unique signs for plural utterances

Unique signs for plural utterances: alleviating doubt in the language learner

Lawrie HunterKochi University of Technology, Japan

http://[email protected]

IDEAL semiotic system creation

Ethnographic observation

Semiotic analysis of need

Signification system design

Implementation

Evaluation

WHY do Japanese learners of English prefer ISmaps?


Heuristic invasion

Serendipity

Search for analytical tools to explain success

Systemic Functional Linguistics/Visual Design Grammar;

Conceptual Integration Theory/Dual Coding Theory

Metaphor comprehension studies

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Ethnographic Observation

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Pragmatics of communication

Pragmatics of signification


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Some Japanese university level learners of English, dubbed 'false beginners,' have acquired English vocabulary and grammar knowledge in six years of high school study but, resuming their study of English in university, they appear unable to make sense of, or sense with, strings of English lexical units.


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mind maps

relation maps

structure maps



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Viewing the second language scenario as a mapping scenario, the author introduced three low-text mapping systems (Mind Maps, Cmaps, and the author's ISmaps) as 'interlanguage' for instructor-learner negotiation of meaning and to explore the effectiveness of low-text mapping as a language task sign system.


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Serendipity

The learners quite uniformly reported that Mind Maps were uninteresting; Cmaps were rejected by many subjects at the outset.

After using ISmaps for a brief period of time, these false beginners rather consistently demonstrated willingness to interpret received English utterance, and to engage in the risky business of producing English utterance to convey meaning.

<big

Description Classification

Degreecomparison

Attributecomparison

Sequence Cause-effect

Contrast

!

Hunter’s infostructure maps (ISmaps)

My friend

CanadianEnglishteacher

57

DESCRIPTION

Hunter’s infostructure maps

CLASSIFICATION

Cars

sedansstationwagonscoupes


<big

old

COMPARISON (relative)

TokyoCalcutta


COMPARISON (by attribute)

red

M’s car K’s car

white

3 years old

new


SEQUENCE

find a

bank machine

put in your

bank card

follow the

directions


SEQUENCE structure signals

ThenFirst and

findbank

machine

put in

bank card

follow

directions


SEQUENCE

slice a tomato

toast two slices of bread

ThenFirst and

tear some

lettuce


CAUSE-EFFECT

heavyrain

I...late for school

buscancelled


ISmaps have been in happy usein KUT's English departmentsince 1998.

Information structures based curriculum

Critical ThinkingAsahi Press 2001

A writing and presentation workbook,

6 units (6 genres) in 30 lessons

Say What You MeanKUT Press 2006A writing and mapping workbook,5 units (5 genres) in 30 lessons

Thinking in EnglishCengage, 2008A writing and presentationmapping text/workbook,5 units (5 genres) in 30 lessons

The domain of ISmaps


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"We should conceive of two different pragmatic approaches: a pragmatics of signification (how to represent in a semantic system pragmatic phenomena) and a pragmatics of communication (how to analyze pragmatic phenomena that take place in the course of a communicative process).

Such phenomena as textual co-reference, topic, text coherence, reference to a set of knowledge idiolectally posited by a text as referring to a fictional world, conversational implicature, and many other phenomena concern an actual process of communication and cannot be foreseen by any system of signification. Other phenomena, such as presupposition, prediction of ordinary contexts, rules for felicity conditions, and so on, can, as we shall see, be considered by the study of a coded system of signification, to describe which both the semantical and the pragmatical approaches are strictly and inextricably interrelated."

Eco, E. (1990) The limits of interpretation. U. of Indiana Press. p. 212


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Cultural factors

Linguistic factors

Psychological factorsPragmatics of signification


Search for analytical tools to explain success:pragmatics of communication

Taking up Eco's notions of a pragmatics of communication to explore the workings of the ISmap success. Communication related tools which proved useful within this framework are

Cultural difference knowledgeLinguistic difference knowledgePsychological (language development) knowledgeEthnographic observation


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Cultural factors

Linguistic factors



Cultural difference knowledge

-reticence (cultural)-perfectionism (meme)-lack of need [sic]-defeatist ethos re English learning


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Cultural factors

Linguistic factors



Linguistic difference knowledge

In Japanese, written signs carry meaning, but in many cases do not speak, or do not speak unambiguously.

As well, Japanese is a left-branching language, and thus clause semantic completeness is not the primary processing unit in initial segmentation (whereas it is the primary unit in English).

This results in a mindset where written utterance need not speak, is not expected to speak, yet where rich meaning does arise.


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Cultural factors

Linguistic factors




Japanese is not a S-V-O syntax.

Japanese characters are logographs.

Japanese has delayed reveal of significand.


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Cultural factors

Linguistic factors




When one's second language is syntactically and orthographically distantfrom one's first language, the interpretation of second language L2 utterance, particularly complex and structured utterance, is impeded by the'foreignness' of grammar and syntax.

e.g.English: A skyscraper is several times higher than an ordinary apartment building. Japanese: Skyscraper no hou ga ordinary no apartment yori high desu.


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Cultural factors

Linguistic factors



Psychological (language development) knowledge

Japanese is a left-branching language, and thusclause semantic completeness is not the primary processing unit in initial segmentation (whereas it is the primary unit in English).

This results in a mindset where written utterance need not speak, is not expected to speak, yet where rich meaning does arise.

Mazuka, R. (1998) The development of language strategies: a cross-linguistic study between Japanese and English. Erlbaum.


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Pragmatics of communicationVisual design grammar

Conceptual blending

Metaphor comprehension



Search for analytical tools to explain success:pragmatics of signification

Taking up Eco's notions of a pragmatics of signification to explore the workings of the ISmap success. Theoretical tools which proved useful within this framework are

Conceptual Integration Theory / Dual Coding TheoryVisual Design Grammar / Systemic Functional Linguistics; Metaphor comprehension studies

Visual Design Grammar says layout in mixed media in English signifies relationships in two ways: left to right images/texts are GIVEN, Mediator and NEW, whiletop to bottom images/texts are IDEAL, Mediator and REAL.

Kress, G. and van Leeuwen, T. (1996) Reading images: The grammar of visual design. Routledge.

Japanese media/graphic arts don't do things that way.


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Conceptual blending



Systemic Functional Linguistics says that rhetoric hinges on GIVEN, what the listener/reader already knows, and NEW, what the speaker/writer is going to 'break.'

Halliday, M.A.K. (1985) An introduction to functional grammar. London: Edward Arnold.

Japanese rhetoric doesn't do things that way.


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Conceptual blending



Conceptual Integration Theory says that metaphor is the combining of disparate FRAMES,

i.e., Conceptual Blending, through which we realize great economy/synergy of thought.

Conceptual Blending is culture-dependent, however, so all great minds do not think alike.

Fauconnier, G. and Turner, M. (2002) The way we think: Conceptual blending and the mind’s hidden complexities. Basic Books.


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Conceptual blending




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Conceptual blending




Japanese is a between-the-lines language: priming effects are derived from syntactic factors.

Processing of metaphor when primed with base (inverted form of metaphor) is faster than when primed with target. Kurosawa, M., & Kawahara,T. (1999). Alignment or Abstraction? Metaphor comprehension in Japanese. Proceedings, Second International Conference on Cognitive Science. http://www.jcss.gr.jp/iccs99OLP/p3-19/p3-19.htm


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Serendipity


Conceptual blending




Japanese is a between-the-lines language: priming effects are derived from syntactic factors.

Processing of metaphor when primed with base (inverted form of metaphor) is faster than when primed with target. Kurosawa, M., & Kawahara,T. (1999). Alignment or Abstraction? Metaphor comprehension in Japanese. Proceedings, Second International Conference on Cognitive Science. http://www.jcss.gr.jp/iccs99OLP/p3-19/p3-19.htm


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Conceptual blending



<= contradicts Gentner and Wolff's findings about the primacy of abstraction factors in metaphor comprehension in English, a specificity-oriented language.

Gentner,D., & Wolff,P. (1997). Alignment in the processing of metaphor. Journal of Memory and Language, 37, 331--355.

Thank you for your kind attention,

and thank you in advance for your feedback and suggestions.

Lawrie [email protected]

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