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Placeholders in present-day informal spoken English
Kuželková, Nina ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Lancová, Klára (referee)
The aim of the thesis is to describe one of the features of vague language called placeholders, the forms they are represented by, how frequently they occur in informal speech and in what contexts they are most likely to be used. The theoretical background comprises three parts. At first, the relationship between vague language and placeholders is discussed. Thereafter, vague language is defined itself and its features, types and aspects, namely grammatical, semantical, pragmatic and sociolinguistic, are explored in more detail. In the third part, the focus is then directed at placeholders themselves. In the analysis, two main groups of placeholders - what- placeholders and thing-placeholders - are further examined from both the morphologico- syntactical and pragmatic points of view. Furthermore, their frequency and gender-related use is also discussed. All the material analyzed in the thesis has been drawn from the Spoken British National Corpus 2014. KEYWORDS Vague language, placeholder, spoken English corpus, corupus linguistics
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Linguistic representation of female and male characters in the Harry Potter series of novels by J.K. Rowling
Landová, Alexandra ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Lancová, Klára (referee)
This thesis compares the ways female and male characters are represented in the Harry Potter series of novels, exploring how particular linguistic choices can shape gendered discourses. Methodologically, the thesis relies on the approaches of corpus stylistics, working with a corpus of Rowling's Harry Potter novels (using the KonText interface), and employing frequency lists and collocations as starting points of the analysis. By examining the most typical collocations of personal possessive pronouns his and her and noun referring to body parts, as well as 5- grams containing gendered possessive personal pronouns, I look at how male and female characters are typically linguistically represented in the Harry Potter series of novels. The analysis confirms that there is a certain imbalance in the linguistic representation of male and female characters, as has been mentioned in previous studies. Keywords: gender and language, gender in literature, corpus stylistics, Harry Potter
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Perception of Religious and Mythological Lexis among EFL Users
Boško, Martin ; Lancová, Klára (advisor) ; Pípalová, Renata (referee)
This diploma thesis explores the perception of mythological and religious lexis among EFL users with an emphasis on mythology. Firstly, it provides a brief theoretical introduction to the topic, after which the main research part describes and analyses the results of research conducted in several Czech lower and upper secondary schools. This research consisted of the assignment of a specially designed worksheet that aimed, among other things, to map students' knowledge of mythological and religious lexis. Two versions of this worksheet were created based on the level of English of the respondents. At the same time, it focused to a small extent on the respondents' ability to link the information within the given worksheet. The research showed that most respondents had some awareness of mythological lexis, with this awareness becoming less important with higher levels of English. However, it also showed that respondents who rated their own knowledge of mythology highly were more likely to succeed in linguistically based exercises. Furthermore, interlingual transfer played a large role in the ability to list the names of planets in English and indicated a relatively significant lack of knowledge on this topic. Finally, neither age nor English level appeared to affect respondents' ability to link...
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Phrasal compounds in English fiction
Rybínová, Veronika ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Lancová, Klára (referee)
The bachelor thesis deals with quotational/phrasal compounds in fiction. The work marginally describes word formation in contemporary English and gradually profiles itself from the category of compounds to phrasal compounds. They are examined on the basis of 109 examples from English original fiction from the English-Czech subcorpus of the parallel translation corpus InterCorp - version 13. The aim of this thesis is to analyse the structure of phrasal compounds, identify their types and their functions in the given functional style and also explore their translations into the Czech language. Based on the categories described in the theoretical part of the work, the practical part analyses particular attributes of phrasal compounds, which are illustrated by examples contained in the created subcorpus. KEYWORDS Phrasal compounds, quotational compounds, fiction, parallel translation corpus, translation counterparts, word formation
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Perception of English prototypes in Czech and German mono-lingual speakers
Kučerová, Alžběta ; Lancová, Klára (advisor) ; Červinková Poesová, Kristýna (referee)
[The purpose of this thesis is to investigate and describe how semantic prototypes are transferred and perceived from L1 Czech and L1 German participants into their L2 English. This thesis attempts to pinpoint and describe whether there are differences in the perception of the prototypes in the two monolingual groups, with the main focus on typicality judgement, grammatical gender and prepositional prototypes. The main assumed source of differences is considered to be the said L1 language background. A questionnaire was created for both Czech and German participants with seven tasks testing the perception of prototypes in their L2 English and to see whether a L1 to L2 negative language transfer takes place. The analysis shows that in the perception of prototypes within typicality judgement exercises, the two tested L1 groups do not differ largely and that the size of one's specialized vocabulary and the fact, that English is their L2, not L1, seems to play a role. Nonetheless, at the scale of this research, it seems plausible to say that prepositional and grammatical gender prototypes are transferred into the participants' L2. More in-depth research on the topic is needed; however, to confirm or reject these findings.]
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Czech High School Students' Attitudes and Beliefs about Native and Non-Native English Accents
Jandová, Daniela ; Červinková Poesová, Kristýna (advisor) ; Lancová, Klára (referee)
This bachelor thesis explores Czech high school students' attitudes and beliefs about native and non-native English accents. The theoretical part offers a comparison of the most significant research surveys both in Czech and foreign context. Furthermore, it also deals with the issues of accent discrimination towards native and non-native accents of English. The empirical part is based on a questionnaire survey. Its aim is to discover what knowledge of native and non-native accents Czech high school students have. It focuses primarily on the importance of accent among students and their personal pronunciation goals, for example if they would like to achieve native-like pronunciation. In addition, it explores what factors most influence students' choice of accent and how important they view the pronunciation of their teachers. Two groups of students were examined, students of the first and fourth year of grammar school. KEYWORDS accent attitudes, native accents, non-native accents, accent discrimination
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The Role of Czech-English Interlanguage Homonyms in Second-language Acquisition
Šupová, Marie ; Lancová, Klára (advisor) ; Jančovičová, Ivana (referee)
This bachelor thesis is concerned with the role of Czech-English interlanguage homonymy in the process of second-language acquisition. The aim is to prove or disprove that the Czech learners are not in general very well acquainted with Czech-English interlanguage homonyms and that various factors heavily influence the depth of their knowledge. The theoretical part provides a brief overview of the synchronic and diachronic development of both the Czech language and the English language, including the influence of the English language on Czech and their mutual history. A further focus is on explaining homonymy and the theory of interlanguage and its influence on second language acquisition. The practical part is based on a questionnaire and attempts to discover whether Czech learners are aware of the phenomenon of "false friends" and the differences between particular instances. Special emphasis is put on the individual factors that impact the learners' command of knowledge, such as depth and quality of knowledge, work or educational experience in an Anglophone country, length of learning English, and frequency of using English. The analysis and evaluation of the results confirmed the hypothesis as valid. KEYWORDS interlanguage, homonymy, second language acquisition, treacherous words
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