Linguistics Beyond and Within, 2019, Vol. 5

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    Explaining IT programming concepts using NSM explications: The case of ‘variable’ and ‘constant’
    (Wydawnictwo KUL, 2019) Biegajło, Bartłomiej
    The paper seeks to explore a practical application of Natural Semantic Metalanguage in defining two core concepts in computer programming, i.e. the concept of a variable and the concept of a constant. The investigation of both programming concepts is carried out with reference to Apple’s Swift programming language, which is now the dominant language in creating applications designed for Apple’s devices. The explications of a variable and a constant developed in this paper are tentative definitions of the most fundamental functionalities behind the two programming concepts. They are meant to ease the learning experience of programming enthusiasts who are at the early stages of their learning path.
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    Slang in animated cartoons: Translation peculiarities
    (Wydawnictwo KUL, 2019) Bondarenko, Kateryna
    The research focuses on analysing the function of slang in modern cartoons (Madagascar 2, Kung Fu Panda, Shrek, Open Season, Cars) as well as translation strategies used to convey accurate meaning. Our data from film scripts (163 examples containing slang terms) has proved that slang, as an important part of cartoons’ verbal component, should be and mainly retained in translation. Excerpts from original cartoons scripts show slang use, that may function both for the protagonists’ characterisation and for the mapping of humor (carnivalesque) world picture. Componential analysis of meaning – breaking down the sense of slang terms into their minimal distinctive features – was used to determine the meaning of lexemes and reconstruct semantic domains actively verbalised by slang. The assumption has been made that due to the universality of domains slang can be potentially translated in most cases. Componential analysis is particularly applicable to semantically related lexemes (in one language or comparable ones). A thorough analysis of slang translation showed the employment of the following strategies: stylistic compensation (50.3%), literal translation (44.7%), omission (4.9%) and cultural equivalence (0.1%). As seen, a substantial proportion of the slang words can be translated from English into Ukrainian without significant loss of meaning. The neutralisation of slang appears to be inevitable in some cases.
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    Verb-particle constructions in Cognitive Linguistics perspective: Compositionality behind selected English phrasal verbs
    (Wydawnictwo KUL, 2019) Jarosz, Izabela
    The developments in Cognitive Linguistics have made it possible to uncover multiple meanings of composite structures to the effect that more and more scholars have become interested in the issue of semantic relations in verb-particle constructions. With only a handful of those focusing on both elements of such constructions, many of them have directed their research towards the study of particles exclusively. The current paper aims to advance the study on phrasal verbs by offering a new outlook on their compositional nature. In order to achieve a desired aim, the principle of partial compositionality is adopted here. Hence, apart from focusing on both the verb and the particle, the senses that go beyond those comprising the composite parts receive considerable attention in this study. The phrasal verbs singled out for the purpose of the analysis include: get and take with selected spatial-orientational particles.
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    But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ Meaning construction in medical encounters
    (Wydawnictwo KUL, 2019) Kárpáti, Eszter; Kleiber, Judit
    This paper investigates interpretation in medical context. Our question is how institutional context influences the utterance meaning: if it is really triple layered (literal, utterance-type or pragmatic, Levinson 2000), or rather a continuum (Wilson 2016). Even idiomatic language use (Kecskes 2017) can induce uncertainty and obscurity, which can be and has to be solved in the given dialogue or discourse context (Wilson and Kolaiti 2017). The paper analyzes various medical encounters in a formal pragmasemantic model called ÂeALIS (Alberti and Kleiber 2014). The benefit of applying this system is that it represents the interlocutors’ mental states (beliefs, desires, and intentions) supplemented by the parameter of authority, by which the occurring mismatches can be captured formally. We have found that two main types of mismatch can be differentiated, and both of them can be originated from the fact that the context is not the same for the participants. Our findings support the view that meaning construction is rather flexible and context-sensitive: it can be considered as wandering along the meaning continuum without any clues.
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    How does foreign accent affect template matching mechanisms? ERP evidence from Polish
    (Wydawnictwo KUL, 2019) Kędzierska, Hanna
    Sentential context is believed to have particularly robust effects on the processing of foreign-accented speech (Lev-Ari 2015). However, recent neurolinguistic studies investigating the relation between non-native speech and semantic predictability suggest that anticipation mechanisms are, in fact, hampered during the processing of foreign accents (Romero-Rivas et al. 2016). The current study is an attempt to shed more light on this issue and establish whether the mechanisms responsible for categorical template matching remain active during the processing of non-native speech. The study investigated neural reactions towards high cloze probability template endings (i.e., the endings of fixed phrases selected in a pre-test) and their unexpected counterparts. 120 Polish sentences were recorded by a native Polish speaker and a non-native (L1 Ukrainian) speaker of Polish in order to investigate the reactions towards an easily recognizable foreign accent. The brain activity of 28 monolinguals (L1 Polish) was recorded during the EEG sessions. In native-accented speech, violations of high cloze probability items resulted in a broadly distributed negativity followed by a P600 effect. No comparable effects were observed in the case of foreign-accented speech. These results are compatible with previous findings (Hanulíková et al. 2012; Romero-Rivas et al. 2016) as they confirm that linguistic anticipatory and reanalysis processes are hampered in the case of non-native speech.