Past Events
English Language Institute
Date: 31 August 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MY632Speaker: English Language Institute staff members, Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: English Language Institute Programmes
The Engish Language Institute (ELI) offers a wide range of intensive English language training programmes for different purposes. These include English for Academic Purposes, English for Specific Purposes and pre-service teacher training (CertTESOL) programmes.
What are all these programmes we teach and what issues are the ELI staff focused on? If you have ever wondered what ELTO, ELTSO, PREPP or EPP stand for, then this is an opportinity to find out.
Ian Gordon Fellow 2012
Date: 12 July 2012
Time: 6.00 pm
Public Lecture by Nick Ellis
Nick Ellis, the current Ian Gordon Fellow, presents a public lecture titled:'Humans make language, and language makes us human: language as a complex adaptive system’. This talk analyses how, as a complex adaptive system, language has evolved to be learnable.
For further information, please see the flyer in the table below.
| Document | File Size | File Type |
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 Ian Gordon Fellow 2012 Public Lecture |
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Honorary doctorate for Prof Janet Holmes
Date: 1 November 2011
Time: 12.00 am
Venue: n/a
Congratulations to Janet Holmes who was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Uppsala in Sweden in recognition of her scholarly achievements. Janet's connections with Uppsala include a visit there in 2004 when she was the plenary speaker at a Conference on Communication in the Workplace, presenting findings from the Wellington Language in the Workplace research. She also gave a research seminar on Women's and Relational Practice in the Workplace and met with academic staff and PhD students to discuss their research.Linguistic Honours Scholarship
Date: 1 March 2011
Time: 12.00 am
Venue: n/a
The school usually offers a scholarship in Linguistics Honours each year. Further details for 2012 will be posted later this year.
Conferences
ILAC 2012
Date: 30 August - 2 September 2012
Time: 11.55 am
Independent Learning Association Conference 2012, Wellington, New Zealand
When: Thursday 30 August – Sunday 2 September 2012
Where: Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
ILAC is an international conference for passionate teachers, learners, and researchers. The conference theme is "Autonomy in a Networked World: Te Tū Motuhake i te Ao Kōtuitui”.
For more information click here.
Linguistic Society of New Zealand Conference 2011
Date: 17–18 November 2011
Time: 12.00 am
Venue: Victoria University of Wellington
This conference will be held at Victoria University of Wellington from 17-18 November 2011. For more information on the conference please visit the conference website
Seminars
David Britain and Kazuko Matsumoto
Date: 17 May 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speakers: Professor David Britain (Univeristy of Bern) and Kazuko Matsumoto (University of Tokyo)
Title: Palauan English - a new variety of the Western Pacific
This paper has three aims: firstly to set the emergence of English in Palau into the context of the country’s complex colonial past. Secondly, in examining the development of English in Palau, we attempt to apply Schneider’s (2007) ‘Dynamic Model’ of postcolonial English formation to this Anglophone community. Finally, we present an initial portrait of the main linguistic characteristics of Palauan English. We attempt, therefore, to provide a holistic account of the process by which a new English emerges in a colonial environment.
Seyed Hadi Mirvahedi
Date: 10 May 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Seyed Hadi Mirvahedi, PhD candidate, Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Language Policy and Planning: From History to Mystery
In this presentation, I briefly review the history of language policy and planning (LPP) since its development within sociolinguistics in the 1950s, stressing how the definition of LPP has changed from having a predominanlty linguistic focus to a more political focus. Drawing on a number of theoretical frameworks, the definition of LPP that I find most useful for my research will be discussed. Finally, I propose an integrated model which demonstrates how LPP decisions and processes are instantiated on the ground, and how this influences the fate of languages and their speakers.
Frank Boers
Date: 3 May 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Speaker: Frank Boers, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: The power of pictures: A reappraisal
It is often asserted that L2 learners are helped to retain new words from texts if the meaning of those words is illustrated in a marginal gloss that includes a picture. This belief in the power of pictures is also reflected in contemporary textbooks, which abound with pictorials. However, how strong is the evidence that pictures aid retention of new words? I will review the relatively small body of published studies on the effects of pictorial glosses, and then report a new study in which L2 learners were asked to recall glossed words after reading conditions with or without pictures in the marginal glosses.
Sasha Calhoun
Date: 19 April 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Sasha Calhoun, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Syntax or Prosody? Focus Marking in Samoan
Prosody and word ordering are two principal means of marking focus cross-linguistically, e.g. in response to “Who ate the jam?” we can say “JOHN ate the jam”, where the prosodic stress marks the focus (“John”), or “it was John who ate the jam”, where the focus is fronted. I report on a study of focus-marking in Samoan. There is an interesting interaction of prosody and word ordering: fronting seems to be used to mark focus, but the prosody differs depending on whether the subject or object is fronted. I speculate on reasons for this.
Marty Pilott
Date: 12 April 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Marty Pilott, PhD candidate, Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Using Qualtrics - The survey experience
A survey is often an essential part of research and various programmes are available to make surveys public. I have been using Qualtrics to design a survey on the acceptability of pronunciation to employers. It has useful features which enable randomisation and a wide range of questions. On the other hand, it can be surprisingly clunky and require a huge amount of proofreading. I will present my survey, at its current stage, explain the processes which I have used, and encourage discussion of how it can be used.
Dr Louisa Willoughby
Date: 5 April 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Dr Louisa Willoughby, Monash University
Title: Deaf migrants to Australia: Linguistic needs and policy response
In this seminar I will explore the linguistic situation and needs of deaf migrants to Victoria in three areas: communication in the home, communication with service providers and language learning in education. Drawing on interviews with deaf migrants, their families and service providers I will highlight the myriad issues facing families who arrive in Australia with minimal English competence, as well of examples of best practice in meeting the language needs of these families and fostering bilingual development for deaf children from migrant backgrounds.
Paul Foulkes
Date: 22 March 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Professor Paul Foulkes, University of York and J P French Associates
Title: Criminal Voices
Analysis of voice, speech and language is increasingly carried out for forensic purposes. Well known cases that have involved forensic speech analysis include the Yorkshire Ripper enquiry, the David Bain retrial, and the ‘Who wants to be a millionaire?’ fraud trial.
In this talk I'll provide an overview of forensic speech analysis, illustrating the principles and problems of working with forensic materials with examples materials from real cases.
Robert Blackwood
Date: 20 March 2013
Time: 1.00 pm
Venue: MY632
Speaker: Robert Blackwood, University of Liverpool
Title: Language Policy, Linguistic Landscapes, and the Corsican drinks industry: Corsica-Cola, chestnut beer, and bottled water
For language activists on Corsica, a key aim for the revitalisation of Corsican has been to expand the use of the language beyond the confines of the education system, street signs, and folk music. This revitalisation is set against France’s well-known restrictive language policy, which has sought to manage language use. In this presentation, we examine the extent to which Corsican is visible in a specific part of the Linguistic Landscape (LL), namely the drinks industry. By examining bottles of water, local beer, and soft drinks, we assess the different approaches to Corsican in the LL adopted by the manufacturers of these products.
Elizabeth Pearce
Date: 15 March 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Elizabeth Pearce, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Marking relative clauses in Unua
Among Vanuatu languages, Unua (Malakula) appears to be unique in that the verbs of its relative clauses bear an affix which occurs only in relative clauses. The Unua relative marker m- seems to have derived historically from a realis prefix *mV- which is attested synchronically as a realis marker in only a handful of Malakula languages. In this talk, I offer some suggestions as to both the relic specialization of *mV- in Unua and its widespread disappearance in other languages of Malakula.
LALS staff
Date: 8 March 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speakers: LALS staff
Title: What are they really up to?
To launch the LALS seminar series for 2013, staff from across the school will take turns to tell you about their research. Could it be that they really do know what they’re talking about in lectures?
You will get to hear what academics do on their research days and during their non-teaching trimester - and all neatly packaged in just one or two PowerPoint slides. Come and get excited by the breadth and depth of research currently underway in LALS.
Richard Kayne
Date: 1 March 2013
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: HULT119
Speaker: Prof Richard Kayne, New York University. Erskine Fellow, University of Canterbury
Title: Comparative Syntax
The primary importance of comparative syntax lies in the fact that it provides us with new kinds of evidence bearing on questions concerning the general character of the language faculty. Figuring out what cross-linguistic generalizations hold and why exactly they hold will invariably help us to crucially narrow down the set of hypotheses that we entertain about the language faculty. Comparative syntax in all its range can be seen as a new window on the language faculty that is just beginning to bear fruit. I will try to give a general characterization of comparative syntax work, with some examples.
Neal Norrick
Date: 7 December 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: HMLT001
Speaker: Professor Neal Norrick, University of Saarbruecken
Title: Talking about food: Recipes in conversation
This talk focuses on telling recipes in conversation, stories about cooking, and joke recipes. Recipes have features in common with narratives and also with instructions. While they routinely issue from narratives and segue back into narratives, in line with their status as sets of instructions, recipe-tellings constitute expert talk, presupposing shared background knowledge, containing technical vocabulary and references to ingredients, measurements, tools and procedures associated with specialized practices. Conversational recipe-telling exploits conventions from written recipes, appropriating their overall sequential order, presuppositions, vocabulary, measurements, and grammatical structures. Conversely, recipes may engender conversational narratives and serve as the pattern for parody jokes.
Behnam Soltani
Date: 26 October 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT632
Speaker: Behnam Soltani, PhD candidate, Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Language, Academic Culture, Power, and Imagined Communities
International students often face challenges to participate in their new academic classrooms. I am researching the socialization of international students in a tertiary institution in NZ. In this case study of one student from my project, data from diaries, interviews, class observations, video/audio recordings and field notes will be presented. I will explore how this student negotiates her participation and co-constructs her identity in her new academic community and what strategies she implements to survive in her new academic context. I will also discuss her imagined communities and their impact on her learning trajectories.
Bao Trang Nguyen
Date: 19 October 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Bao Trang Nguyen,PhD candidate, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Language learning through task rehearsal and performance in English foreign language lessons in a Vietnamese high school
This talk focuses on language-related episodes (LREs)(Swain,1998) that arose in task rehearsal and the extent to which they led to uptake in subsequent performance of the same task. The study took place in six intact Grade 11 classes in a Vietnamese high school. The findings showed that an encouraging number of language items attended to in LREs were taken up successfully in performance. However, incorrect uptake also occurred. It was also found that tasks and proficiency impacted on uptake, and the quality of uptake was closely linked to the ways in which learners resolved their LREs in task rehearsal.
Anna Piasecki
Date: 12 October 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Dr Anna Piasecki, PhD celebration, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Demystifying the bilingual mind
This talk will reflect on my journey exploring the mechanisms that allow bilinguals to operate in a particular language with the seeming ease with which they do so. Although it may be tempting to assume that a bilingual can simply switch one language off that is irrelevant in a given context, the talk will show (1) that this is not the case and that both of a bilingual’s languages ‘interact’ continuously, and (2) certain approaches that bilinguals may employ in ambiguous situations. Most importantly, the talk will also show that the architecture of a bilingual’s mind is not static but that, subject to experience, it constantly evolves to accommodate the needs of a bilingual speaker.
Kemel Jouini
Date: 5 October 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Kemel Jouini, PhD candidate, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Subjects & Topics: What’s the difference? Subject-verb agreement configurations in V1/V2 structures
The derivation of subject-verb agreement configurations in V1 and V2 structures (in Germanic, Celtic/Semitic languages) is feature-driven. In these languages, the feature structure of I(nflection) and C(omplementizer) may be morphologically ‘richer’ than in other languages. Focusing on ‘Expletive-constructions’, I propose that T(ense)-features and D(eterminer)-features, mainly, combine differently in the representation of ‘Subjects’ in agreement configurations.
Thus, on the basis of such feature combinations, variation in the derivation of V1 and V2 structures centres on how T-features and D-features are distributed in sentence structure. Ultimately, the difference between ‘Subjects’ and ‘Topics’ follows from such a distribution.
Lisa Matthewson and Prof Henry Davis
Date: 1 October 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speakers: Lisa Matthewson Associate Professor, University of British Columbia and Erskine Fellow at the University of Canterbury & Professor Henry Davis, University of British Columbia
Title: Towards a Scientific Approach to Linguistic Typology
Imminent large-scale language extinction obliges linguists to gather accurate information about linguistic diversity. Evans and Levinson (2009) argue that generative linguistics is ill-suited for discovering diversity, and that informal typological methods are superior.
We argue, in contrast, that diversity is only accurately detected through formal research on individual languages. We outline a scientific methodology for cross-linguistic research, drawing from our work on endangered Amerindian languages. Our case studies demonstrate that formal research detects significant diversity, and dispel the myth of the ‘armchair linguist’ who forces languages into a universalist mold.
Part 1: Syntax (categories, binding).
Part 2: Semantics (modality, quantification).
Jean Parkinson and Jill Musgrave
Date: 28 September 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speakers:Jean Parkinson and Jill Musgrave, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Developing noun phrase complexity in academic writing
This talk outlines a project in which research and practice meet. It explores an approach to designing classroom materials and teaching them that draws on a discourse analysis of academic texts written by the students with whom the materials will be used. Firstly we present an analysis of a small corpus of writing by EPP students, focusing on use of the noun phrase, and comparing it to another student corpus of writing by more expert writers of academic English; secondly, building on this analysis, we outline development of language teaching materials and an instructional approach to implement them.
Nicky Riddiford
Date: 21 September 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Nicky Riddiford, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Using ‘please’ in a request: is it always a magic word?
Most non-native speakers of English have a highly-developed knowledge of the features of polite expressions for making requests in their own language, however, many use the word please indiscriminately in English requests with little awareness of the subtleties involved. This paper presents the findings of a research study into the use of ‘please’ by native speakers of English. Findings from a corpus search, questionnaire, role-plays and interviews suggest that the role of please is a complex one and its use varies according to the context.
The results of this research study were used as part of the communication training materials in the skilled migrant programme at Victoria University and the impact of this input was tracked during two trimesters.
Anna Siyanova
Date: 14 September 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Dr. Anna Siyanova, School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: Activating gender stereotypes: A life-span perspective
Research suggests that information about stereotypical gender associated with certain occupations and characteristics is incorporated into speakers’ representations. The present study employed a priming paradigm and four groups of participants (eight- and ten-year-old children, young and senior adults) to investigate the activation of gender stereotypes in Italian. The findings suggest that gender stereotyping is almost adult-like by the age of seven, and that the processing pattern, observed in young children, continues into adulthood and old age relatively unchanged. As such, this is the first study that investigates on-line processing of gender stereotypes from a life-span perspective.
Ghil'ad Zuckermann
Date: 7 September 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Venue: MYLT101Speaker: Professor Ghil'ad Zuckermann, Chair of Linguistics and Endangered Languages, The University of Adelaide, Australia
Title: Sleeping Beauties Awake: Towards the Establishment of Revival Linguistics
This groundbreaking lecture will analyse the ethical, aesthetic and utilitarian benefits of language revival, and propose the establishment of Revival Linguistics, a new discipline studying systematically the universal constraints and local peculiarities apparent in linguistic and cultural revitalization across various sociological backgrounds. With coca-colonization and homogenization there will be more and more groups added to the forlorn club of the lost-heritage peoples. Language reclamation will become increasingly relevant as people seek to recover their cultural autonomy, empower their spiritual and intellectual sovereignty, and improve their wellbeing. There is an urgent need to offer perspicacious comparative insights relevant to language reclamation.
ELI staff
Date: 31 August 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT632
Speakers: English Language Institute staff members
Title: English Language Institute Programmes
The English Language Institute (ELI) offers a wide range of intensive English language training programmes for different purposes. These include English for Academic Purposes, English for Specific Purposes and pre-service teacher training (CertTESOL) programmes.
What are all these programmes we teach and what issues are ELI staff focused on? If you have ever wondered what ELTO, ELTSO, PREPP or EPP stand for, then this is an opportunity to find out.
Marty Pilott
Date: 17 August 2012
Time: 4.00 pm
Venue: MYLT101
Speaker: Marty Pilott, PhD candidate, School of linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Title: The role of acceptability in pronunciation
A research proposal: English ability is a barrier to migrants' integration and employment. This is often described as "poor English" but accent is clearly important. My research agenda examines the problems caused by non-acceptability of migrants' accents to employers. There is little research on the role of pronunciation, and so there is little advice available for ESOL teachers on acceptability.
These are my research questions:
1. Does pronunciation affect employers' assessment of the suitability of migrants for employment?
2. If so, which problematic pronunciation features are most salient amongst the speakers considered less acceptable?