each group of subjects in a comparative manner. The data collection tools, composed of 12 familiar and 12 unfamiliar idioms, which are categorized in 6 first-degree and 6 third-degree idiom groups, have been tested with idiom-picture matching and in-context tasks. To evaluate the mental scores of all participants, Stanford Binet Intelligence Scale: Fourth Edition has been used. The findings elicited after the analyses of the applied task results demonstrate that the figurative comprehension of idioms was significantly weaker in individuals with Down syndrome than chronologically-matched typically developing controls. However, the participants with DS exhibit similar performances to those of the typically developing mental age peers. In relation to the types of tested idioms, the better performances of the DS group subjects have been observed in the comprehension of familiar and first-degree idioms, meaning that the familiarity and the semantic degree of idioms significantly mattered. The findings of the study also provide that as the mental age of the DS participants increases, so does their idiom interpretation increase. Additionally, the findings confirm the Global Elaboration Model and, taking it one step further, show that use of context is another facilitating factor for DS individuals, just as it is for typically developing subjects. The study, besides the field of linguistics, also contributes to the language-based visions and practices of special education experts, speech and language therapists, teachers and families, whose educational and therapeutic approaches matter in the lives of individuals with DS. Keywords: Turkish idiom comprehension, idiom categorization, mild-level Down syndrome, young DS adults, typically developing peers
Animacy effect on Turkish object relative clause production among young adult native speakers of Turkish
This study investigates animacy influence on Turkish RC formation and its consistency in different tasks/contexts. Meanwhile, the interference of semantic (e.g. frequency) and syntactic variables (e.g. structural difficulty) in RC formation is also analysed. Therefore, a Picture Description and Metalinguistic Awareness Task were applied to two participant groups composed of young adult Turkish native speakers (nG1=46, nG2=58). After combining the data of groups, animacy effect on RC passivization in each task was tested by Chi-square test and their RC outcomes were compared by Kappa to check the consistency of the animacy influence. Finally, RC and statements in METU Turkish Corpus were analysed and outcomes of 105 RCs and 657 statements data were compared with participant RC use outcomes by using Two-Proportions Analysis to check a possible frequency or structural simplicity effect on RC formation. In the end, a significant effect of animacy was observed in both tasks; however, the comparison outcomes attested no agreement between the tasks in terms of RC preferences. Thus, two factors were assumed to have interfered in RC production process in either task: visual salience and task difficulty. Corpus RCs also demonstrated a significant animacy influence, which was initially associated with the fine-grain version of Tuning Hypothesis; however, the two-proportions test results indicated some other factors that could have influenced the RC preferences in corpus like genre or some other semantic (e.g. concreteness) or discourse (e.g. topicalization) factors. Meanwhile, corpus statements did not demonstrate any reactions to animacy, yet they were concluded to share more similarities with Object RCs than passive RCs in terms of argument structure and word order, which were presumed to be the reasons for high rate of active ORC preference in participant data and for the statistical similarities between participant RC and corpus statement preferences as shown by two-proportions test.
Apologizing in Turkish and Korean: A cross-cultural study
This study investigates the apology strategies of native speakers of Turkish (NTR) and native speakers of Korean (NKR) in varying social situations in terms of social distance, social dominance and the severity of the offense. The study further aims at examining the similarities and differences in the apology strategies of NTR and NKR. The data of the study are collected through the use of a written discourse completion test (DCT) which consists of sixteen situations, twelve of which include different social situations and four of which include filler situations to prevent the participants from giving automatic answers. The analysis of the findings is done manually, and the apologies of the speakers are coded. The apology taxonomy of Hatipoğlu (2012) which is the modified version of the apology strategies of Cohen & Olshtain (1983) is adapted and used for the coding of the data. Later, the percentages of the apology strategies used by NTR and NKR are calculated for running descriptive statistics of the findings. The study tries to explain the differences and similarities of the apology strategies in the light of Hofstede's cultural dimensions (1981, 2001) and Politeness Theory (1987). The results of the study reveal that both speaker groups use explicit expression of apology commonly, however it was also observed that NKR use the strategy of explanation only when the addressee is in a hierarchically equal or lower position.
Thematic and discursive construction of homosexual movement in Turkey through Kaos GL magazine
This dissertation aims at investigating thematic and discursive construction of homosexuality through texts published in Kaos GL Magazine, the first and longest-standing alternative gay and lesbian publication in Turkey. More specifically, the research is an attempt to unearth two discursive-linguistic aspects of texts: (1) thematic distribution and thematic relation patterns of the texts; (2) discursive strategies and linguistic means and forms of realisation on which the construction of homosexual movement is based. To this end, 6 texts in the first five-year of the magazine (between the years 1994 and 1999) were purposively selected at the end of a preliminary inventory research, and included into grounded thematic analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). In the former analytical procedure, based on Grounded Theory (Glaser and Strauss, 1967; Corbin and Strauss, 2008), a systematic coding process was carried out, eventually finding out two most frequent thematic categories which describe the social order and the way homosexuals positioned themselves in the specific period of time. Textual segments pertaining to the categories obtained through the coding process were finally included into CDA. This analysis was based on the framework of the Discourse-Historical Approach, a well-established tradition in CDA studies. In accordance with this model and an added 'insider' perspective (Wodak, 2011), textual segments were diachronically analysed to find out the ways the social actors are represented (van Leeuwen, 1996 & Wodak et al., 2000). The findings of grounded thematic analysis show that, within five years, homosexuals' description of the social order was mostly and consistently based on the themes heterosexism and homophobia while a strong emphasis on constructing a collective and unifying action was observed in the second half of the period as a way of self-description. In a parallel sense CDA findings demonstrate that, in the context of the socio-historical background of the period, homosexuals construct a counter negative-othering discourse to describe the society in the early texts of the period while a positive-self presentation comes to the forefront towards the end of the period based on the goal of forming group solidarity. The study is significant for revealing that it is not always the marginalised groups that are negatively presented in dominant discourses but also marginalised in-groups can identify themselves with out-groups by making use of similar negative-other presentation strategies. In this sense this study has implications for researchers, particularly in the field of Queer Linguistics, who aim at investigating in-group discourses. Also, the findings of the study can serve as a basis for further research on the construction of homosexuality not only through texts but also other discursive practices. Keywords Critical Discourse Analysis, Queer Linguistics, social constructivism, homosexual movement, group identity, Kaos GL Magazine
An analysis of Turkish singular pronouns based on accessibilitytheory
This study aims at analyzing the use of Turkish singular overt and zero pronouns based on Accessibility Theory proposed by Ariel (1988). For this aim, a sample is compiled from Turkish novels. In the excerpts from these novels, there are Turkish 1st, 2nd and 3rd singular personal overt and zero subjects and their antecedents. The total number of excerpts in the sample is 300. The relation between the antecedent and the pronouns is examined related to three Accessibility dimensions, namely recency, givenness, and syntactic prominence. Recency effect refers to the sentences between the antecedent and the pronoun. The theory asserts that when recency increases, the use of zero pronouns decreases. Givenness effect is the number of mentions to the entity referred by the pronoun. The theory argues that when givenness increases, the possibility of the use of a zero pronoun also increases. The third effect, syntactic prominence effect, is about the subjecthood of the antecedent. When the antecedent is a subject, it is expected that zero pronouns instead of overt ones are employed. The aim of this study is to test the effects of these three dimensions of Accessibility Theory on the use of Turkish singular overt and zero pronouns. In order to achieve the aim of the study, the three dimensions of the Accessibility Theory are examined on the compiled sample. The use of overt and zero Turkish singular pronouns, ben (I), sen (you) and o (he/she/it), are analyzed separately and together in regard to the effects of recency, givenness, and syntactic prominence. The findings of the study do not completely support the assumptions of the Accessibility Theory. In another words, it is possible to state that Turkish overt and zero pronouns cannot be fully explained with these three dimensions. On the other hand, the findings also reveal that givenness factor has an effect for overt and null 1st person singular pronouns and that syntactic prominence is operative for overt and null 3rd person singular pronouns.
Intergenerational analysis of Kyrgyz and Russian languages in the context of post-Soviet revitalization policy
This thesis analyses Kyrgyz and Russian languages in terms of language use, language attitudes and language proficiency among young and old generations in Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan. The aim of this thesis is to investigate language use of two generations regarding Kyrgyz and Russian languages in different spheres of life, measure their proficiency in these languages and to analyze their attitudes towards these languages. In order to achieve these aims, a questionnaire was administered to 100 ethnic Kyrgyz participants living in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. The first group involved fifty participants who grew up in independent Kyrgyzstan. The second group included fifty Kyrgyz people who grew up in the Soviet regime. The data obtained were analyzed by using independent samples t-test and the chi-square test. The findings show that there is a significant difference between young and old generations in the following domains of language use: religious ceremonies, shopping, reading magazines and newspapers, telling the time and address. According to these findings, the young generation uses the Russian language more while the older generation uses the Kyrgyz language more. Next, the difference for the following domains is found to be statistically insignificant: family, university and work, interactions with friends outside of work or university, messaging, in writing formal papers and interactions in hospitals and formal places. These findings suggest that there is no relationship between age and language use in above-mentioned domains. The findings of the study also indicate that self-reported proficiency in Kyrgyz and Russian languages do not significantly differ between young and old generations. As for language attitudes, the findings do not show any significant difference between old and young generations in terms of their attitudes towards Kyrgyz and Russian languages. All in all, this study hopes to contribute to the better comprehension of the language situation in Kyrgyzstan and expand the linguistic information about it.
A structural and stylistic analysis of Turkish proverbs
This study examined Turkish proverbsin terms of structural analysis and proverbial markers to reveal what structures are prominant and how they affect Turkish proverbs. The universe of this study consist of 2667 proverbs and the sample size is determined as 338. The number of samples was obtained according to the total number of proverbs corresponding to each letter and they were selected randomly. The descriptive statistics was used to analyze the data. In syntactic analysis, findings show that tense markers and negation are significantly used. Passive, time/place adverbials and relative clauses are moderately used in the examples. Furthermore, aspect markers and modals are statistically insignificant. Frequently found structures among the categories mentionedare agentless passives, internal negation, present tense, modality morpheme –(y)mE(z)and relative clause –An. Examining grammatical structures, it is remarkably seen that suffixes are much more used rather than words. The reason for this is that suffixes are mostly attached at verbs, and nominal sentences are found less in the samples. Proverbial markers are examined under three categories: sentence type, proverbial devices and sentence function. In those three categories, simple sentences, compound – complex sentences, complex sentences, syntactic parallelism, rhyme, declerative sentencesand imperative sentences are significantly used. Findings also show that syntactic features affect the occurance of the elements of proverbial markers. In complex sentences, subordinate clause often consructed with relative clause suffixes.Also, in complex sentences, sub – clauses are mostly nominal. Most of the metaphors are used in nominal sentences, because it resemblesone thing to another by using the structure X is Y. Keywords Proverbs,syntactic analysis, proverbial marker
Codeswitching between Azeri and Persian: Sociolinguistic and structural aspects
The present study is an attempt to shed light on the language contact phenomenon viz. codeswitching occurring between Azeri and Persian by the bilingual speakers of these languages in the context of Tabriz, Iran. To this end, two sets of data were collected. In the first set, approximately 9 hours of naturally occurring conversations were audio recorded in various situations and places, such as a grocery store, a jewelry store, a spare parts shop, a hair salon, university campus, taxi, etc. For the second set of data, 7 video clips of TV interviews with the governmental authorities of Tabriz, Iran, was retrieved from a video streaming website. The recorded data were manually transcribed and codified. Analysis of the data was carried out at two stages, sociolinguistic analysis and structural analysis. For the purpose of structural analysis, Myers-Scotton's (1993) Matrix Language Frame Model and Myers-Scotton and Jakes's (2000) 4M Model were used. For the sociolinguistic analysis of the data, Myers-Scotton's (1993) Markedness Model was used. Findings of the research showed that, codeswitching occurred much more frequently in the TV interviews. Sociolinguistic analysis of the data also revealed that all of the codeswitching in the TV interviews were unmarked. Nevertheless, in the naturally occurring conversations, the noun phrases (NPs) that included proper nouns such as organization names, etc. were the "unmarked choices". In all of the constituents with "Matrix Language" and "Embedded Language" elements, Azeri proved to be the Matrix Language, providing the morphosyntactic frame for the constituent, and Persian was the Embedded Language. In the codeswitched sentences, Persian nouns had the highest number of occurrence in both data sets. There were Persian adjectives occurred in the data which were the second highest occurring Embedded Language elements among others. Regarding the frequency of the Matrix Lnaguage (Azeri) suffixes that inflected with the Embedded Language (Persian) elements, in the naturally occurring conversations, Azeri possessive suffixes occurred more frequently than other suffixes. In the TV interviews, Azeri person markers occurred more frequently than other ML suffixes and the Azeri instrumental markers were used less than other suffixes.
The impact of calibration on scoring reliability and rater severity in a business English written exam
This study investigates the impact of calibration on inter-rater reliability, intra-rater reliability, and rater severity in an online written examination. Six raters, with backgrounds in English Language Teaching, marked the same set of 32 exams in two phases, with a calibration meeting held in-between. Intraclass Correlation Coefficient analysis, T-tests, Many Facet Rasch Measurement, and descriptive statistics were used to evaluate the impact of calibration on reliability and severity. The findings suggested that calibration significantly enhances inter-rater reliability and scoring consistency while also highlighting the complexities of intra-rater reliability when calibration is introduced. Notable shifts in rater severity levels were also observed post-calibration. These findings have implications for ensuring reliability and consistency in evaluation processes. The results underscore the potential of calibration in improving the scoring reliability and reducing rater severity effects, contributing to a more reliable assessment process in corporate and educational settings.
A ray of light in samuel beckett's plays: waiting for godot, endgame, and happy days
The purpose of my thesis is to reveal a ray of light in a world of death, suffering, and decay in Samuel Beckett's plays: Waiting for Godot, Endgame, and Happy Days. In the thesis, I argue that Beckett shows how human beings can have hope, joy of life, and courage to go on in a world of void. The Introduction focuses on the time the plays were written. I discuss the impact of the post-World War II spirit on western drama and in particular Beckett's plays. Then Waiting for Godot, Endgame, and Happy Days are examined in terms of suffering, human persistence, and hope. In the discussion of the three plays, first, I show how Beckett portrays a gloomy, and dark atmosphere through a bare stage, and plot. The harsh living conditions that the characters have to endure are explained. Second, I explain that hope is an essential aspect of human nature. No matter how desperate characters' condition seems to be, they maintain their strength and courage to resume the struggle. Despite poverty, solitude, and boredom, they do not yield to death. The characters have an untiring hope that their living conditions will improve one-day. Finally, I conclude that Beckett himself should have had the belief in life in order to write his plays, novels, and poems.
The Relationship between proficiency in a foreign language and critical thinking skills
11 ABSTRACT THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PROFICIENCY IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS Meryem MİRİO?LÜ (AKÇAYOGLÜ) Ph. D. Dissertation, English Language Teaching Department Supervisor: Asst. Prof. Dr. Erdoğan BADA December, 2002, 144 Pages The present study focuses mainly on the relationship between proficiency in a foreign language and critical thinking skills. In the Adult Second Language learning process, individuals utilize various language learning strategies, for example inferencing, hypothesis testing, deducting, etc., which correspond to the characteristics of critical thinking. The effective use of these language strategies may contribute to success in language learning as well as critical thinking skills. During the process of second language learning, the learner is engaged in cognitive strategies. This experience of learning a second language may result in an increase of critical thinking ability of second language learners. Our findings indicate that a relationship between language proficiency and critical thinking is existent. Besides language proficiency, family background was found to have an impact on critical thinking skills. Key words; Critical Thinking Skills, Second Language Proficiency Level, Second Language Learning Strategies
The use of creative drama as an instructional strategy to enhance vocabulary of 7th and 8th grade students in primary schools
The aim of this study which consists of four chapters is to investigate the effects of creative drama activities on teaching vocabulary to 7th and 8th grade students in primary schools. The study was conducted in the 2010-2011 academic year, lasting 6 months. KaramÕk and Koçbeyli Primary Schools in Afyonkarahisar were taken as the case schools in order to collect and evaluate the data. The first chapter of the study is the introduction. It gives a general background of the research study, explains its aim and the scope, and gives brief explanation of the assumption, limitations and methodology of it. The second chapter defines what drama and drama terms are, explains the place of drama in education and language teaching, introduces drama techniques, describes the general advantages of the use of drama in education and particular benefits in terms of language teaching, presents drama in vocabulary teaching, and lastly, describes younge learners and their characteristics and the relationship between young learners and drama. The third chapter presents the methodology and the techniques of data analysis. Twelve tables and ten figures were examined and interpreted, and findings and comments were given. The fourth chapter is the conclusion. It provides a brief summary of the study. It also presents implications and some suggestions. In addition, the study has appendices; the complete versions of the twelve lesson plans, the complete versions of the exams and the questionnaire.
Anadolu Üniversitesi Hazırlık Okulu yazılı anlatım değerlendirmesi için kullanılan iki sistemin güvenilirliğinin değerlendirilmesi
Title: Evaluation of The Reliability of Two Grading Systems for Writing Assessment at Anadolu University Preparatory School. Author: Nesrin Oruc Thesis Chairperson: Dr. Patricia N. Sullivan Bilkent University, MA TEFL Program Committee members: David Palfreyman Michele Rajotte Bilkent University, MA TEFL Program Evaluating student writing is always a difficult task for English teachers. Not only it is time consuming to read a seemingly endless stack of compositions, but it is also difficult to write a grade in red ink on the work of a student which represents so much of her/himself, and to put our students into categories such as "A" student, "C" student, or "F" student brings up the issue of the most effective ways of assessing student writing. Assessing students' writing has always been accompanied by arguments between writing instructors at Anadolu University. This is not only because of the long hours spent on grading compositions, but also because of the inconsistencies among the grades and the graders. The main reason for this problem is that at Anadolu University a Standard Grading Format (SGF) has not been used for writing assessment. Instead writing instructors have used their individual grading system to evaluate papers. The main purpose of this research study was to examine writing instructors' individual approaches to assessing writing and then to determine whether the use of a holistic scoring scale would result in an increase in the reliability of the writing assessment at Anadolu University Preparatory School.The participants were six writing instructors from Anadolu University Preparatory School teaching writing to different levels. Half of the instructors were male, half were female. The instructors had between 1 and 10 years experience in language teaching and they were all non-native speakers. The process was begun by giving 15 papers chosen to represent different grade levels from the Anadolu University Preparatory School placement exam to instructors to grade in their accustomed manner. Then, after a training given an SGF using a five band holistic scoring scale which was adapted to Anadolu University Preparatory School, instructors were again given the same 15 papers and were asked to use the new SGF to grade the papers again. Data were analyzed first by a One-way ANOVA in order to find the mean scores of each system. Then the Student T-Test was used to compare the mean scores of the systems. The results of the One-way ANOVA indicate that there is significant relationship between the grades given to the same paper by five different instructors before and after the training which means both of the systems were reliable within themselves. On the other hand, the Student T-Test results indicate that there is a large difference between the scores given to the same papers by the same instructors with two different writing assessment systems. Consequently, no clear judgement can be made as to which system is superior. With regards to the grades given by the instructors for individual papers, the results of qualitative analysis indicate that inconsistencies arise from individual instructors' writing assessment practices and that this may be lessened with holistic scoring.
İki dillilerin zihin sözlüğünde gerçekleşen birinci ve ikinci dildeki eşdizimli sözcük işlemleme ilişkisinin incelenmesi
Many studies have attempted to investigate how the bilingual mental lexicon is structured and it has been suggested by various researchers that both lexicons or L1 and L2 lexical items in a single mental lexicon seem to interact to a certain extent during language production. However, there are certain disagreements over the interaction between these two mental lexicons or lexical items in a single lexicon during the lexical activation and selection processes. Particularly, some questions like "in which phase of the activation process can we observe an interaction?" and "what are the factors affecting this interaction?" have been raised. Another related topic scrutinized by many theoretical and applied linguists and hotly debated in the literature is whether the activation of lexis is language specific or language non-specific. The current study attempts to assume the process to be language non-specific (e.g. Green, 1986, 1998a, 1998b) and tries to illuminate the cross-linguistic nature of the bilingual mental lexicon with a specific emphasis on collocations, which seems to be an understudied topic. In addition, the research approaches the issue of cross-linguistic lexical priming from a syntagmatic perspective with the help of a typologically different language, Turkish, which previous research appears to lack. To be more precise, extending Hoey's (2005) lexical priming theory which suggests that every word is primed to occur with particular other words it collocates by studying a typologically different language, the study attempts to explore (a) the existence of collocational priming in Turkish in the bilingual mental lexicon, shed light on (b) the cross-linguistic aspect of collocational priming in L1 Turkish and L2 English bilinguals, and (c) illuminate the possible factors affecting (cross-linguistic) collocational priming in the bilingual mental lexicon. To this end, sixty collocational items were extracted from two balanced corpora based on their frequency values, semantic transparency and congruence. Next, three priming experiments were designed and the L1 Turkish-L2 English bilingual participants were asked to respond to a lexical decision task with the help of a software designed for reaction time experiments. The mean reaction times for collocate and noncollocate items were compared to investigate a potential viii priming effect. In addition, the influence of collocational frequency, congruence, typology, presentation direction (L1-L2 or L2-L1), and type of exposure on (cross- linguistic) collocation priming was scrutinized. The findings of the first experiment revealed that collocational priming existed in Turkish in the bilingual mental lexicon and collocational frequency played a significant role in collocational processing. The results of the second experiment indicated that there was cross-linguistic collocational priming for ADJ(ective)+N(oun) word combinations only suggesting a typology effect and that congruence, collocational frequency and presentation direction (L2-L1 or L1-L2) were playing partial roles in the process. Last but not least, the results of the third experiment whose participants had been living in the UK for at least two years showed that the type of exposure to L2 appeared to influence how collocations were processed cross-linguistically. The output from the experiments were discussed in the light of the current bilingual mental lexicon models and second language vocabulary acquisition frameworks; Spreading Activation Model (Collins and Loftus, 1975), Dual Activation of Collocational Connections (Wolter and Gyllstad, 2011), Modified Hierarchical Model (Pavlenko, 2009) and Psycholinguistic Model of Vocabulary Acquisition in L2 (Jiang, 2000).
Toplumsal anlamı dizinleme: Toplumsesbilgisel değişkenler ve Türkçenin dinleyici algısı
The communicative content taking place between speakers and listeners yield variation in which people transmit and interpret the messages. In regard to the variation in pronunciation, the phonemic nature of sounds and their implementations in various segmental environments constitute and transmit the message. When the phonological and phonetic aspects of speech are taken into consideration along with social aspects and social constructions, broader aspects of variation arise. In this sense, the broader aspects of variation exhibit the cumulation of knowledge in the society and they are realized and interpreted by language users as social meanings. In line with this, the current perception study aims to uncover the social meanings associated with the variant pronunciations of alveolar flap /ɾ/ and velar stop /k/ variables in Turkish. In regard to this preliminary aim, the study endeavours to bring an understanding to the social resources employed during the perception and lays out the indexical fields (Eckert, 2008) associated with the /ɾ/ and /k/ variables. In uncovering the socially accumulated knowledge in the perception of listeners, the study employs a tripartite experimental design. In the first phase, variant pronunciations of the sociophonetic variables (i.e., /ɾ/ and /k/) have been obtained through three distinct sociolinguistic data elicitation methods; sociolinguistic interviews, map task and read speech. In the second phase, the environmental aspects (i.e., duration and pitch) of these variables have been equalized and the tokens for the next phase have been determined. In the third phase, which focuses on the perception of these variables, qualitative and quantitative data have been gathered through sociolinguistic group interviews (N=110 in 30 groups) and matched guise survey (N=228) respectively. In the sociolinguistic group interviews, the listeners have been provided with social cues about the speaker as education and socioeconomic level. This interactional qualitative data have been analysed by employing ethnomethodological conversation analysis and further triangulated through a quantitative matched guise survey. The findings show that the /ɾ/ variation is perceived alongside two distinct social personae: tiki and gay men depending on who produces the variable. When produced by a female speaker, listeners have perceived the variable as a salient component of the sociolinguistic style of tiki persona, while they have perceived the same variable along with a gay persona when produced by a male speaker. On the /k/ variable, listeners have yielded an Inner Anatolian persona. In perceiving the speaker, it has been found that listeners exploit the social resources. These social resources, which are social cues and social information, have been employed by the listeners depending on the context of interaction. Thus, it can be argued that the context of interaction, which has been formulated through the social cues, themes and listeners' backgrounds, is a mediator between listeners' perception and the social persona of the speaker. Furthermore, stances adopted by the listeners are also determinant in the perception process and act as a mediator in the social meaning perceiving process. Thus, it can be stated that listeners' stances and their level of stance takings calibrate whether a sociophonetic variable bear indexical or iconic associations. The findings also show that social meaning perceiving is a complex process that draws on the relationship between the sociophonetic variant perceived, the context of interaction and the perceived persona of the speaker.
Absurdity in Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five and The Sirens of Titan, and Albert Camus' The Stranger and The Plague
Human depression and the atrocities of wars were major reasons behind the rise of absurdism as a philosophical and literary movement which became one of the most discussed and studied themes among authors and critics after the Second World War, and more precisely in the fifties and sixties of the previous century in Europe and later in America. The object of the present thesis is to describe and explain absurdity in the selected novels of American humanist writer, Kurt Vonnegut and French-Algerian writer who is also considered the founder of absurdism, Albert Camus. Thus, two novels of each writer are studied in terms of absurdity. In order to cast light more on the subject, the study provides the relation between absurdism and the other philosophical movements. In his novels, Vonnegut describes human condition and the cosmologically. He raises philosophical questions like how the cosmos works, why man is here, where he goes, etc. He is eager to find purpose, order, and reason in the cosmos because he cannot accept a senseless world, but instead he finds that pointless, unpredictable, and cruel things just senselessly happen. Camus, on the other hand, raises absurd themes in his works, and claims that human being is punished with a life which has no inherited meaning. According to Camus, the first step to confront the absurd for an individual is being conscious of the real condition and then revolting against it; he should no longer think about himself only, but also of others. Both writers find no intrinsic meaning or purpose in life although Vonnegut does not describe it as explicitly as Camus does. Furthermore, they have IV different approaches as for responding to the absurd, but since they are both atheists, they exclude clinging to religion as a correct response. Key Words: Absurdity, despair, death, purpose, hope, humanism, and life.