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English as a Lingua Franca and Simultaneous Interpreting: Potential Challenges and Strategies Applied
Schlöglová, Tereza ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Luef, Eva Maria (referee)
This thesis focuses on simultaneous interpreting of speeches delivered by non-native speakers of English (ELF speeches). The continuing expansion of English and increased use of the language among non-native speakers as a common lingua franca changes the face of the interpreting profession today. The theoretical part of this thesis examines some of the basic notions of ELF research and explores how they relate to the act of simultaneous interpreting. A few key theories of interpreting are introduced, as well, to argue why the very diverse speeches by non-native speakers might be considered more challenging. The practical part seeks answers to research questions related to the speakers on the Czech and European interpreting markets, to the strategies used while interpreting ELF speeches. Data is gathered via interviews with professional interpreters with a Czech-English combination. From the analysis emerges information regarding the English these speakers use, what strategies are useful in such situations, what are the most important differences between interpreting native and non-native speakers of English, and what should interpreter training look like to prepare students for the current market conditions. Keywords: simultaneous interpretation, English as a Lingua Franca, ELF, interpreting...
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Linguistic Identity in the English as a Lingua Franca Communication: Changing Perceptions on English Non-nativeness in the Context of an Erasmus Community of Practice
Klánová, Aneta ; Janáč, Jiří (advisor) ; Sherman, Tamah (referee) ; Sonkoly, Gábor (referee)
The standard ideology, embedded in discourses of traditional language teaching, has been found to have an influence on non-native speakers' linguistic identities. It manifests itself in their preoccupation with grammatical correctness and accent, and consequently in shaping negative self-perceptions, by focusing on the lacks in proficiency relative to the native speaker model. Some of the recent studies, however, reported contrasting findings. They reveal a weakening of this influence, which stems mainly from the current role of English as a global lingua franca. The ultimate goal of this study is to explore the English non-native students' perceptions of their English, as it served as a main shared resource for socializing within their community, in order to find whether and how this decentralization, combined with the "real life" use of English within an informal environment of an Erasmus community of practice, might impact their linguistic identities. The theoretical part of this study consists of three sections. Firstly, it provides a description of the concept of English as a lingua franca and its development. The second part explicates the relation between ELF and linguistic identity whereas the third part introduces the community of practice approach, which has been employed both as a...
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Vietnamese University Students in the UK and Their Use of English Names
Pham, Thu Tra ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Luef, Eva Maria (referee)
and keywords The aim of this thesis is to investigate the management of personal names of Vietnamese students living and/or studying in the United Kingdom. It explores reasons for adopting English names, situations for different name usage, and motivations behind name choices. The data were obtained both quantitatively through a questionnaire and qualitatively through one-on-one interviews. The results confirm that management of personal names heavily depends on the individual. However, certain patterns can be observed. The study's findings demonstrate that participants use strategies for selecting an English name that align with those proposed in previous works by Burt (2009), Chen (2015), and McPherron (2009). Additionally, the research corroborates the role of convenience as a significant factor influencing individuals to adopt an English name as proposed by previous research. However, the study also identifies deviations from existing literature. Notably, the trendiness of having an English name appears to hold less importance for the participants, differing from the findings of Barešová & Pikhart (2020). Furthermore, contrary to the perspectives of Chen (2015) and Heffernan (2010), the research indicates that adopting an English name for use in English classes does not significantly impact the...
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Language and Socialization in two Romani Communities
Kubaník, Pavel ; Elšík, Viktor (advisor) ; Sherman, Tamah (referee) ; Grill, Jan (referee)
JAZYK A SOCIALIZACE VE DVOU ROMSKÝCH KOMUNITÁCH Language and Socialization in two Romani communities Dissertation Mgr. Pavel Kubaník ABSTRACT The thesis consists of several partial studies connected with the language socialization paradigm. Language socialization is a theoretical and methodological framework, which attempts to analyze a process of individual's socialization into particular society through the analyses of everyday interactions and its contextualization within broader cultural concepts of a particular society. The thesis is based on data from two separate fieldworks in two extended Romani families. The first family lives in the Eastern Slovak Romani settlement of Gav, the second family currently lives in Prague, where they recently came from another Eastern Slovak Romani settlement of Krásne. While in Gav the language of primary socialization is Romani, the Prague family ceased to speak Romani in child-directed communication, although the Romani language is still a significant communicative code in interactions between adults. The chapters of the thesis that are based on data from Eastern Slovakia analyze baby talk, i.e. simplified register of Romani, its structure and use in child-directed interactions and other domains; interactions in which children are prompted to display self-assertive...
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Categorization in the czech media in the context of the war in Ukraine and reader's reactions
Jiránková, Petra ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Andrlová Fidlerová, Alena (referee)
The thesis deals with how the media portray groups of foreigners affected by the Russian- Ukrainian war beginning in February 2022, and how foreigners are seen by participants in Czech-language Internet discussions. However, the articles and comments also feature other actors who are important in the given context, especially Czechs, politicians and the media. The theoretical section introduces the media, their functions and influence on the audience, as well as the background of the war in Ukraine and groups of foreigners who are affected by the conflict and who are also the most frequently mentioned in the selected articles. These are primarily Ukrainians and Russians, as well as Africans and Arabs. It also deals with the issue of stereotypes and prejudice, including ethnic ones. Finally, it presents a description of the procedure for analyzing articles and comments, and at the same time provides theoretical starting points for the practical section. In the practical section, 9 articles from three internet news servers are analyzed, specifically from Aktuálně.cz, iDNES.cz and Novinky.cz. The analysis of the articles focuses on their content, the actors in the text, the conversation analysis, the ethnocentric approach, the "foreignness" of foreigners and the factors that led to the creation of the...
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Language biographies of the third generation of the Greek minority in the Czech Republic
Zahálková, Tereza ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Jílková, Lucie (referee)
This thesis explores the processes and mechanisms of the acquisition and use language as described by the third generation of Greek political immigrants living on the territory of the Czech Republic. It also deals with how the respondents talk about the questions of code switching and their ethnic self- identification. The text is divided into two main parts, theoretical and empirical. In the theoretical part, an introduction to the history of Greek refugees and the causes of their immigration in the context of their simultaneous maintenance of identity and language is elaborated. The methods available for this type of research are then described. In the empirical part, based on recorded interviews, the language behaviour of narrators was analysed and interpreted by using the language biography method. The main finding is that although the group is adapted to the Czech environment, it tends towards the Greek community and still learns the language of its ancestors. Though the respondents had been learning Greek since childhood, the main development of their competence in it began with the period of their adolescence. Within intergenerational communication, it was found that interactions between parents and their children were more homogeneous than in the relationship between grandparents and grandchildren....
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Forms of address in Finnish in the context of dynamic politeness norms
Štauberová, Markéta ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Fárová, Lenka (referee)
The aim of this thesis is to describe the current state of select politeness phenomena in Finnish which are expressed through language structure, namely the forms of address. My main research questions were: How do Finnish native speakers use T- and V-forms? Has there been any perceived development in the use of address forms in Finnish in the past ten years? Are there any special situations, occasions, places or institutions (...) in which speakers expect particular form of address? Have they experienced any recent changes? How is the possible rise in use of the V-form connected to the use of other politeness expressions in Finnish? The thesis begins with a general description of the most significant theoretical approaches to politeness. It, then, defines a place of forms of address within the linguistic politeness. The main theoretical basis for the thesis is linguistic pragmatics, in which politeness is seen as a dynamic interpersonal activity. Not only is politeness a linguistic phenomenon but it is also a matter of social behaviour. Therefore, it differs culturally but also situationally. In the second chapter, I examine the Finnish forms of address as a linguistic phenomenon. First, I consider nominal and pronominal forms of address, second, I explain the grammatical base for Finnish...
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The mutual intelligibility of Swedish and Danish in tourist interactions outside of Scandinavia
Kohoutová, Alexandra ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Slouková, Radka (referee)
The continental Scandinavian languages are very closely related and this fact often leads to the presumption that their speakers are able to communicate with each other without using another language (e.g. English); this type of communication is called semicommunication (this term firstly used Haugen in his paper from 1966). Although there are many historical, social and linguistic preconditions which favour semicommunication, interactions between Scandinavians can be characterized by frequent misunderstandings. This thesis focuses on semicommunication between Danish and Swedish and it consists of the author's research on Danish-Swedish conversations outside of Scandinavia with both native and non-native speakers of the languages. The research took place in Prague, in a tourist office with Danish owners and Scandinavian clients. It is based on audio recordings of conversations between non-native Swedish speaking employees of the office and Danish tourists. The aim of the research is to find out in which situations and why semicommunication fails, how the possible misunderstandings are solved and whether they create problems for subsequent communication. The conclusion of the analysis is that the extent of misunderstandings was about the same with Danish tourists and Swedish speaking employees of...
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English as Lingua Franca in Cyprus after 2003: Questions of identity
Savoglu, Mustafa ; Ira, Jaroslav (advisor) ; Czoch, Gábor (referee) ; Sherman, Tamah (referee)
As a multilingual and multicultural island, Cyprus has been segregated based on religion, identities, communities, and nationalities. In 1974, this segregation became a physical division of the island. After twenty-nine years of division, in 2003 April 23rd , the borders or in other words, the check-points were opened, and the two biggest communities of the island; Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, have been put in contact again. The phenomenon that the both communities were put in contact again also brought the question of language along with. This thesis investigates the evolution of the language policies and planning (LPP) in Cyprus. This research has found that since the beginning of the first crossings, English language has been functioning as Lingua franca, and being spread across the divide. The research analyzes the evolution of the LPP under three categories; A) Politics and Language Policies and Planning in Cyprus, B) Civil Society and Language Policies and Planning in Cyprus, C) Education and Language Policies and Planning in Cyprus. The results of the research have shown that the both sides (North and South) are willing to achieve a Greek and Turkish bilingual Cyprus, whereas the current situation points out that the lack policies and planning along with cooperation between the two...
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Unconscious code-switching between second and third language
Park, Minyoung ; Sherman, Tamah (advisor) ; Lehečková, Eva (referee)
The present diploma thesis focuses on the unconscious code-switching between second and third language. The main objective of this thesis is to deal with principles of unconscious code-switching, describe and categorize actual appearances of unconscious code-switching between second and third language. After introducing issues, the second chapter sums up the way of second and third language acquisition in terms of bilingualism and multilingualism. The third chapter presents a definition and theoretic bases of code-switching. The fourth chapter concerns the analysis of the reason for code- switching in terms of usage-based and psycholinguistic approaches. The fifth chapter presents a categorization of code-switching from syntactic and pragmatic perspectives. The sixth chapter concerns the analysis of cases of code-switching from recorded interviews and the explanation of possible factors causing unconscious code-switching. Key words: Unconscious code-switching, bilingualism, multilingualism, usage-based approach, psycholinguistic approach, function words, acquisition, second language, third language, WIPP
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