Stephen van Vlack

Sookmyung Women`s University

Graduate School of TESOL

History of the English Language

Fall 2006

Week 12 - Answers

Cangarajah (1999) Chapter 6

1. Should English be the sole medium of instruction in the ELT classroom, why or why not?

Obviously, the answer to the question of whether English should be the sole medium of instruction in the ELT classroom is an astoundingly loud NO. This obviously runs against the grain of conventional wisdom in the field of SLA, but at this point we should be used to Cangarajah running against this grain. There are many reasons for why maybe we do not want English as the sole medium even in the English language classroom, and this pertains particularly to periphery situations such as we find ourselves, but may very well not be valid in the target language environments or when English is taught in the inner core. What are the things we`ve said throughout this course is that language learning is a part of globalization and functions concurrently with aspects of globalization. In a very real way it is hard to separate language and language learning from globalization. In theory, globalization sees all areas of the world as being equal. From a global perspective all human beings and their cultures, and this would obviously include languages, have to be seen as being equal. All human beings have something to contribute to this collective global endeavor we may call humanity. Well, why should language learning to any different?

The bottom line is that people already have a first language or maybe many languages which they have already mastered to a certain point when they start learning English. Rather it then trying to do so well neat the use of this first language or other known languages as is often the case in SLA, we want to try to get our learners to you lose the skills they already have (L1, L2. L3) to better and more efficiently acquire new skills (English). If the acquisition of English is to be seen as taking place separately and differently from pre-existing languages in the targeted system then there will be dire consequences on the learning. The bottom line for our students is that English and Korean do and must coexist in the world. If they are able to coexist in the world, and we know they do, then we need to also find ways for them to coexist in the classroom if we want our classroom situation to somehow prepare our students for the world at large. The simple way of achieving this is to not dissuade the use of any subsequent languages but to promote their use in limited ways so that they may be used to scaffold that and enhance the learning of the target language, in this case English. The trick, then, is not letting the first language somehow overrun use of the target language (English).

2. How can we juggle languages in the classroom?

The basic idea behind shuttling languages in the classroom comes in how languages are actually used in real multilingual societies and even increasingly in traditionally monolingual societies like Korea under the influences of globalization. As mentioned above, in global situations languages do and must coexist in this does not mean coexisting entirely separately. They coexist at the same time, what not necessarily in the same place in the same places. We can use basic models of the bilingual, multilingual language use to model how we might want to use all available languages in the classroom.

Think about the different linguistic situations of countries that we have looked at throughout this course. Most countries have an official language (countries we’ve been looking at predominantly have English as an official language) but this official language is not used all the time and in every sphere society. The vast majority of countries in the world are indeed multilingual and not just regionally multilingual but functionally multilingual. We have seen that in most countries in which English is the official language English is only used in certain ways. The speakers in these countries must somehow know when to use English and when not to use English. There are certain societal norms for language use. We can create the same set of norms in the classroom so that we can enhance the use not only of English but of other languages in our ELT class.

Although it might be hard to follow at first you want to set up not rules but tendencies or norms of use pertaining to the students L1 one and English, the target language. Use English for more formal or academic occasions, such as present input and other related functions and use the L1 for more interpersonal types of communication with students. These are just a few examples of how we might achieve this. How each teacher does this will depend of course on their own societal situation as well as the students and the goals of the language course itself.

3. How does language use relate to language socialization?

Well, having discussed how we might set this up in relation to societal norms it should certainly be quite easy to see how our classroom language use can and should relate to language socialization. Again, we have said how languages certainly do coexist outside the classroom. Based on this idea we want to also have languages coexist within the classroom. As Cangarajah (1999) quite rightly mentions we do not want to give our students the wrong message about English. What globalization is about is not the exclusivity of English, for this is not only highly artificial but also wrong and therefore potentially detrimental. We want to create a model where our students can see how English and their local languages, in this case Korean, can harmoniously coexist. We want create a more positive attitude towards English by effectively using the L1. We do not want to have to restart the entire language learning process by cutting the L1 out of it. Languages are used for particular reasons in society, we need to let our students understand this and the best way of doing so is to let them exist in similar ways in the classroom.

Kecskes and Papp (2000), Chapter 4

1. Words are obviously linked to concepts and thought, but what is the nature of this link: that is, how do words differ from concepts?

In the language processing model of Levelt (1989) the conceptualizer was divided into two parts or levels, the macro and microprocessor. The macro level of conceptualization is based on the intent, the need for the speech event and this seems to be the same (mostly) for all languages a multilingual might be able to use. This has to do with things like need or functions and researchers in interlanguage pragmatics have shown that they are largely similar across languages (Kasper and Rose, 2002). The micro level, which prepares the basic conceptual form of the message has been claimed by several researchers into multilinguality to be more language specific. This configuration about the miro level is based on observations made about the connection or link between thought (concepts) and words.

While concepts and words are not the same thing they are related. And while it has often been argued that most learners are aware of certain concepts before they lexicalize them, in reality much learning occurs where concepts and their lexical representations are encountered simultaneously. Really one does effect the other. It is important to understand the nature of how words actually function in language. While a concept has a fixed meaning and a word is drawn (projected) from its corresponding conceptual base in order to be used in a linguistic utterance, it must be acknowledged that words themselves do not have fixed meanings. Maybe the simplest way of thinking about this is that when you look in the dictionary you often find a primary meaning of a word and really this is not the words meaning but this is the conceptual base of the word. What shall also find in the dictionary are what are often termed secondary meanings or meanings which come from the context of the utterance. The secondary meanings are really the word related meanings and not the concept. Based on this it is probably easy to see how words and their conceptual bases are connected. Also, for multilinguals it may be easy to see how they could have a similar conceptual store but actually have different words related to a common concept. The words themselves in each of the languages might very quite a bit depending on different lexical (word) properties. A word is actually used in language as a connected but separate meaning from the concept itself from which it is drawn.

Because languages are learned (well sometimes) in context and used in context and context is socially embedded, there are certain cultural differences between words while there might not be with these underlying concepts. Basically what Kecskes and Papp (2000) say is that these underlying concepts are culturally vacuous but certainly not linguistically vacuous because language seems to be the major connection point between culture and thought. It is language which links culture to concepts through words.

In order to understand this we need to really see how words are actually used in languages. Here is an example of something which often happens to me in my office. People often call but not for me and I need to tell them that they have dialed the wrong number. I usually do this in English and not Korean because it convinces them more quickly. Or I might start in Korean and if they are not nice or are too persistent I shift into English. This usually does the trick of getting rid of them. Still, however, some people don`t believe me and keep on calling back repeatedly. It is at this point that I shift into other, less spoken languages, to basically scare them off. English is not usually that frightening for Koreans. German is a little more frightening, and Danish is terrifying. Nobody has ever called back after I have spoken to them in Danish. So here is how you tell someone that they have dialed the wrong number in these three closely related but different languages. All of them share the same underlying macro conceptualizations. Let`s see how we can analyze some of the micro and lexical differences.

(1) You`ve dialed (you have) the wrong number.

(2) Sie haben falsch gewaehlt./Sie haben sich verwaehlt.

      You have wrongly dialed/You have yourself wrongly dialed.

(3) Det har du forkert nummeren.

      That have you wrong number-the

(4) I`m sorry but you have dialed the wrong number.

(5) Tut mir Leid aber Sie haben falsch gewaehlt./Tut mir Lied aber sie haben sich verwaehlt.

     Does me pain but ......

(6) Det maa du yndskyld men du har forkert nummeren

     That may you excuse but......

In the examples above we can see that the underlying intent is the same but how this intent is reached varies from each language. There are some striking differences between how German speakers and English speakers say the same very basic thing about dialing the wrong number. Likewise, in the second set of examples we can see how making a kind of apology (although not for our own mistake) is lexically coded quite differently in each of the languages. These differences occur, in theory, because all what seems to be a connection between concepts themselves and the different lexical forms. Lexical forms not only shape the structure of the language but are shaped by the structure of the language. In short we can say that concepts are generally quite similar between languages (although not the same) and are therefore quite simple, but it is the words themselves that are multifaceted and difficult.

In thinking about the nature of words one of the main questions we need to think about is how words are supposed to code their meaning so that they can be used in context. Word meaning is a tricky variable in language and even words that spring from the same context will have different shades of meaning based on, to a large extent, the cultural and linguistic surroundings in which they find themselves. One of the simple things we know about word meaning is what is known as prototype theory. All words have in their very center core a prototype. These prototypes are based on frequent usages of the word and the word`s connection to the world. Most people studied will show a similar types of prototypes for words provided they belong to the same culture but people from other cultures will have different prototypes for the same concept. From this very simple example we can see that because of cultural context words do vary from their underlying conceptual base. An individual word will only cover part of the entire concept. English itself is a language which has a particularly large vocabulary, but the same applies in all languages. There is no such thing as completely equivalent words. Synonyms might all have at some point sprang from the same conceptual base but they cover different aspects of that base. Words and concepts are connected by their different aspects of meaning.

2. Not all words are the same. How do some words differ from others?

Certainly it is clear to all of us that not all words are the same. Words differ from other words in several important ways.

Scope of meaning - specificity

One of the main ways in which words may differ from each other is in their scope of meaning. Based on this we can organize words hierarchically. For example, a word like animal has a wider scope in its meaning than a word like dog, but dog has a wider meaning than poodle. This is a simple example from we can see that words vary greatly depending on the scope of their particular meaning. Translation equivalents across languages might have different scopes of meaning.

Polysemitism - number of meanings

Words also vary greatly depending on the number of meanings they have. A rather frequently used word like party is going to have many more meanings then a rather infrequently used word like solemnization. Most of these different meanings of course will not be listed in your dictionary but they will emerge from the context of the different situations. A child`s first birthday party, for example, is going to vary tremendously from the party of an 18-year-old, and someone`s 21st birthday party will be different again. And these are just variant meanings of birthday party. Just think of all the different other meanings of the word party.

The nature of representation - concrete/abstract

Another way in which words vary is according to what they represent. Some words represent concrete things, these are objects or conditions which occur in the reality of the world and can be visually realized in a concrete way. Abstract things are objects, actions, or emotions, for example, which do not exist in the real world: they exist only in our cognitive structure. Abstract things are made up by human beings and/or prey to our internal understanding more than through a relationship with the world at large. Based on this obviously abstract words are more difficult to get the meaning of, particularly cross culturally and /or cross linguistically.

Semantic connections

Words also vary in their semantic connections. Some words have many different semantic connections and this is where their meaning comes from to a large extent. Think of the word leopard, or house. Other words have quite limited semantic connections. Think of the word aviary. In general more frequently used words have stronger and more semantic connections while less frequently used words have fewer semantic connections.

Schematic connections

Then we have schematic connections. While semantic connections are based on meaning and solely language, schematic connections are based on things that are connected because they often co-occur in the world itself. For example, the word knife has no semantic connection to eat or food, but there is quite a strong schematic connection between these words because we eat certain foods with a knife.

Usage patterns - in which contexts does it more frequently occur

We also have usage patterns. Different words very in the contexts in which they will occur. If we look at the examples of apologize and sorry, it is quite clear that they are probably part of the same underlying conceptual store, but they occur in different contexts and are used in different ways in the actual language.

(7) I deeply apologize for any inconvenience I may have caused you.

(8) Sorry for the trouble.

The reality is that they really do not happen to appear in similar situations and a quick search through any language corpora will show us that.

Collocational partnerships

Words also vary in the partners that they keep. Adjectives for example will be able to modify only certain words in a particular language. So we take a sample of two different color adjectives like black and white. You can have black coffee but not white coffee. You can have white snow but not black snow. Each word is able to be surrounded by a limited number of other words. Also, words vary dramatically in the number and strength of their collocational partnerships. Some words like good have a very extensive collocational range, while addled has an extremely limited range.

(Physical size)

Finally we can say that words also vary in their physical size. A word, if we want to think about it in this way, can be either just a single morpheme, such as un-, or a polysynthetic unit such as, come here right now. Lexically they are both going to function in a very similar way and be prey to the same types of conditions mentioned above.

From all this we can conclude, and I agree very strongly with Kecskes and Papp on this point, that we really need to look differently at language. It seems that much of what we understand as linguistic structure is determined not by some underlying universal syntactic element but rather by words themselves (lexis). We come to this conclusion based on the observation that the same word denoting a different meaning is going to require a different syntactic structure. We can`t simply slot lexical items into preconstructed syntactic structures based on their conceptual meaning. By looking at the above list we see that words vary from each other and from themselves way too much for the this type of slot grammar proposal to have any kind of validly in the real world.

3. How do bilinguals or multilinguals learn words in a new language?

Much of the discussion in this area relates to the timing as well as the type and intensity of the acquisition. Simply put we can describe two different types of bilingual or multilingual acquisition; simultaneous and consecutive. Simultaneous bilinguals or multilinguals are people who are exposed to these languages at more or less the same time, simultaneously and in the same place (generally). They may have more than one first language. A consecutive bilingual, on the other hand, has already acquired much of one language before they start learning the other. They may also be learning the new language in a different physical environment than the languages they already use. Consecutive bilinguals further vary based on whether the language they are learning is a second language or a foreign language. The basic observation here is that simultaneous bilinguals and consecutive bilinguals in a second language have what is often called a compound type of organization. This means that the words they have in their 2 or more languages may share a common conceptual store but they do not necessarily affect each other or hurt each other. What is often observed in consecutive foreign language bilinguality, on the other hand, is that a new word which is learned in the new language is linked first to the word (translation equivalent) of the first language and is somehow reliant on or controlled by this translation equivalent. Such learners may even develop a separate concept for the word in the new language because they have not experienced any of the new word in the real world. In a consecutive bilingual situation because the word in the new language is acquired after the concept has been learned and a word already exists in the first language for this concept, this word in the new language will be fused onto the translation equivalent from the pre-existing language. This can lead to confusion as we will see below.

4. What are some of the more serious potential problems for bilingual word learning?

There seem to be three major levels of word meaning or word structure which may pose serious problems for bilingual word learning. Here of course the important element of bilingual word learning is that the learner already has lexical codes (words) for these underlying concepts in her or his first language. So what we are really talking about here is interference, but these specific types of interference relate to what we already know about words themselves. So based on we know about words, as discussed above, we can say that this type of interference may occur on three different basic levels.

Conceptual level

One of the most common ways of teaching words in a new language by teachers all over the world is to simply offer a translation equivalent. So, we might say that the translation equivalent of pity in English is Mitleid (literally `with suffering`) in German. While these two seem to be similar it could be argued that they don`t actually come from the same conceptual base even though they are what we would call translation equivalents. Mitleid has a quite different shade of meaning than pity in English. It indicates not necessarily a true feeling of pity but one of maybe a false pity or what we would call in English crocodile tears. Problems result for language learners when they assume the translation equivalents come from the same conceptual base a lot and therefore do not have a clear understanding of the meanings of these new words. We discussed the possibly clearer example of [KALBI] and [RIBS]. While the two are translation equivalents they certainly represent different underlying concepts. To link the concepts would be a mistake. So, in reality, proficient speakers of two languages have most of the concepts shared in the CUCB, but some concepts will NOT be shared and will be stored in a language(culture)-specific conceptual store. A proficient speaker needs to know which is which. They can achieve this knowledge through intensity.

Differences in metaphorical structure

We have already talked, albeit briefly, about languages (and thought at least at some levels as well) as being structured along the metaphorical structure. Thus, for example, ANGER=HEAT is a common metaphorical structure which is used in the English language almost universally and may also be used in other languages as well, albeit in different ways and forms. We could also argue that English also has another metaphor for structuring thought and language which we can phrase as HOME=CASTLE. This metaphorical structure is used to shape our thoughts and create specific linguistic structures which are meaningful to English speakers. I might be wrong but I don`t think the Koreans have this same metaphorical structure. Korean men at least have a similar but different metaphorical structure along the lines of; CAR=CASTLE. Because of these different metaphorical structures Korean learners of English may very easily misinterpret or simply fail to understand much of the language they hear. It is becoming more and more apparent that the language we use is, to a large extent, metaphorically structured. In order to learn a language well the learner must somehow be able to pick up on these metaphorical uses in the new language. Do you see what I mean?

Lexical level

Finally we have differences on the lexical level. The basic idea revolves around what we already went over in class, namely, that there are vast lexical differences between words. These same differences will also occur across translation equivalents, to a rather high degree. When a word is learned in a new language and is, again, linked with a translation equivalent learners will often make the mistake of carrying over the lexical features from one language onto the lexical features of the language which they are learning. As we saw in class, because the lexical features are very much language and even context specific this can cause them not only to use the word in strange ways but, more importantly, to misunderstand the word when they read or hear it. Learners tend to be functioning under the idea that words have fixed meanings which come directly from their conceptual base. In short, learners generally work with basic meanings. They are often unable to deal with or interpret loaded meanings. These loaded meanings are part of the lexical level of a word as opposed to the conceptual level of basic meaning.