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Linguistic complexity of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series
Gottwald, Michal ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Jančovičová, Ivana (referee)
This bachelor thesis examines the language complexity in the initial and final volumes of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, testing the hypothesis that the novels' linguistic features, impacting readability, are adjusted to the intended readers' evolving comprehension and reading skills. As the series progresses, the complexity is expected to increase, reflecting the maturation of its audience. The research investigates whether the series' later novels are syntactically and lexically more complex than the earlier ones, with the help of employing corpus stylistic methodology. The theoretical part of this thesis outlines the definition of linguistic complexity and its relation to readability and discusses various methods of analyzing literature from a linguistic perspective. The complexity is measured using various criteria: the number of tokens, types, chapters, sentences, the extent and types of clausal subordination and non-finite clauses. Sentence length and type-token ratio are also considered. The methods include frequency lists and keyword analysis, complemented by a detailed examination of text samples. KEYWORDS complexity, children's literature, sentence structure
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Three ways of expressing future time in modern British fiction and non-fiction (will/shall + infinitive, to be going to + infinitive, present prograsive)
Mikuláš, Martin ; Jančovičová, Ivana (advisor) ; Pípalová, Renata (referee)
This diploma thesis analyses three selected ways of expressing futurity in modern English: will/shall + infinitive; the to be going to construction; and the present progressive tense. The expression of futurity is explored in fiction and non-fiction separately. However, this thesis concentrates only on written English. In Part One, several approaches to the phenomenon of futurity are introduced. In Part Two, the selected expressions of futurity are presented and analysed as to their meaning, distribution, syntactic and Contextual factors. Attention is paid to the proportion of occurrence of these expressions, their meanings, and how these are affected by context (situation, subject, negation, voice) and style. Analysis is made separately for fiction and non-fiction corpus; their comparison is included in the last chapter. The frequency of the occurrence of future expressions and their meanings in the two registers are summarised in tables at the end of the work and in graphs included in the text. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)
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Interference in Use of English Perfect Tenses by Czech Students of German
Taušková, Martina ; Matuchová, Klára (advisor) ; Jančovičová, Ivana (referee)
This thesis focuses on the influence of knowledge of the German language on use of English perfect tenses. It is based on the research, in which university students of English took part. The research does not prove that students who speak German (including students who do not study German as their major at university) achieve better results than others but it shows that among German speaking respondents, there is a direct proportion between the length of learning German and the amount of correct answers. The research shows that students who study both English and German as their major, scored significantly higher.
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Realisation of r sound in the Speech of Czech Learners of English
Hodková, Barbora ; Červinková Poesová, Kristýna (advisor) ; Jančovičová, Ivana (referee)
This bachelor thesis focuses on the differences between realisations of English and Czech /r/ sounds and the possible negative transfer from the mother tongue on the Czech speaker's pronunciation of /r/ in English. To evaluate the aforementioned phenomenon, a method using a pronunciation test and a questionnaire were used. The test consisted of a reading part and a picture description, where the second part provided semi-spontaneous talk. The questionnaire was designed so that the questions about the individual pronunciation-affecting factors were answered. The final analysis investigated whether the level of English and the age at which the speakers started to learn English directly affects the degree of native-like pronunciation of /r/ in English.
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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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The language of Dungeons & Dragons: a corpus-stylistic analysis
Košťál, Tomáš ; Malá, Markéta (advisor) ; Jančovičová, Ivana (referee)
The goal of the thesis is to describe the language of the tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons. Taking the existing theories pertaining to the study of texts from the perspective of a register, the creation of a narrative and common corpus-assisted tools and methods of analysis as its starting point, the thesis combines corpus-assisted quantitative (n-gram and word-list analyses with the help of concordances and collocations) and qualitative (subjective interpretation of select features based on personal knowledge of the material) methods to analyze a game of Dungeons & Dragons represented by a corpus comprising 29 consecutive episodes of an internet show dedicated to playing the game, Critical Role. The register analysis gives a functional interpretation of the situational and ubiquitous linguistic features of the game; in the latter part of the analysis, the linguistic means through which narrativity is achieved are examined, as is the degree to which various types of participants contribute to its creation. The thesis also demonstrates that some of its results can be generalized to tabletop role- playing games, of which Dungeons & Dragons is an iconic example. Lastly, this paper evaluates the appropriateness of employing these methods of analysis in the study of this type of text.
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