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A contrastive description of English and Czech using the methodology of n-gram extraction
Šebestová, Denisa ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Březina, Václav (referee) ; Kopřivová, Marie (referee)
This dissertation examines phraseological patterns in three registers (parliamentary debates, newspaper reporting, children's fiction) in English and Czech. It identifies and analyses recurrent word sequences through n-gram extraction, aiming to characterise the phraseology of each register and compare them cross- linguistically, while observing how the n-gram method can be adapted to accommodate for the typological properties of each language. Czech is particularly challenging in this respect due to its morphological and positional variability. The dissertation comprises three case studies, each focussed on a different register. The first case study explores different n-gram lengths using a small corpus of a specialised register - parliamentary debates, suggesting that for a comprehensive register characterisation, different lengths should be combined. It notes the importance of discourse-structuring patterns and the problem of overlaps between n-grams. In the newspaper study, I extract n-grams containing prepositions - a convenient starting point given their frequency and involvement in text- structuring. N-grams are complemented with collocation analysis, revealing some evaluative prosodies and semantic preferences of patterns and suggesting that the newspaper register is not purely...
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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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Intonation of cleft and pseudo-cleft sentences in the speech of advanced Czech learners of English
Hynková, Tereza ; Červinková Poesová, Kristýna (advisor) ; Malá, Markéta (referee)
The bachelor thesis examines the intonation of English cleft and pseudo-cleft sentences in the speech of advanced Czech ESL students. The aim of the thesis is to describe the tone choice in speech realisations of cleft and pseudo-cleft constructions produced by Czech ESL students. The first part scrutinizes literature and sets a theoretical framework for the small-scale research conducted in the second part of the thesis. The theoretical part describes the syntax of cleft and pseudo-cleft constructions, it focuses on the functional sentence perspective and provides basic information about intonation. In the second part, audio recordings are analysed in order to examine the Czech speakers' usage of tones when reading a meaningful conversation containing the target structures. It concludes that the falling tone is prevalent in the realisations of cleft sentences, whereas the productions of pseudo-clefts are more diverse. Moreover, the respondents are likely to realise three or more out of five cleft sentences using the same realisation type. They are likely to realize three or fewer out of five pseudo-cleft sentences using the same realisation type. The thesis sheds light on a marginal topic that is not popular among researchers. It compiles information on the intonation of clefts and pseudo-clefts...
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Syntactic and FSP aspects of the existential construction in fiction
Drenková, Leona ; Dušková, Libuše (advisor) ; Malá, Markéta (referee)
The aim of this study is to examine the existential construction there is / there are from two viewpoints: syntactic and functional. Analytical tools devised in the framework of functional sentence perspective (FSP) are employed to explore information structure in two types of existential constructions, viz. bare existential constructions and existential constructions with adverbial(s). The study first comprehensively explains the core of the FSP theory and concepts employed in consequent FSP analyses. The analysis of bare existentials is concerned with two areas of examination. First, syntactic structure of the subject noun phrase is examined; attention is paid primarily to types of modification involved. Second, the FSP structure is identified; the main focus being placed on the structure of the notional subject. A special attention is paid to the FSP patterns the bare existential construction can implement. The problem of questions and focalizers is touched upon. The analysis of existentials with adverbial(s) focuses on the FSP role of adverbials in relation to their position in the sentence, semantics and contextual boundness. Finally the problem of potentiality is pointed out and the occurrence of other verbs than be is discussed. The outcome of the study is to identify communicative functions the...
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