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Specific Grammatical Features of African-American Vernacular
Nelson, Sabina ; Šaldová, Pavlína (advisor) ; Popelíková, Jiřina (referee)
The thesis focuses on grammatical features of African American Vernacular English (AAVE). The theoretical part provides general information on the variety and describes the morphological and syntactic features that distinguish the variety from Standard American English (SAE) or other vernaculars. The main source used to capture these specific features is Lisa Green's African American English: A Linguistic Introduction (2002), which was found to present the most contemporary and detailed description of the variety. Occasionally, materials by other linguists were also employed. At the end of the theoretical part, a brief summary of features of SAE is included in order to show what the variety is contrasted with. The empirical part of the thesis surveys the morpho-syntactic specificity of the vernacular as represented in fiction, identifying and classifying one hundred features of AAVE in each of three contemporary African American writings: The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Beloved by Toni Morrison and Brothers and Keepers by John Edgar Wideman. The majority of specific features are found in the area of verbs whose morphology tends, in general, to be specific in all vernaculars, but other word classes and syntactic structures are represented as well. Key words: African American Vernacular English,...
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Discourse functions of imperative "look" and "listen" in comparison with their Czech counterparts
Tomašovičová, Katarína ; Dušková, Libuše (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
The present paper studies the English imperatives look and listen used as discourse markers. The study focuses on two aspects: firstly, to identify the factors indicating the primary function as opposed to the discourse function of look and listen in English, and secondly, to analyse the Czech counterparts of these verbs used as discourse markers. The paper is comprised of two main parts. The first, theoretical background, describes the grammatical form of the English imperative with focus on look and listen, the concept of discourse markers, the cross-linguistic studies focusing specifically on look and listen, the correspondence between English and Czech imperative, and the potential Czech counterparts. The second, empirical part analyses two hundred and three examples of the imperatives look and listen and their Czech counterparts from the parallel translation corpus InterCorp. Key words: imperative, look, listen, discourse markers, primary function, Czech counterpart
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The syntax and semantics of the subject "it" as a style marker
Fišerová, Helena ; Dušková, Libuše (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
This thesis analyses the distribution of the different functions of the subject it in two text types: academic prose and fiction. The objective of the thesis is to discover to what extent and in which aspects the two examined text types differ. The analysis is based on two hundred examples of it in the subject function obtained from the British National Corpus (BNC), one half of them drawn from academic prose, the other from fiction. The functions of it analysed include anaphoric it, anticipatory it, empty it and it as the subject in a cleft sentence (focusing it). The discussion of anaphoric it focuses on the distance of the referent from the pronoun, the realisation form and semantic role of the referent; in the case of anticipatory it, attention is paid to the type of subordinate clause realising the extraposed subject and the realisation form and semantics of the predicate in the superordinate clause; for the cleft sentence, the analysis deals mainly with the realisation form and underlying syntactic function of the focused element. Additionally, the instances of it that did not fit into any of the four main categories are also examined. The two text types are first discussed separately, and the findings are then compared in the final part of the thesis. Key words: anaphoric it, anticipatory...
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The role of metalanguage in ELT
Masopustová, Lucie ; Gráf, Tomáš (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
(in English) The thesis deals with the topic of the role of metalanguage and metalinguistic terminology in English Language Teaching at Czech grammar schools. The concepts of metalanguage and metalinguistic terminology are viewed as one of the potential educational tools in the field of learning and teaching English grammar. The theoretical part of the thesis focuses, among other things, on benefits and limitations of the use of metalanguage, and on the suitability of conditions for the use of metalanguage, i.e. on the variables which may affect the educational process are discussed in this part as well. Moreover, an overview of the approaches to teaching grammar in relation to the use of metalanguage and metalinguistic terminology is provided in this chapter together with the summary of findings obtained from the studies concerned with learners or teachers knowledge of metalinguistic terminology. The empirical part is based on the questionnaire survey among Czech grammar school students and teachers. The main areas examined in the research are: learners' and teachers' attitudes to and beliefs about learning and teaching English and English grammar, learners' and teachers' attitudes to metalinguistic terminology as well as learners' knowledge of the terminology and teachers' awareness of the...
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The functions of comment clause "you know" in literature and the TV sitcom "Friends", and its Czech translation counterparts
Kuthanová, Magdalena ; Brůhová, Gabriela (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
The aim of the present study is to describe and analyze the English comment clause you know in a corpus of written sources called Intercorp and a corpus created of eight episodes of the television series Friends, which represents the natural language. The study works with the presumption that the language of the TV show Friends is in its conversational nature similar to the natural language of conversations and therefore can be contrasted to the artificial language of written form. As the Czech translations of both corpora are available to us, the study greatly focuses on two main aspects: the Czech translation counterparts of the you know comment clause and their pragmatic functions. The theoretical part introduces the comment clauses, describing their features and functions, not only as described by Quirk et al. (1985), but also from the point of view of the discourse linguists that see the comment clauses like you know as markers and specialize in their research, mostly Povolná (2010), Stenström (1995), Schiffrin (1987) and others. The outline of potential Czech counterparts is given as well, suggested by Dušková (2009), Běličová (1993) and duo Grepl & Karlík (1998, 1999). Moreover, we mention the language of television and the difference between conventional and audiovisual translation, and the...
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Syntactic, semantic and stylistic aspects of the subject of the infinitive
Straková, Radka ; Dušková, Libuše (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
The diploma thesis is concerned with syntactic, semantic and stylistic aspects of the subject of the infinitive. The aim is to examine all forms of realization of the infinitival subject, and to investigate relation between the syntactic function of the infinitive and the form and semantics of its subject. Furthermore, the thesis attempts to characterise and compare fiction and academic prose in terms of realization of the subject of the infinitive. In the theoretical part of the study, the infinitive is introduced as one of the means of complex condensation, and is discussed from a formal and functional point of view. Further, a general characterisation of the subject of the infinitive is presented, focusing on various forms of its realization and on its interpretation. The main part of the study, the corpus-based research, consists in a detailed analysis of 200 instances of an infinitival clause collected from the British National Corpus. Since the study focuses on two different registers, the material is analysed for each of them separately. In the last part of the analysis, the registers are subsequently compared in terms of distribution of syntactic functions of the infinitive and realization of the infinitival subject.
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Structural ambiguity based on the grammatical indeterminacy of the ing-nonfinite form in subject position
Vojtěch, Albert ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
This thesis deals with the structural ambiguity of constructions similar to Flying planes can be dangerous, where the ambiguity can arise due to the grammatical indeterminacy of ing- nonfinite form that can be interpreted both as gerund and participle. The ambiguity is analysed on the basis of the transitivity of ing-nonfinite form and subsequently on its semantic compatibility with the noun in the role of subject and object, in the ideal case the ambiguity and compatibility is tested further in the sentence context. The first part, the theoretical background presents us with what the secondary sources say to the phenomenon of ambiguity, distinguishes the types of ambiguity and also covers the grammatical description of non-finite verb forms. The Second part, material and method, describes the method of sampling, which brought us 2 samples extracted from British National Corpus. First sample comprises of 25 instances of "ing-nonfinite form + noun + verb constructions" (sg/pl, type of verb and verb tense are not restricted) and the second sample comprises of 100 instances of similar constructions, however the verb following the noun has been restricted on formal grounds for verb tense, verb type and number in order not to represent a hindrance for the ambiguity. The third, analytical part comprises...
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English adverbial participial constructions and their Czech and French translation counterparts
Chmelařová, Jitka ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
Participial constructions are usually studied as means of complex condensation, the degree of which is directly related with the typology of the given language. The present thesis focuses rather on the functions of these constructions in English and their reflection in Czech and French translation counterparts. Previous research suggests that syntactic congruence will be rare. Translation counterparts should include instances of coordination and subordination, the latter of which is associated with explicitation of the implied semantic relations. Excerpts for the analysis are drawn from the parallel corpus InterCorp. The 100 excerpts of English adverbial participial constructions were excerpted only from original English texts, along with their Czech and French translation counterparts. The present BA thesis focuses only on -ing participial constructions. The excerpts are analysed in terms of the English construction (syntactic structure, degree of integration, position, presence of subordinators, semantic relation to the superordinate clause) and in terms of the type of translation correspondence in both languages (congruent/ divergent counterpart, its syntactic structure and function).
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The duration of stressed and unstressed vowels in English speakers of Spanish
Kubánková, Eliška ; Skarnitzl, Radek (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
The thesis discusses the topic of word stress in Spanish and its acoustic correlates. The fact that studies in the last decades have shown conflicting opinions regarding the subject demonstrates the complexity of the phenomenon. Stress is not only language-specific, but also bound to context. When acquiring a second language, speakers have the tendency to transmit the phonetic and phonological system of their mother tongue to the target language. The aim of the thesis is to examine the acoustic correlate of duration in the Spanish of English speakers, considering the impact of language transfer. Twelve English speakers were recorded speaking Spanish. The duration of vowels in both stressed and unstressed syllables was measured in disyllabic, trisyllabic and quadrisyllabic words with different positions of the stressed syllable. The results indicated variation across stress schemes. Overall, a longer duration of the vowel in stressed syllable was found in disyllabic and trisyllabic oxytone words, and in quadrisyllabic paroxytone words. In trisyllabic paroxytone and proparoxytone words, the relative difference of vowel durations between stressed and unstressed syllables was less significant, likely due to the tendency of final syllable lengthening, which was recorded in all word types. No significant...
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English counterparts of Czech finite subjectless clauses
Pospíšil, Jan ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Šaldová, Pavlína (referee)
The thesis focuses on the English counterparts of a Czech clause type which does not exist in English - finite subjectless clauses. These Czech clauses with a verbal or verbo-nominal predicate correspond to English clauses with a subject and a predicate. The thesis describes the repertoire of means used as subjects of the English constructions, also examining the factors which influence the choice of a particular subject and predicate, and the structure of the English sentence. The most influential factors are linked with the semantic class of the clause, i.e. whether it refers to the states of the surrounding environment or physical and psychical states, whether a general human agent is implied, or whether the meaning of the clause is associated with modality. The material is extracted from the Czech-English parallel corpus InterCorp. One hundred examples of Czech finite subjectless clauses were obtained from Czech original texts (the "core" texts). The clauses extracted comprise predicates which include the third person singular of an active past participle, i.e. Setmělo se. Došlo k nedorozumění.
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