Volume 43, Issue 1 -

Cooperative vs. Individual Learning of Oral Skills in a Call Environment This study aimed at exploring the effectiveness of two computer-based techniques, cooperative and individual learning, for teaching and learning oral skills - listening and speaking. It was also concerned with investigating students' attitude towards using CALL approach and techniques for teaching oral skills. The sample of the study consisted of four groups. The first one studied oral skills according to the cooperative computer technique, and the second group was taught via the individual computer technique. The third group studied according to the cooperative traditional technique, while the fourth group used the individual traditional technique. The findings of the study which is based on a limited number of participants showed that the cooperative computer technique was found to be a functional method for learning and teaching oral skills. The survey conducted in this study also indicated that students had a positive attitude towards using CALL approach and the cooperative computer technique. As a result, it is recommended to integrate CALL approach into the oral skill curriculum.

Modal Verbs: Typology and Conceptualisation in Greek and English The purpose of this paper is to compare the Greek and English conceptual categories of directives and conclusions so as to present the cognitive dimension of cross-linguistic influence in Foreign Language Learning (FLL). This comparison entails a tertium comparationis , namely, a taxonomy based on cross-linguistic semantic categories, which share comparable linguistic expressions. Modality , being a general cross-linguistic semantic category, lends itself to the requirements of a comparative tool. A cross-linguistic discussion of modality, however, is not limited only to those aspects that comprise the knowledge of these linguistic units and the rules of joining them together at the level of sentence. It also seeks to anticipate possible difficulties Greek EFL learners may encounter while using specific English modal verbs in a variety of contexts, which situationally constitute representations of different conceptual aspects of the speech acts of directives and conclusions. Hence the emphasis is on the pragmatic component as well. The cognitive perspective is borne out by viewing certain English modal verbs and their Greek counterparts as interconnected members of conceptual categories, i.e. Idealised Cognitive Models (ICMs; Lakoff 1987), being run through by the unifying element of force (Talmy 1988).

The Problem of the Russian Labial Fricatives: Why V is Different This paper offers a new account of the ambiguous sonorant/obstruent behaviour displayed by the labial continuant v in Russian. This classic case of phonological opacity has been the subject of much debate in the literature. Derivational analyses advanced so far have proved unsatisfactory. It is argued that a coherent explanation for this phenomenon is provided by Optimality Theory (Prince and Smolensky 1993), where the indeterminate sonorant/obstruent behaviour of v is derived from the interplay of independent constraints. The analysis developed in this paper relies on the assumption that v is represented as the laryngeally unspecified sonorant /w/ in the underlying representation. On the surface, /w/ strengthens to the obstruent [v] but, unlike "regular" sonorants, does not receive the [+voice] specification by Sonorant Default. As a result, the output [v] lacks the laryngeal specification and so cannot affect the adjacent obstruent. The assumption that the output [v] remains unspecified for voice makes it possible to explain the fact that v can undergo but not trigger Voice Assimilation.

Studies on the Interlanguage of Arab EFL Learners: An Overview This study reports on a recent bibliography titled The interlanguage of Arab learners of English: A preliminary annotated bibliography. The bibliography, carried out over the last few years by the writer of this paper is now available on the home page of the International Journal of Arabic-English Studies (IJAES) at www.ijaes.org. In particular, the study highlights the type and nature of the studies listed in the bibliography through providing representative titles and sources. It also discusses the types of problems encountered in the process of compiling the bibliography. In this context it suggests, albeit briefly, a system for listing Arabic surnames of authors adopted in the bibliography, which may minimize the problem of referencing and documentation.

Natural Syntax: Negation in English Natural Syntax is a developing deductive theory, a branch of Naturalness Theory. The naturalness judgements are couched in naturalness scales, which follow from the basic parameters (or "axioms") listed at the beginning of the paper. The predictions of the theory are calculated in "deductions", whose chief components are a pair of naturalness scales and the rules governing the alignment of corresponding naturalness values. Parallel and chiastic alignments are distinguished, in complementary distribution. Here almost only chiastic alignment is utilized, the latter being mandatory in derivations limited to unnatural environments. (This paper deals with negation, a phenomenon of low naturalness in Natural Syntax.) The exemplification is taken from English. The following pairs of variants are dealt with in deductions: (1) Is there somebody else? vs. Is there nobody else? (2) Nobody vs. nothing. (3) She is not lazy vs. She does not like ice cream. (4) Absence vs. presence of not with no and any. (5) The adverb nowhere clause-initially and clause-internally. (6) Nowhere expressing rest and movement. (7) Pronouns with no- used as subject or object vs. pronouns with any- used as object. (8) Not with finite and non-finite verbs. (9) He hadn't vs. he didn't have. (10) The adverb never in situ and ex situ. (11) No money vs. not any money in conversation. (12) The determiner no vs. the pronoun none.

Acquisition of the Second Language By Patients with Brain Injury After Prolonged Coma Eight patients with cranio-cerebral trauma after prolonged coma participated in a study investigating their ability to learn a second language (L2). A severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) results in a dramatic decrease of consciousness and cerebral activity. If the state lasts more than 48 hours, it is considered a coma. Due to irreversible changes in the brain, chances of regaining premorbid physical and mental functions drastically diminish after 4 weeks of coma. Only a limited number of post-coma patients succeed in regaining full efficiency. The present study verifies whether it is possible for these patients, for whom it takes months, sometimes even years, of regular exercise to regain normal language functions in the native language, to learn an L2. The experiment was carried out within "The Academy of Life", a program of classes for in- and outpatients, whose aim is to re-adjust patients to everyday life in society after discharge from hospital. All the subjects had known English to some extent before their accidents. There were 18 sessions lasting 1.5-2 hours within a period of 6 months. The subjects were examined twice: before and after the program. The results show that learning an L2 is still possible. The subjects improved their performance in the following language components: lexicon, grammar and pronunciation. The acquisition process was delayed by post-traumatic aphasia which led to a lack of criticism of the patients' own utterances, as well as a dysfunction of the switch mechanism. The subjects also suffered from disorganization of memory and concentration. However, some patients achieved higher results than it had been expected. The relatively young age of the subjects (mean 20.6 years) increased their chances of learning an L2.

Prominence in Beat Structure The sonority scale is generally invoked in order to provide an account of possible syllable or beat structures - the more sonorous a segment the more likely it is to serve as a nucleus. Auditory considerations, however, point to the primacy of onsets instead of nuclei as the most perceptually prominent segments in a syllable. Prominence Phonology (Schwartz, in preparation) considers the structure of a beat to be based on the interaction of two preference scales - one for onset prominence, and one for nuclear prominence. This paper presents the auditory properties of the two scales, and describes how the interactions between them may affect beat structure. These interactions can offer a plausible account of the "empty nucleus", and provide a formal vehicle in describing the application of Natural Phonological processes. The connection between beat structure prominence scales and the representation of segments in Prominence Phonology is also discussed, with implications for the interface between phonetics and phonology.

On Bridge Requirements in English A minimalist analysis of island conditions and bridge requirements on wh-movement in English is proposed. It has been traditionally assumed within the generative framework that wh-movement is impossible or degraded across a range of structurally analysable configurations (islands) and acceptable elsewhere (bridges). Structures meeting the configurational requirements but nevertheless having a degraded grammaticality status (non-bridge constructions) were, not rightly, banished from the scope of syntactic research proper. With the advent of minimalism, a syntactic account of non-bridge constructions can be achieved. The paper employs and modifies ideas from, among others, Chomsky (1998 and 1999), Uriagereka (1999), and Franks (2000) to show that the time of merging of a given constituent is crucial for its islandhood. Thanks to a minimalist perspective taken here, unification of bridge and island conditions seems possible. Also, a reinvestigation of Erteschik's (1973) verb typology is offered with an interim conclusion that that factivity of verbs with complement clauses is a decisive factor for their island status.

A Democratic IGBO Orthography From the earliest attempt at Igbo codification by the protestant missionaries and the Igbo exslaves resettled in Sierra Leone to the present day, Igbo orthography is associated with criticisms, suspicion and conflicts (Ogbo 1984; Achebe 1984; Capo 1990; Uwalaka 2001; Ugorji 2003, 2005, etc.). While the introduction of the official Onwu orthography of 1961 seemed to have resolved the seven-decade fiendish orthography controversy which bedevilled the development of the language, it actually only resolved those controversies that came along religious lines involving the Roman and Protestant Missions. This study identifies two other problems, namely the linguistic and the sociological, that are yet outstanding: hence the recent and sustained complaints about literary constraints, dialect exclusion (detailed in Ugorji 2003, among others) and the diversionary linguistic engineering involving the dialects of Izii, Ezaa, Ikwo, Ikwere, Ika, etc. Following the imperatives of the new world democratic order (Emenanjo 2002), this paper suggests a democratic and integrated orthography, built on the principles that preserve citizens' personal and collective linguistic rights as well as linguistic and cultural diversity. In Ugorji (2003), the principles for language and dialect vitality are outlined; the concern of the present work is to show how the tenets are implemented in Igbo graphisation as a case in point. More importantly, it is an effort to demonstrate how language or dialect vitality option proves to be a solution to conflicts associated with language or dialect, and a means to implement the democratic demands for sociolinguistic equity, enunciated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights (1996), the Declaration of Rights of Persons Belonging to National, Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities (1992), among others, which seek to assert the rights of individuals and communities.

Review