Web resources for further study

This section of the website includes a range of electronic materials across the broad field of English language study which can be used to form the basis of student project ideas and/or for general discussion purposes in-class. A number of additional activities are also given here which can be carried out individually or in groups. The materials included often combine areas that are covered as different strands within the textbook. One of the aims of this is to illustrate how the different areas of English language study are frequently interwoven with one another. This material is aimed to be of use to both students and their teachers.

Hyperlinks have been provided but should there be any problems with access, we recommend that you attempt to locate the material through your web browser, using the titles provided.

Twenty-first century words

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is continually adding words to its online and hard-copy dictionaries in order to reflect current language use. This article from 2014 reports some of the most recent additions:

Hofherr, J. (14 August 2014) ‘Oxford’s Online Dictionary adds 21st century-friendly words’, www.boston.com/news/nation/2014/08/14/oxford-online-dictionary-adds-century-friendly-words/zl0QtAXlzcWJttYBDef86H/story.html

Do any of these words reflect the twenty-first century so far? What other words would you suggest?

You can continue to track updates at the OED website: http://public.oed.com/the-oed-today/recent-updates-to-the-oed

 

‘Mind your slanguage’: slang and language change

The following two articles report separate incidents in which school faculty have introduced a ban on their students using slang:

BBC Author (7 February 2013) ‘School bans words like “nowt” from the classroom’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/21367833

Coldwell, W. (16 October 2013) ‘Banning slang will only further alienate young people, innit’, http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/16/banning-slang-harris-academy-alienate-young-people

Read the articles and assess the range of opinions that have been expressed both in the article itself and in the comments that accompany the article. Consider which opinions you agree with the most based upon what you learnt about the English language when reading the textbook.

Read the following article about Australian slang in English:

Nunn, G. (26 May 2014) ‘Is Aussie slang dying out?’, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/26/is-aussie-slang-dying-out

Consider what role our exposure to Australian slang plays in our perceptions of Australia’s national identity.

What factors are important to the assimilation of slang terms taken from other cultures and languages?

Around the time of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, The Guardian was one of many publications offering a glossary of South African slang terms:

Hambly, V. (26 February 2010) ‘Talk the talk: A-Z of South African slang’, http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/feb/26/south-africa-world-cup-slang

Consider what aspects of local and national culture are captured in slang terms. Does slang reflect some groups of people better than others?

How do you think locals would respond to tourists using slang terms?

 

The OED word of the year: 1906–2014

Below are some of the winners of the ‘Word of the Year’ competition run by the Oxford English Dictionary from 1906 to 2014. Why do you think these words won in these particular years? What can these examples tell us about the importance of historical context in terms of the advent of neologisms and language change more generally?

  • 1917: camouflage
  • 1919 peace rally
  • 1934: Gestapo
  • 1936: male chauvinism
  • 1947: bikini
  • 1943: passion killers
  • 1957: Mr Nice Guy
  • 1966: tower block
  • 1949: Big Brother
  • 1970: Big Mac
  • 1979: karaoke
  • 1987: to email
  • 1994: metrosexual
  • 2004: chav
  • 2005: sudoku
  • 2006: bovvered
  • 2007: carbon footprint
  • 2008: credit crunch
  • 2009: simples
  • 2010: big society
  • 2011: squeezed middle
  • 2012: omnishambles
  • 2013: selfie
  • 2014: vape

To find out more about the 2014 word of the year and how the words are chosen you can read the following article from the OED website:

Oxford Dictionaries (17 November 2014) ‘The Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year is… vape’, http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2014/11/oxford-dictionaries-word-year-vape/

The following article reports on South Africa’s Word of the Year from 2013:

Dlanga, K. (13 December 2013) ‘What is South Africa’s Word of the Year?’, http://mg.co.za/article/2012-12-13-what-is-south-africas-word-of-2013

This article from The Guardian discusses Australia’s Word of the Year 2015:

Groves, N. (5 February 2015) ‘Mansplain is Australian Word of the Year’, www.theguardian.com/books/australia-books-blog/2015/feb/05/mansplain-is-australian-word-of-the-year

 

Word of the decade in American English

The following article from The Washington Post reports on the American Dialect Society’s word of the decade for the 2000s. The discussion touches upon a range of important issues relating to words, meaning and sociolinguistics, including age and social class background and also how this affects the judging process:

Zak, D. (9 January 2010) ‘American Dialect Society picks “tweet”, “Google” as top words for 2009, decade’, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/08/AR2010010803692.html

Consider the words that are mentioned in this article. Have you ever used ‘dracula sneeze’ or ‘sea kittens’? Do you know what they mean? Would you use ‘H1N1’ or ‘swine flu?’

The winning words decided upon by the American Dialect Society, after much debate, were ‘tweet’ for the year 2009 and ‘Google’ for the decade. How often do you use these words?

Consider the potential differences that exist between different varieties of English in the inner, outer and expanding World Englishes circles. How would these differences in language affect the words that are voted to reflect different years or decades in different global locations?

In 2014 the American Dialect Society announced that its choice for word of the year was a hashtag: ADS Author (9 January 2015) ‘2014 Word of the Year is “#blacklivesmatter”’, http://www.americandialect.org/2014-word-of-the-year-is-blacklivesmatter

Consider what effects the language of the internet and in particular, social media has on language use more broadly. What does this suggest about the role of technology in modern society?

 

Globalisation: World Englishes corpora

The International Corpus of English corpus (ICE):

As highlighted in B10, the ICE corpus is a unique collection of data taken from a range of geographical locations where individual research teams are given the task of compiling one million words of written and spoken English data. The homepage for this exciting and ambitious corpus project is as follows:

http://ice-corpora.net/ice/index.htm

Corpora have been collected from the following locations. Those marked with an * can be freely downloaded from the website above:

  • Canada*
  • East Africa*
  • Great Britain
  • Hong Kong*
  • India*
  • Ireland & SPICE
  • Ireland*
  • Jamaica*
  • New Zealand
  • Nigeria (written)
  • The Philippines*
  • Singapore*
  • Sri Lanka (written)
  • USA (written)*

The website contains further details and gives regular updates on new locations which are being added to the ICE corpus.

The Vienna-Oxford International Corpus of English (VOICE)

The homepage of the VOICE corpus can be found at the following link:

http://www.univie.ac.at/voice/

You can gain free access to the VOICE corpus by following the instructions on the homepage of this website. The site also includes links to a range of research papers and articles on the topic of English as a lingua franca that have been published using the VOICE material.

 

Semantic ambiguities

Puns are a form of word-play that capitalise on the semantic ambiguity of homophones, homographs, metonymic and metaphorical language. But in the case of homophone-based puns, humour can be lost because of dialect variation, as shown in the following article:

Trawick-Smith, B. (27 May 2014) ‘“Courtney Act” and Non-Rhotic Puns’, http://dialectblog.com/2014/05/27/courtney-act-non-rhotic-puns

Consider the appeal of pun-based stage names and the role of word-play in performed identities. Should such performers be concerned about the humour being lost in dialectal variation?

Can you think of any other examples of puns that are lost in certain dialects?

 

Impoliteness and language attitudes

The following web-links expand upon the issue of Gordon Ramsay’s language choices (discussed in B3) and develop how this relates to (im)politeness and cultural expectations through representation in the mass media. What are your opinions on the linguistic issues raised in these articles? Do you think that British broadcasters are right not to bleep out some of the swearing that other countries refuse to broadcast? Why/why not? Where do you think the limits should be in terms of the amount, content and intensity of swearing broadcast in the media?

BBC Author, (19 June 2008) “Australia’s ire over chef’s f-words”, BBC website.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7462876.stm.

Daily Mail Reporter, (20 June 2008) “How Gordon Ramsay’s foul mouth pushed Australia to crack down on TV swearing” Daily Mail Online.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1027700/Gordon-Ramsays-foul-mouth-pushes-Australia-crack-TV-swearing.html.

Jamieson, A. (6 December 2008), “Anger as Gordon Ramsay’s swearing on US shows ‘unbleeped’ for British TV”, Telegraph Online.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/3569380/Anger-as-Gordon-Ramsays-swearing-on-US-shows-unbleeped-for-British-TV.html.

Sweney, M. (11 May 2009) “Gordon Ramsay criticised over ‘sheer intensity’ of swearing on C4 show”, The Guardian.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2009/may/11/gordon-ramsay-ofcom-swearing.

 

Swearing in the mass media

The following web-links will take you through to materials which discuss swearing in the mass media in different varieties of English. Consider your opinions on the issues that are raised in these articles. Do you think swearing is appropriate in charity advertising? Do you think swearing has lost its power to outrage? Is there too much swearing in The Guardian? Do you think the Australian press complaints commission were right in their decision to ban the advertising posters?

In May 2015, The Guardian reported on a noticeable increase of profanity in charity advertising.

Marrins, K. (8 May 2015) ‘Up yours! Why charities keep giving us the finger’, www.theguardian.com/voluntary-sector-network/2015/may/08/charities-campaigns-profanity-shock-tactics

Consider the views raised in the article. Is swearing appropriate in conveying a highly emotive message? How does this compare to other approaches associated with charity advertising?

In April 2010, The Guardian had cause to examine its own censorship practices:

Marsh, D. (14 April 2010) ‘Is there too much swearing in The Guardian?’, www.theguardian.com/media/mind-your-language/2010/apr/14/swearing-guardian

The article raises the point that a number of news stories are concerned with swearing in the public eye. Do you think this is indicative of modern society? How does this reflect attitudes towards swearing and towards censorship?

Wheeler, B. and Duffy, J. (4 February 2004) ‘Has swearing lost its power to outrage?’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3460123.stm

BBC Author (28 March 2007) ‘Australian advertising posters withdrawn as they contain “bloody”: So where the bloody hell are you?’ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6501439.stm

 

Pragmatics and speech acts: Apologies data

The following web-links will take you through to further instances of political apologies. Consider the issues that are raised in these articles in light of what you have learnt about apologies in your study of pragmatics and speech acts:

Syntax and stylistics

In the stylistics strand, we highlighted that stylistic analyses can be carried out at any level of the linguistic rank scale.

The following electronic journal article provides a very interesting and engaging illustration of how a stylistic analysis can be produced by using syntax as an analytical framework. This piece focuses in particular upon analysing two contemporary post-apocalyptic novels, Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker.

It goes on to discuss teaching practices based upon the application of this kind of stylistic analysis in the classroom, with suggested discussion questions. It also considers how stylistics can be used to analyse and compare the spoken dialogue of film adaptations with novels, based upon the film version of The Road (2010). Comparative work between film scripts and the original novel upon which such adaptations are based provides another potentially fruitful area for the development of student projects and seminar activities:

Boyne, M. (2009) ‘Sentenced to Destruction: A Stylistic Analysis of the Syntax of Two Post-Apocalyptic Novels’, Crossing the Divides: Multi-Disciplinary Approaches to Teaching and Researching English, Vol.5. The Higher Education Academy English Subject Centre, http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~aezweb/working_with_english/5/boyne_2009.pdf

The work of the CLiC Dickens project at the University of Nottingham’s Centre for Research in Applied Linguistics is an example of ‘corpus stylistics’. It demonstrates how computer-assisted methods can be used to study literary texts and to reveal recurrent textual patterns that operate above and below the level of explicit conscious awareness.

CLiC Dickens: A corpus tool to support the analysis of literary texts:

http://clic.nottingham.ac.uk/concordances

The tool allows you to search for specific phrases and words across the Dickens canon, or by looking at specific texts. It then presents each occurrence of that language feature as a series of lines, with information about where those examples appear in the text.

What insights does the tool offer in relation to a particular author’s style? How do we get a broader view of how certain characters are depicted in the novels? How do such tools support our impressions of the novels, as a way of collecting linguistic evidence?

 

Methods and ethics

The growing importance of ethics in English language and linguistics data collection has been clearly emphasised in the textbook. The British Association of Applied Linguistics has published its guidelines on good practice, including research ethics for collecting language data. This document will help expand upon your knowledge of the importance of ethics and also give some practical guidance on ethical practices and procedures:

http://www.baal.org.uk/dox/goodpractice_full.pdf.