Coursework Idea's unfinished

For my investigation I am going to be looking at my three year old cousin, and how his gender affects his language. Additionally I will be looking at grammar, lexis and phonology as well as other theories that I am expecting to come across whilst listening and watching him.

I am going to be looking at the choices he makes etc. I have already filmed him where I asked him what his favourite colour was and I am going to analyse this. I am going to ask him to tell me a story, I have looked through magazines with him and he pointed out which things were his favourite.

I could potentially look at Bruner's theory, and look at how the rest of my family interact with him, looking at how they accommodate to his style of speech and how they speak slowly.

 

Stages of child language development- spoken language

 

 

It genuinely interests and surprises me how quickly babies learn to communicate, and not only that aspect but also from the perspective of the parents and how they understand what the child is asking them for. in my research i am going to be looking at stages of child language development from being in the womb up to the age of 5.Even though it may seem that there is no order of how children learn this is not the case. They will start off speaking vowels which they will do with a rounded mouth "oo", "ah" , then consonants "b","p","g","k","m","d","t","n" because these are easier to pronounce rather than "s" or "z" which many children aren't able to do at that age.

The Womb:

In my research i found that even when babies are in the womb they are already starting to detect some noise although the sound is limited, by week 16 of the pregnancy babies can hear what is happening for example: when the mother's stomach rumbles or when air is travelling in and out of the lungs and by week 24 the baby starts responding to the noises and voices.

0-3 months: Babies have distinguished cries for different situations, a cry could mean a variety of things; hungry, tired, unhappy etc. At this age they are able to smile and usually do this to voices or faces that are familiar to them.

 4-6 months:


This is usually the stage where babies become fascinated with toys, especially toys that make noise or have a certain texture for them to touch. They will start to tell you what they want by using hand gestures eg. pointing or making a grabbing motion with their hands. At this stage this is where the child becomes more vocal, by gargling or babbling, it often sounds like he/she is talking, they also use a lot of bilabial sounds such as "p", "m","w", and "b".

 7-12 months:


At this stage he/she have probably said their first words which could be anything but the most common ones are: "dada" ,"mama","no","bye bye" and "night night".  More consonants, long and short vowels are used too, they will start to use words or other noises rather than crying to tell you what they want. They can also recognise and respond to questions "where's daddy gone?" , they have learnt their own name and will look at you when you call them. Games and nursery rimes become fun and they will start to lean the tune.

 1-2 years:

Words are developing and are becoming easier to understand as more consonants are used. They might start asking their own questions "more chippies", "what's that?" and in return will respond to more questions. They can learn each of their boys parts and point them out. They also will want the same story, game or song repeated numerous amounts of times.

 2-3 years:

Toddlers will understand two stage commands "bring your cup over here and put it on the table", they will also understand meanings and concepts "yucky", "nice". At this stage the child's vocabulary is developing rapidly, they will use a lot of utterances which will be easy for family members to understand.



3-4 years:
Speech is now becoming fluent, clearer and easier for people other than family members to understand, they will talk about anything! usually to do with nursery or what they did at the park etc. Sentences are longer as they can combine together four or more words.



4-5 years:
Detailed and long sentences are used at this stage "Molly said my dress was pretty and she is going to ask her mummy to buy her one the same like mine". They can tell descriptive and imaginative stories to engage with other people. Sounds are normally pronounced correctly although they could have some difficulty with "th","r" and "v".


There are four main stages of spoken language: Babbling, the Holophrastic or one-word stage, the two-word stage and the Telegraphic stage. The babbling stage isn't as important as the other stages as this is where the child is experimenting with sounds, it is learning its surroundings and is attempting to imitate the noises around them. When the baby understands the concept of non verbal and verbal communication then it will move onto the next stage of language acquisition.

The Holophrastic/ one word stage:
In this stage nouns make up around 50% of the infants vocabulary while verbs and modifiers make up around 30% and questions and negatives make up the rest, it is made up of one word stages and utterances "play". Infants would use this stage to show that they need or want something although this might not be so obvious as it could be for attention. When they have learned to speak in one word sentences successfully then they will move onto the next stage.

The two word stage:
The two word stage is made up of two word sentences, single modifiers are also being used "that cat", along with questions "mummy eat?"

Telegraphic stage:
This stage contains three or four word sentences and is considered to be the most important stage in language development. This is sometimes the stage where the child learns the links between words and objects e.g "daddy playing with ball". At this stage of development a childs vocabulary will epand from 50 words to up to 13,000, the child will then start to learn how to join words, incorporate plurals and get a grip on tenses.





References:
Bowen, c (1998). (2014 (updated)). Ages and stages summary . Available: http://www.speech-language-therapy.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=34:ages&catid=11:admin&Itemid=117. Last accessed 9th september 2015.

unknown?. (2015). Fetal Hearing . Available: http://www.whattoexpect.com/pregnancy/fetal-hearing/. Last accessed 9th september 2015.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=child's+language+development&biw=1280&bih=929&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0CAYQ_AUoAWoVChMIj-XhrtruxwIVBL0aCh0s4AEF#tbm=isch&q=child+language+acquisition&imgrc=_



https://enlsac2max.wordpress.com/stages-of-language-acquisition/

Reading Log of A2 Units

Razavi, L. (2014). Language learning: what motivates us?. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/mar/19/language-learning-motivation-brain-teaching. Last accessed 1st august 2015. Razavi had an interview with John Schumann, a linguistics professor. Schumann talked about a new theory that he had developed called 'the interactional instinct' which is what he believes is how children learn how to talk, as they have a drive to be like the people that they are surrounded with.

Press Association. (2015). ICYMI, English language is changing faster than ever, says expert. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/may/01/icymi-english-language-is-changing-faster-than-ever-says-expert. Last accessed 31 august 2015. The article was looking how text talk is evolving e.g. the use of emojis and acronyms and the main users being teenagers. They also surveyed adults on whether they understood the meanings of the word 'bae' or 'fleek' concluding that there is a large generational gap.

Hill, A. (2011). Singing to children may help development of language skills . Available: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/may/08/singing-children-development-language-skills. Last accessed 31st august 2015. Hill referred to Sally Goddard Blythe, a consultant in neuro-developmental education who has a book about this topic. Blythe said that "a song is a special type of speech" and that by singing lullaby's etc. it helps the child learn about hoe language is constructed as well as learning skills about beats and rhythms.


Farwell, c/ Ferguson, c (1975). Words and Sounds in Early Language Acquisition . USA: Linguistic Society of America . pg 419. Farwell and Ferguson wrote about how children have to learn and grasp a lot of key elements in the English language a large proportion of that being lexical and phonological aspects. The child also has to learn to understand how and when it is appropriate to use the language, which is normally mimicked from hearing people around them speak.

MCculloch, G. (2015). Move over Shakespeare, teen girls are the real language disruptors. Available: http://qz.com/474671/move-over-shakespeare-teen-girls-are-the-real-language-disruptors/. Last accessed 25th august 2015. In this article MCculloch looks at the findings of two linguists; Terttu Nevalainen and Helena Raumolin-Brunberg, the pair studied letters written between the years of 1417 and 1681. Their study led them to find that it was in fact women who have changed the way we talk and speak over the era's, women are more socially aware and concerned about how they are perceived by others which could be one of the reasons why women have led language change. It is not yet known for sure why women are more ahead than men, it could be nature v nuture?

Mini investigation

For my investigation i have chosen to look at how Asda and Tesco use language in order to persuade the consumer to shop at their supermarket. I chose to look at this because we are constantly being exposed to advertising whether it be from watching television,watching videos on youtube, listening to the radio and on billboards etc. My hypothesis is that each supermarket builds the consumer in different ways to target their own specific audience.



Methodology- I chose the first two adverts from each supermarket  both from 2015, this makes it more reliable and shows that i didn't cherry pick the adverts.



Asda's predominant technique is the use of verbs, from both of asda's adverts there is a total of 37 verbs used. The verbs are used as they will have different meanings to each of the target audience members, the words can be interpreted in many ways in which could persuade a certain person to shop in their supermarket and purchase one of their products. Both of the asda adverts share a similarity as they rhyme " mopping,chopping,topping, popping" a polyzygotic is used here as it has a longer lasting effect on the audience, and to make the advert catchy and flow better. The connotations of the specific words will have an effect on the target audience too "steaming" the adjective has many different connotations as it could refer to ironing, cooking and cleaning which could appeal to both men and women.



Asda also uses synthetic personalisation by using second person pronouns "you", "you're" this is used to make the audience feel as though the advert is targeted specifically towards them and to build a relationship with them, it addresses the audience personally and could persuade them to shop at the supermarket and to buy their products. Asda's uses informal language in order to appeal to their target audience which is more likely to be families "roll back", "low prices", this would appeal to families as the recession has meant major cutbacks on the amount that families are spending, they are aware about the prices of products and would much rather shop in a supermarket where they can get more for their money.



Tesco's techniques are using nouns over both of the adverts i only found 5 nouns, the nouns are used to modify the meaning of the words "trusty","finest","carefully" this creates a different target audience compared to that of Asda. Whilst tesco does cater for 'regular' families which is demonstrated in the adverts it appears to be for the more affluent consumer. There is a slight lexical field of the word expensive "finest","ladyship","trusty","carefully","amazing" when these are placed with the product is creates an image of a finer lifestyle.



Another thing that is interesting from the Tesco advert was on the audio of the advert the voice over copies the tone and pitch of the other actors voices this appeals to the target audience as they feel as though that particular moment the advert is talking to them.

In conclusion my hypothesis has been proven and i believe that the evidence that i have collected supports this.

Alan sugar transcript

I chose to look at the apprentice extract as i was interesting in looking for language and power theories. i transcribed a short extract of the clip:

LS(lord sugar): Could've, would've, should've (1) yeah could've but you didn't (.) yeah (.) right (.) no (.)but you didn't yeah. I think i've heard enough(.) for me to make a very very difficult decision here today.

Claire: Sir Alan may i say one more thing please?

LS: (3) if you insist.


The theory that I chose to link this text to was Norman Fairclough's theory of unequal encounters, and Wareing's types of power.


Before I began to annotate I knew that we would see an unequal encounter because it is a clip from the apprentice whereby Lord Sugar has the most power as he can choose to fire contestants. As Lord Sugar is more dominant he doesn't have to worry about using standard English as he isn't trying to impress anyone. On the other hand the contestants need to use standard English and be polite as they are trying to gain respect and ultimately win the show.


Lord Sugar has both influential and instrumental power, this is because he is the authoritative figure and has the power to fire the contestants if they do not follow his instructions and complete the tasks that he had set. Ultimately the contestants want to please lord sugar to gain power over the other contestants in the hope that they will win the show.

The part of the transcript that interested me the most was the line spoken by claire, firstly she addresses him by the name "Sir Alan" the use of the proper noun "Sir" is used to benefit Lord Sugar's status. She is also using politeness forms in order to protect herself from a face threatening act "may", "please" here she is demonstrating Brown and Levinson's politness strategies. Her politeness has the desired affect as Lord Sugar allows her to speak. Although he makes her wait for what seems like a long pause in order to make her feel more nervous and to make the tension in the boardroom higher to create an atmosphere and a feeling that anyone could be fired, the three second pause that he makes her wait is yet again another example of how he is using his authority over the contestants. 

investigating language on twitter- A2 lesson

For three lessons we have been investigating language on twitter, we looked at various different tweets and annotated them to look for theories and other things that might have told us something interesting; for example:



This tweet showed multimodality and the fact that it is written in capitals means that you don't necessarily have to read the tweet as the capitals attract your attention and show that it is important. The emojis are used  to show his emotion- the 3 party images are used for celebration which we know means that something good/successful has happened.


For my investigation I decided to look at gender theories as I think there is more to talk about and it is relevant and interesting to find in most conversations. My hypothesis was 'Men are more dominant as they are straight to the point whereas women waffle', I was also looking for emotive language between the two genders I was doing this by looking at the length of the tweets.


For my methodology I chose to look at every third tweet to ensure that there were no anomalies and to make it more reliable as I wouldn't be cherry picking the tweets. The two people that I chose to look at were Ed Miliband and Amy Childs.


I made a chart which showed the different features and what I found in both of the genders over a total of 10 tweets for men and 10 tweets for women totalling to 20 tweets altogether.

Feature	Men	Women
Emojis	0	12
Emotive language	13	7
Sentence length	Average: 20.1 Range: 16-27	Average: 9.2 Range: 3-17
Hashtags	1	10

In my analysis I found that my findings do not support my hypothesis. This is primarily because of the choice of people that I chose to look at. Ed Miliband is an mp whereas Amy Childs is from a reality television show. It is interesting though in the fact that Ed uses more emotive language where we would expect Amy to as she is the woman, although this is because at the time when the tweets were posted it was nearing the general election where Ed needed to gain votes from the public whereas Amy does not.


Reflecting on the data sources I have found that they were ill judged as they are from different backgrounds, therefore this meant that I was a constraint and disproved my hypothesis.


In the next investigation I will make sure that I chose my sources from similar/ the same backgrounds, similar ages, same status and same profession to ensure that the data will support my hypothesis

Short extract of a romantic novel

                                                                          Stay




She stood there, in a pastel pink laced dress that came down to her knees, she wore matching stilettos and her long blonde hair fell down her back. As she stood looking at herself in the mirror disapprovingly the nerves began to hit, she felt the flutter of butterflies in her stomach and felt her hands becoming shaky and sweaty. This was it, it was finally time to go on her date with a man that she had met a few months ago whilst on the beautifully exotic island, it had been a few years since Karen had gone on a date and she was feeling a bit rusty, understandably as she didn't want to get stood up again




An hour had gone by since he was supposed to meet her, she felt foolish, unwanted and betrayed. She left the restaurant and instead opted for a relaxing walk along the beach. The beach was calm, a light breeze brushed along her exposed arms and legs, which was a nice change from the normally humid air. She took a deep breath in, the smell of the salty sea filled her nostrils as she tried to keep herself composed. It didn't take long before the tears started streaming down her face as she remembered the excitement she was feeling to finally start looking for romance. She couldn't understand why he had turned her down, did he find someone else? someone better than her?




Suddenly a mysterious figure loomed in the distance, it slowly started approaching her. She carried on walking towards the figure, he looked familiar. She quickened her pace, all of a sudden she noticed hundreds of candles stood in the sand and on a small glass table, she couldn't believe her eyes it was beautiful. Her attention switched to the dark figure, her eyes must be deceiving her, it couldn't possibly be him could it? Before she knew it he slowly took her hand and brought her over to the candlelit table. He slowly and delicately kissed her on the lips, her heart was beating faster than it had ever beaten before, the butterflies danced. She hadn't lost him, he'd stayed.