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A Case Study of Transitivity Analysis of Trump’s Winning Speech Based on Systematic Functional Grammar
Issue:
Volume 7, Issue 4, July 2019
Pages:
150-157
Received:
2 April 2019
Accepted:
23 May 2019
Published:
2 July 2019
Abstract: The systematic functional grammar proposed by Halliday has profound influence on the linguistic theory research in the second half of the 20th century. Halliday believes language has three meta-functions: ideational function, interpersonal function and textual function. The ideational function is to convey new information, to communicate a content that is unknown to the hearer. The ideational function mainly consists of transitivity and voice. Transitivity is simply the grammar of the clause in its ideational aspect. It consists of six different processes: Material process, Behavioral process, Mental process, Verbal process, Relational process and Existential process. Political speech is an important form of public speech and it plays an extremely important role in political life. Based on Halliday’s ideational functional theory, the thesis selects Trump’s winning speech and analyzes it from the perspective of transitivity system. The main purpose of the article is to analyze Trump’s language skills, and at the same time, provide a research idea and method for readers to interpret political speech discourse. This article revolves around the following two questions: 1. How are the six processes distributed in Trump’s winning speech? 2. What are the functions of the six processes in Trump’s speech? Based on these two questions, this paper conducts statistics on speech through quantitative and qualitative analysis. Through analysis, the author finds that there are three processes used frequently. They are relational process (35%), material process (30%), mental process (24%) in turn. While the verbal process (8%), the behavioral process (2%), and the existential process (1%) are very low frequency. This is because of Trump’s speech intention. As a new president, he needs to express his own ideas, clarify his position and policies affecting people’s emotions, call for public support, and clarify his vision and plan for the future of the United States.
Abstract: The systematic functional grammar proposed by Halliday has profound influence on the linguistic theory research in the second half of the 20th century. Halliday believes language has three meta-functions: ideational function, interpersonal function and textual function. The ideational function is to convey new information, to communicate a content ...
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A Brief Description on Impersonal Constructions in Uyghur
Issue:
Volume 7, Issue 4, July 2019
Pages:
158-165
Received:
13 June 2019
Accepted:
8 July 2019
Published:
17 July 2019
Abstract: Impersonal constructions have been a regular topic of investigation in various languages which belong to different language families across the world. Discussions over Impersonal constructions would constitute main contribution to the theoretical study. Although impersonal constructions are the main characteristics of Uyghur, but it’s been hardly noticed by theoretical linguists. With this research, I would like to put forward the idea that Uyghur also have a wide variety of impersonal constructions, the analysis of which would bring an interesting contribution to the typology of impersonality. Scholars conceive impersonal constructions in different terms, some apply morphological methods, and others adopt syntactic approaches. Whichever methodology they apply, it is unarguable that impersonal constructions are agentless by nature, in which the sentences may not have an overt subject. They are many varieties of types, such as agentless gerunds, agentless passives, existential sentences etc. Since Uyghur is a pro-drop language, omitting the pronominal subject also helps to form impersonal constructions. This paper provides a brief description on the types of impersonal constructions, explicates several ways of forming agentless sentences, and introduces main types of impersonal sentences in Uyghur.
Abstract: Impersonal constructions have been a regular topic of investigation in various languages which belong to different language families across the world. Discussions over Impersonal constructions would constitute main contribution to the theoretical study. Although impersonal constructions are the main characteristics of Uyghur, but it’s been hardly n...
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Measuring Breadth and Depth of Vocabulary Knowledge of Chinese EFL Learners at Different Learning Stages
Issue:
Volume 7, Issue 4, July 2019
Pages:
166-171
Received:
23 May 2019
Accepted:
29 June 2019
Published:
22 July 2019
Abstract: An updated Vocabulary Levels Test and an updated Word Associates Test are conducted to measure the breadth and depth of vocabulary Knowledge of Chinese EFL learners from junior middle school to senior middle school to college respectively in this research. The ANOVA analyses of the test results show that Chinese learners’ breadth knowledge at any learning stage is insufficient and does not meet the requirements of corresponding English teaching syllabus although there is significant development from junior middle school to senior middle school to college. With the rise of learning stages, the difference of the acquisition of lower level words gradually disappears and the difference of higher level words appears. Compared to breadth knowledge, Chinese learners perform worse in the test of depth of vocabulary knowledge. Although there is a significant rise from lower stages to higher stages, the development of depth of vocabulary knowledge is very slow and dissatisfied. The main reason for it is that Chinese students value the expansion of vocabulary size and neglect the establishment of semantic and collocational relationship among words. The results of the Pearson correlation analysis show that there is little correlation between Chinese learners’ breadth of vocabulary knowledge and depth of vocabulary knowledge.
Abstract: An updated Vocabulary Levels Test and an updated Word Associates Test are conducted to measure the breadth and depth of vocabulary Knowledge of Chinese EFL learners from junior middle school to senior middle school to college respectively in this research. The ANOVA analyses of the test results show that Chinese learners’ breadth knowledge at any l...
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Vietnamese EFL Teachers’ Classroom Assessment Practice at the Implementation of the Pilot Primary Curriculum
Pham Thi Nguyen Ai,
Nguyen Vu Quynh Nhu,
Nguyen Ho Hoang Thuy
Issue:
Volume 7, Issue 4, July 2019
Pages:
172-177
Received:
7 May 2019
Accepted:
27 June 2019
Published:
23 July 2019
Abstract: With the launch of the National Foreign Language 2020 Project, the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) has introduced a pilot English curriculum for the primary educational level, which aims to help primary school pupils achieve level A1 in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). The implementation of the new curriculum requires major change in teaching methodology, teaching materials and classroom assessment. A new textbook series has also been developed in alignment with the pilot curriculum. Methodology training workshops have been provided so as to facilitate the process of implementing the new curriculum and textbooks. Classroom assessment training curriculum developed in accordance with the pilot curriculum has been delivered to key primary English language teachers. This study reports our investigation into changes teachers have made in their assessment practice on the implementation of the pilot primary English language curriculum. The research involves 67 teachers of primary schools implementing the new curriculum. Data are collected by means of teachers’ in-depth interview and assessment samples. The findings have shown that the investigated teachers have made effort to change their assessment practice so as to facilitate the new curriculum. However, there are still a number of contextual and perceptual factors interfering with the process of changing the assessment practice.
Abstract: With the launch of the National Foreign Language 2020 Project, the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) has introduced a pilot English curriculum for the primary educational level, which aims to help primary school pupils achieve level A1 in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). The implementation of the n...
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A Corpus Analysis of ‘Death’ and ‘Life’ Metaphorical Expressions Based on Forough Farrokhzad’s Persian Poetry Book
Mohammad Aliakbari,
Yousef Karami
Issue:
Volume 7, Issue 4, July 2019
Pages:
178-181
Received:
11 June 2019
Accepted:
10 July 2019
Published:
23 July 2019
Abstract: Many inquiries of cognitive linguistics represented that conceptual metaphors have played a substantial role in the conceptual system of human. Metaphors are frequently grounded in culture and can thus answer as a beneficent source for the consideration of cultural ideas alluded in language. The present study attended the distribution of death and life conceptual metaphors in Forough Farrokhzad’s Persian poetry book and their metaphoric frequency in the users’ ideas, opinions, and thoughts. By studying Forough Farrokhzad’s Persian poetry book as one of the well-known literary books, rich of, death and life metaphorical expressions, a corpus of 33 death and life conceptual metaphors has been selected and analyzed. Two rators who were Persian Literature teachers were interviewed to prepare us by investigating the accuracy of the conceptions of death and life metaphors within the poems and giving their comments. Furthermore, as a research method, a focus group was employed by Persian Literature teachers to present their opinions about the positive and negative connotations of the included death and life metaphors in the pertinent book. Findings proposed that death and life metaphors are not equally distributed in this book, are used with multiple conceptions and stood for either positive or negative connotations. Likewise, it was detected that death and life metaphoric expressions mostly show positive attitudes, but some of these metaphors break the available rule, connoting negative attitudes only.
Abstract: Many inquiries of cognitive linguistics represented that conceptual metaphors have played a substantial role in the conceptual system of human. Metaphors are frequently grounded in culture and can thus answer as a beneficent source for the consideration of cultural ideas alluded in language. The present study attended the distribution of death and ...
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