Few previous studies have investigated the relationship between global perspective and willingness to communicate in English. Hence, more studies are needed to validate their correlation. Furthermore, hardly any pertaining studies have been conducted at English Medium Instruction universities. As such, the current study aimed to fill these gaps in the context of an EMI university in China, by investigating whether GP correlates with second language WTC and what factors impact the two variables. Data were collected from students (...) via an online questionnaire and follow-up interviews. The questionnaire findings confirmed a moderate positive correlation between GP and L2 WTC. The interview data unraveled that several factors influenced students’ L2 WTC, including needs and motivations driving L2 WTC, concerns constraining L2 WTC, and intercultural cognition facilitating L2 WTC. These findings suggest that: students could be more determined to practice their English if they realize the significance of the role of English in their life; teachers could foster students’ WTC by creating a non-threatening English-speaking environment and encouraging students to communicate in English in and outside the classroom; and teachers could educate students about GP and L2 WTC, which might help to expand students’ horizon and stimulate their interests in foreign cultures and global affairs, so as to facilitate the sustainable growth of their English learning. (shrink)

In recent years, a greater focus has been placed on the influential power of domain-general psychological properties in second language acquisition and learning. The investigations of these properties, such as grit, academic procrastination and enjoyment etc. have been extensively conducted and are well-documented. Notwithstanding the surge of academic inquiry, the link between psychopathological notions and second language learning has not been adequately established and thoroughly scrutinized. The current study, therefore, aims to broaden the spectrum of second language research and explore (...) the impact of social phobia on willingness to communicate in the second language context. Meanwhile, this research introduces the self-construct, particularly the ideal L2 self to further examine and elucidate the impact. 173 qualified Chinese speakers of L2 English participated in the study. By conducting correlation analysis, regression analysis and structural equation modelling analysis, it was revealed that social phobia had a significant negative impact on L2 willingness to communicate in social situations of meetings and public speaking. Ideal L2 self acted as a complete mediating role in the impact. Pedagogical implications and future directions were proposed and discussed. (shrink)

This article presents empirical data on the limited availability of hospice and palliative care to the 6 million people of the English-speaking Caribbean. Ten of the 13 nations therein responded to a survey and reported employing a total of 6 hospice or palliative specialists, and having a total of 15 related facilities. The evolving socioeconomic and cultural context in these nations bears on the availability of such care, and on the willingness to report, assess, and prioritize pain, and (...) to prescribe opiates for pain. Socioeconomics and culture also impinge on what medications and modalities of care are routinely available for pain or other conditions and can challenge professionalism, empathy, and responsiveness to patients’ unrelieved pain. Although all respondents report having a protocol for pain management, hospice, or end-of-life care, their annual medical use of opiates is well below the global mean. The International Narcotics Control Board , which monitors such use, encourages Caribbean and other low- and middle-income countries to increase their use of opiates to treat pain, and to overcome both unfounded fears of addiction and overly restrictive interpretation of related laws and regulations. Contextual considerations like those described here are important to the success of policies and capacity-building programs aiming to increase access to hospice and palliation, and perhaps to improving other aspects of health and healthcare. Exploring and responding to the realities of socioeconomic and cultural conditions will enhance public and policy dialogue and improve the design of interventions to increase access to palliative and hospice care. Improving access to palliative and hospice care in the Caribbean demonstrates beneficence and helps to fulfill human rights conventions. (shrink)

The study of voice behavior examines the inclination of staff and team members to speak up and contribute ideas to the team. In this article, we investigate how factors such as leader-member exchange (LMX), psychological safety and psychological empowerment influence such behavior. Our findings, which are based on a sample of 308 employees working for a state-owned telecommunications company on the Chinese mainland, indicate that ethical leadership promotes employees’ voice behavior through enhanced leader-member exchange, which also leads to greater (...) feelings of psychological safety and psychological empowerment. The theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed. (shrink)

Esta investigación pretendía examinar una posible relación entre la autopercepción de la predisposición del alumnado de secundaria a hablar inglés en situaciones fuera del aula y su participación en un proyecto de telecolaboración desarrollado en inglés como lengua franca. En la investigación participaron 22 estudiantes españoles, 26 polacos y 14 rumanos. Los datos se recogieron mediante un cuestionario en línea, administrado al alumnado en la fase anterior y posterior a la telecolaboración. Los hallazgos indican que la telecolaboración audiovisual y sincrónica (...) tiene un impacto positivo en la predisposición a hablar inglés fuera del aula con otros usuarios del mismo idioma. (shrink)

Learners’ willingness to communicate in a foreign language is regarded as a critical issue in educational contexts, so the role of emotional factors in learners’ willingness to communicate has drawn the attention of investigators. This review investigated the studies on the relationship between English as a Foreign Language learners’ grit, foreign language anxiety, and willingness to communicate. This review showed a significant relationship between learners’ grit and willingness to communicate. The earlier studies showed that gritty (...) learners with incessant inspiring efforts are more likely to communicate in a foreign language. This review also indicated that lower anxious learners tend to have more willingness to communicate. Earlier studies also indicated that the theories, such as broaden-and-build, positive psychology, dynamic system, affective filter, and attentional control can justify the relationships between these constructs. Moreover, the study has some pedagogical implications and suggestions for teachers, learners, syllabus designers, material developers, teacher educators, policy-makers, and advisors. The ideas can improve their awareness of teachers’ willingness to communicate, grit, and foreign language anxiety in educational environments. (shrink)

This study investigates the effect of socio-ecological networks on the willingness to communicate in English among Japanese people. Previous studies have shown that relational mobility, which is defined as the availability of opportunities to choose new relationship partners, positively affects the WTC in English for Japanese people. However, the network structure of the variables of relational mobility and its effects have not been revealed yet. The present study conducted network analysis with 474 Japanese university students and found (...) the two clusters that correspond to the dimensions of relational mobility in the partial correlation network. Three variables regarding opportunities to meet new people and leave current relationships positively affected the WTC in English; one had a negative effect. Centrality indices, such as nodes strength, betweenness, and closeness, revealed the centrality of several variables in the network. Bootstrapping methods showed the trustworthiness of the estimated network structure and centrality indices as well as edges and variables whose effects differed significantly from that of others. Contrary to the regression analysis results, the network analysis findings can help us understand the in-depth effect of relational mobility on the WTC in a second language, which will prove useful for intervention studies. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article examines right-leaning press representations of people living in the UK who can’t speak English, or at least speak English well, following the 2011 Census, which was the first to ask respondents about their main language and proficiency in English. The analysis takes a corpus-assisted approach to critical discourse analysis, based on a 1.8 million-word corpus of right-leaning newspaper articles about ‘speak English’ in the years following this historic Census. The analysis reveals (...) the tendency for the press to focus on immigrants – particularly in the contexts of education and health – who are represented with recourse to a series of argumentation strategies, or ‘topoi’. Over the course of this paper, we argue that these topoi are problematic, as they present paradoxes, obscure the role of the Government in ensuring integration, overlook the difficulties of language learning and cultural assimilation, and generally contribute to a broader anti-immigrant UK media narrative which serves to legitimise exclusionary and discriminatory practices against people from minority linguistic and ethnic backgrounds. (shrink)

Robust technology infrastructure is needed to enable learning health care systems to improve quality, access, and cost. Such infrastructure relies on the trust and confidence of individuals to share their health data for healthcare and research. Few studies have addressed consumers’ views on electronic data sharing and fewer still have explored the dual purposes of healthcare and research together. The objective of the study is to explore factors that affect consumers’ willingness to share electronic health information for healthcare and (...) research. This study involved a random-digit dial telephone survey of 800 adult Californians conducted in English and Spanish. Logistic regression was performed using backward selection to test for significant associations of each explanatory variable with the outcome variable. The odds of consent for electronic data sharing for healthcare decreased as Likert scale ratings for EHR impact on privacy worsened, odds ratio = 0.74, 95% CI [0.60, 0.90]; security, OR = 0.80, 95% CI [0.66, 0.98]; and quality, OR = 0.59, 95% CI [0.46–0.75]. The odds of consent for sharing for research was greater for those who think EHR will improve research quality, OR = 11.26, 95% CI [4.13, 30.73]; those who value research benefit over privacy OR = 2.72, 95% CI [1.55, 4.78]; and those who value control over research benefit OR = 0.49, 95% CI [0.26, 0.94]. Consumers’ choices about electronically sharing health information are affected by their attitudes toward EHRs as well as beliefs about research benefit and individual control. Design of person-centered interventions utilizing electronically collected health information, and policies regarding data sharing should address these values of importance to people. Understanding of these perspectives is critical for leveraging health data to support learning health care systems. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Force and Translation; Or, The Polymorphous Body of LanguageElissa MarderOr un corps verbal ne se laisse pas traduire ou transporter dans une autre langue. Il est cela même que la traduction laisse tomber. Laisser tomber le corps, telle est même l’énergie essentielle de la traduction. Quand elle réinstitue un corps, elle est poésie.—Jacques Derrida, “Freud et la scène de l’écriture”The materiality of a word cannot be translated or carried (...) over into another language. Materiality is precisely that which translation relinquishes. To relinquish materiality: such is the driving force of translation. And when that materiality is reinstated, translation becomes poetry.—Jacques Derrida, “Freud and the Scene of Writing”Babel Revisited (The Mother Tongue and The Translation Machine)On January 20, 2012, Lawrence Summers, former president of Harvard and former Secretary of the U.S. Treasury, boldly announced a six-point vision for reforming the U.S. education system in a New York Times Education supplement editorial modestly entitled, “What you (Really) Need to Know.” For the [End Page 1] purposes of this discussion, I will limit myself here to a brief examination of what he says about the study of foreign languages and the merits of machine translation in the item listed as “number 5”:5. The world is much more open, and events abroad affect the lives of Americans more than ever before. This makes it essential that the educational experience breed cosmopolitanism—that students have international experiences, and classes in the social sciences draw on examples from around the world. It seems logical, too, that more in the way of language study be expected of students. I am not so sure.English’s emergence as the global language, along with the rapid progress in machine translation and the fragmentation of languages spoken around the world, make it less clear that the substantial investment necessary to speak a foreign tongue is universally worthwhile. While there is no gainsaying the insights that come from mastering a language, it will over time become less essential in doing business in Asia, treating patients in Africa or helping resolve conflicts in the Middle East.For those of us who still earn our living by teaching literary texts written in foreign languages in foreign language departments in the university, Summers’s breezy assessment that the university of the future need not (indeed ought not) include extensive foreign language study is, sadly, not exactly news. On the contrary, there is nothing particularly innovative or original about the position he advocates here: his vision of a future “global” American university—in which virtually all speculative activities are conducted solely in English—has already begun to be implemented in various colleges and universities around the world. If his remarks are nonetheless noteworthy, it is because of his apparent willingness—even eagerness—to defend a policy that university officials often officially still pretend to abhor. Indeed, Summers’s position goes far beyond the more familiar pragmatic voices that have concluded that the reduction of foreign language instruction is a necessary and unavoidable consequence of the unfortunate economic reality that the American university as we once knew it has become financially untenable and hence unable to accommodate areas of study that can be construed as nonessential. Instead, Summers goes a step farther: he actively advocates against investing precious university resources in foreign language study on ideological, political, quasi-philosophical, or dare I say it, perhaps even theological, grounds. By appealing to the value of what he calls here “cosmopolitanism,” he clearly implies that English’s status as “global language” discharges English speakers in the U.S. university system from any potential obligation to any other language on the globe. [End Page 2]According to Summers, English is optimally positioned to be a vehicle for genuine “cosmopolitanism” because, as a so-called “global language,” it constitutes a receptive, inclusive, and welcoming “common ground” for multicultural exchange that would be otherwise impossible given the sheer volume and overwhelming diversity of all the other languages in the world. In other words, in his opinion, recourse to English actually facilitates and enhances—rather than inhibits—genuine multicultural encounters as it offsets the potentially... (shrink)

Like all deaths, Raymond Williams’ must touch most profoundly those who were closest to him; it belongs first to his private circle. But it also belongs to his fame: to those who have read his books, heard him speak in public, were taught by him, and, then, to those who have been taught by those he taught, and so on. Because Williams was so committed and important politically—writing not just as an academic but as a leftist—his death also enters (...) public history. One can ask: does it mark the end of an era? Or, on the contrary, is it the sign of a beginning set in motion by the programs, the shifts of emphasis, he urged? Such questions are all the most insistent because the left, as a political force and as an idea, is so fragile today. Indeed, no other theme seems as urgent in thinking about Williams’ life and work now; for, to put it rather glibly, it is no longer easy to tell left from right. If we regard “being on the left” as requiring the belief that state control of the economy and the ideological apparatus and the empowerment of the proletariat are steps demanded by the journey towards real, rather than illusory or formal, freedom, then who is still on the left? And if “being on the left” does not require such beliefs, if there is a left that is not statist, how does it differ from liberalism, from a Deleuzian or Foucauldian micro-politics or a mere insistence on “social justice”?2 2. This is not to approach the question of what it means to be a “Marxist” in cultural/literary studies. Historically, one of the clearest demarcations of Marxism within and from the left in general was its willingness to theorize and imagine revolution. The difficulties faced by Williams’ work and career are very much those posed by a nonrevolutionary Marxism. Simon During is a lecturer in English at the University of Melbourne. His Foucault and Literature will appear in 1990, and he is currently working on a book entitled Literature without Culture. (shrink)

Biobanks and biospecimen collections are becoming a primary means of delivering personalized diagnostics and tailoring individualized therapeutics. This shift towards precision medicine requires interactions among a variety of stakeholders, including the public, patients, healthcare providers, government, and donors. Very few studies have investigated the role of healthcare students in biobanking and biospecimen donations. The main aims of this study were to evaluate the knowledge of senior healthcare students about biobanks and to assess the students’ willingness to donate biospecimens and (...) the factors influencing their attitudes. A cross-sectional study was conducted among senior healthcare students at King Abdulaziz University, Saudi Arabia. The data were obtained using a self-administered questionnaire in English. In addition to the respondents’ biographical data section, the questionnaire assessed the respondents’ general knowledge about biobanking, the factors influencing their willingness to donate biospecimens to biobanks and their general attitudes towards biomedical research. A total of 597 senior healthcare students were included in the study. The general knowledge score was 3.2 out of 7. Only approximately 44% and 27% of students were aware of the terms “Human Genome Project” and “biobank,” respectively. The majority of the students were willing to donate biospecimens to biobanks. Multiple factors were significantly associated with their willingness to donate, including their perceived general health, past experience with both tissue testing and tissue donation, biobanking knowledge score and biomedical research attitude score. The main reasons for students’ willingness to donate were advancement of medical research and societal benefits, whereas misuse of biospecimens and confidentiality breaches were the main reasons for a reluctance to donate. Despite their strong willingness to donate biospecimens, students exhibited a notable lack of knowledge about biobanking and the HGP. To expedite the transition towards PM, it is highly recommended to enhance healthcare curricula by including more educational and awareness programmes to familiarize students with OMICs technologies in addition to the scope of research and clinical applications. (shrink)

Promoting English as a Foreign Language learners’ willingness to communicate and self-efficacy in different contexts has drawn the attention of many investigators. This review explored the effect of digital-based flipped learning classrooms on enhancing learners’ willingness to communicate and self-efficacy. The related literature indicated that learners’ intention to communicate is affected by social media and digitalized materials used in flipped classrooms. Compared to the traditional educational contexts, this review showed higher levels of self-efficacy in flipped classrooms among (...) EFL learners. Furthermore, the review expounded on the implications and future directions for EFL teachers, teacher educators, educational policy-makers, and advisors. The ideas can improve their awareness of learner self-efficacy, willingness to communicate, and the use of flipped learning approach in educational contexts. (shrink)

In the twentieth century, philosophy came to be dominated by the English-speaking world, first Britain and then the United States. Accompanying this development was an unprecedented professionalization and specialization of the discipline, the consequences of which are surveyed and evaluated in this article. The most general result has been a decline in philosophy's normative mission, which roughly corresponds to the increasing pursuit of philosophy in isolation from public life and especially other forms of inquiry, including ultimately its own history. (...) This is how the author explains the increasing tendency, over the past quarter-century, for philosophy to embrace the role of "underlaborer" for the special sciences. Indicative of this attitude is the long-term popularity of Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, which argues that fields reach maturity when they forget their past and focus on highly specialized problems. In conclusion, the author recalls the history of philosophy that, following Kuhn's advice, has caused us to forget, namely, the fate of Neo-Kantianism in the early twentieth century. Key Words: analytic philosophy • normative • positivism • pragmatism • professionalism • underlaborer. (shrink)

Members of the Student Clinical Ethics Committee discussed the ethical and legal issues arising in a case referred for consideration – the family of a very elderly non-English speaking Asian lady did not want her to be informed that she had incurable lymphoma. The case study summarises the reflections of the Committee and focusses on: the role of cultural norms in healthcare decision making; the extent to which the views of the family about what is best for the patient (...) should be respected, whether the patient should have been informed of her terminal diagnosis and the role of the clinician in navigating complex family dynamics. (shrink)

This study investigates the reasons leading to Chinese students? foreign language speaking anxiety (FLSA). China is a nation with the largest number of English as a foreign language learners in the world, but most of them have learnt ?mute English? when it comes to expressing themselves orally in English. FLSA may be an important factor leading to their unsatisfactory learning achievements. However, it has not been adequately addressed in the educational settings of China. This study endeavours to (...) make a contribution in this aspect. With two cross-validated methods (questionnaire survey and focused interview), this study drew comprehensive data from 332 participants at two universities in China and found 14 major reasons of Chinese students? FLSA. It also compared students? and teachers? views about these reasons and reported the significant differences emerged. It further argued that understanding the reasons is an important step in reducing FLSA and hence enhancing learning effectiveness. (shrink)

[ https://plus.google.com/108060242686103906748/posts/cwvdB6mK3J6 ]"As Literature germinates within me, my words are-“Literature is something, that I need to be acclaimed for, I need to know more...it’s my life that has given me birth, my way of thoughts that I am visualizing in the perspective of all dimensions, my frailties, my faults...my every comprehensive discussion even after my death, my spiritualism, my haunting towards the ecology of the cosmic world, and the way that I have brought up at my elbows to enhance myself (...) more in the bloom of dissolved doomed tragedy of a human life! It is indeed ravenous…but we the beings to run through this midst of life, as I need to pace up with at every inception and the idealistic phenomenal moments…!”. . (http://philpapers.org/profile/112741.). (shrink)

The attitudes of teachers in Wales to speaking and listening in the National Curriculum, both as a profile component in English and as a requirement across the curriculum, were tested using a Likert-type attitude scale. A 10%, sample of the whole of Wales was involved, specifically teachers of key stage 2. The results show the differences in attitudes between the teachers according to age, years in teaching and training. A factor analysis revealed almost universal agreement that speaking and listening (...) help children to learn. This is discussed in relation to a group of statements concerning classroom practices in speaking and listening. (shrink)

College English teaching aims to cultivate students' comprehensive ability to use English. The study of spoken English barriers is a hot topic in this subject area. Based on a survey of non-English primary college students' spoken language impairments, this paper analyzes the research status of spoken language impairments at home and abroad. It relies upon the theoretical basis of Swain's output and Krashen's input hypotheses. With extensive data mining in colleges and universities as the entry point, (...) this paper's content, object, and method are determined by combining qualitative and quantitative research with empirical research. Through the combination of classroom observations, questionnaires, interviews, and other research forms, this paper concludes that the spoken language barriers of non-English primary college students include language and non-language barriers. The influencing factors of the spoken language output barriers include subjective and objective aspects. The questionnaires are analyzed from the three dimensions of the students, schools, and education departments. This paper proposes some ways to overcome the spoken English barriers of non-English college students. It also suggests that non-English college teachers should pay more attention to the cultural transmission of English-speaking countries in English classes, cultivate students' cross-cultural awareness, and enhance students' enthusiasm in English learning. These actions are more conducive to overcoming the psychological barriers in spoken English output. (shrink)

The present study addresses language ostracism in intercultural communication, a phenomenon when someone speaks a language but some members of this language community don’t speak to him in this language. This phenomenon is illustrated by language behaviour towards visually distinct bilingual minorities in Taiwan. Visually distinct minorities in Taiwan reported that they had been spoken to in English by small children or people who did not believe and accept that they really understood Mandarin when they spoke it. They (...) might be spoken to in English despite actually speaking good Mandarin. Taiwanese people behave this way because of two conditions existing in Taiwan: an English-speaking foreigner stereotype where people assume that every foreign-looking person speaks English, and English privilege in Taiwanese society which leads to people being treated better if they can speak English. (shrink)

This research aims to investigate the impact of learning lexical chunks on the English as a Foreign Language Saudi learners’ speaking fluency. The study uses an intervention with intermediate Saudi learners comprising lexical chunks based upon the books Collocation in Use and Common Idioms in English. Findings obtained from the post-test show that the experimental groups scored significantly better when compared to their performance in the pre-test of speaking fluency. On the contrary, the difference in the performance of (...) the control group between the pre and post-tests is not significant as far as speaking fluency is concerned. The findings also show that the experimental group participants had favorable sentiments regarding explicit lexical chunk training. The research has theoretical and practical consequences in teaching and learning a foreign/second language. (shrink)

BackgroundPromoting the social value of global health research undertaken in resource poor settings has become a key concern in global research ethics. The consideration for benefit sharing, which concerns the elucidation of what if anything, is owed to participants, their communities and host nations that take part in such research, and the obligations of researchers involved, is one of the main strategies used for promoting social value of research. In the last decade however, there has been intense debate within academic (...) bioethics literature seeking to define the benefits, the beneficiaries, and the scope of obligations for providing these benefits. Although this debate may be indicative of willingness at the international level to engage with the responsibilities of researchers involved in global health research, it remains unclear which forms of benefits or beneficiaries should be considered. International and local research ethics guidelines are reviewed here to delineate the guidance they provide.MethodsWe reviewed documents selected from the international compilation of research ethics guidelines by the Office for Human Research Protections under the US Department of Health and Human Services.ResultsAccess to interventions being researched, the provision of unavailable health care, capacity building for individuals and institutions, support to health care systems and access to medical and public health interventions proven effective, are the commonly recommended forms of benefits. The beneficiaries are volunteers, disease or illness affected communities and the population in general. Interestingly however, there is a divide between "global opinion" and the views of particular countries within resource poor settings as made explicit by differences in emphasis regarding the potential benefits and the beneficiaries.ConclusionAlthough in theory benefit sharing is widely accepted as one of the means for promoting the social value of international collaborative health research, there is less agreement amongst major guidelines on the specific responsibilities of researchers over what is ethical in promoting the social value of research. Lack of consensus might have practical implications for efforts aimed at enhancing the social value of global health research undertaken in resource poor settings. Further developments in global research ethics require more reflection, paying attention to the practical realities of implementing the ethical principles in real world context. (shrink)

How did the events of the early modern period affect the way gender and the self were represented? This collection of essays attempts to respond to this question by analysing a wide spectrum of cultural concerns - humanism, technology, science, law, anatomy, literacy, domesticity, colonialism, erotic practices, and the theatre - in order to delineate the history of subjectivity and its relationship with the postmodern fragmented subject. The scope of this analysis expands the terrain explored by feminist theory, while its (...) feminist focus reveals that the subject is always gendered - although the terms in which gender is conceived and represented change across history. Feminist Readings of Early Modern Culture not only explores the representation of gendered subjects, but in its commitment to balancing the productive tensions of methodological diversity, also speaks to contemporary challenges facing feminism. (shrink)

While previous studies have examined front-line teachers’ written feedback practices in second language writing classrooms, such studies tend to not take teachers’ language and sociocultural backgrounds into consideration, which may mediate their performance in written feedback provision. Therefore, much remains to be known about how L2 writing teachers with different first languages enact written feedback. To fill this gap, we designed an exploratory study to examine native English-speaking and non-native English-speaking teachers’ written feedback practices in the Chinese tertiary (...) context. Our study collected 80 English as a foreign language students’ writing samples with teacher written feedback and analyzed them from three aspects: Feedback scope, feedback focus, and feedback strategy. The findings of our study revealed that the two groups of teachers shared similar practices regarding feedback scope and feedback strategies. Both NES and NNES EFL teachers used a comprehensive approach to feedback provision, although NNES teachers provided significantly more feedback points than their NES peers and they delivered their feedback directly and indirectly. However, their practices differed greatly with regard to feedback focus. Specifically, when responding to EFL students’ writing, NES teachers showed more concern with global issues, whereas NNES teachers paid more attention to linguistic errors. With a surge in the recruitment of expatriate NES and local NNES English teachers in China and other EFL countries, our study is expected to make a contribution to a better understanding of the two groups of EFL teachers’ pedagogical practices in written feedback provision and generate important implications for their feedback provision. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:When “to die in freedom” is Written in EnglishPetar Ramadanovic* (bio)Cathy Caruth. Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1996. [UE]For Teresa BrennanWhile waiting to leave Vienna in May of 1938, Sigmund Freud writes a letter to his son Ernst. “Two prospects,” he says, “keep me going in these grim times: to rejoin you all and—to die in freedom.” Almost sixty years later, Cathy Caruth comments (...) upon this letter, emphasizing that the last four words—“to die in freedom”—were written in English. It is here, Caruth suggests,in the movement from German to English, in the rewriting of the departure within the languages of Freud’s text, that we participate most fully in Freud’s central insight, in Moses and Monotheism, that history, like trauma, is never simply one’s own, that history is precisely the way we are implicated in each other’s traumas.[UE 23–24]And she concludes: “In this departure, in the leave-taking of our hearing, we are first fully addressed by Freud’s text, in ways we perhaps cannot yet fully understand” [UE 24].In this text I argue that Caruth’s understanding of trauma as “deeply tied to our own historical realities” [UE 12] offers a possibility to think anew our involvement in each other’s histories, as we examine what we mean by history, writing, and community. My reading depends in particular on the insistent recurrence of figures of “entanglement” in Caruth’s text, which I take to be Caruth’s own “translation of the concept—of the experience of trauma” [UE 7]. 1 That is, Caruth’s “entanglement” is the trace of an [End Page 54] unclaimed experience and has a function analogous to “departure” in Freud’s text and to “falling” in Paul de Man’s, both analyzed by Caruth in Unclaimed Experience. As such, “entanglement” and its variations, being “inextricably bound up” or “inextricably tied,” are not representations of trauma. They rather suggest a different, aporetic understanding of the relation between history and reference, experience and writing.I will try to show that Caruth’s notion of trauma as unclaimed experience, together with our entanglement in each other’s histories, chart a history of the modern subject as a history of implication. This subject is recognized by its inextricable ties to what cannot be experienced or subjectivized fully. And this unfinished becoming, surviving and being with others, is the form of its being and its history. The subject in or of trauma is thus, for Caruth, culturally and politically a diasporic subject, en route toward subjectivity.DiasporaFreud—the one who wants to die in freedom—is running away from a genocide, just ahead of it, so to speak. The diaspora toward which he is going is a place where one simultaneously speaks English and another language. As such, this diaspora is both a site of translation and a destination of resettlement: neither a paradise nor a melting pot, but a situation or a space which is not yet and which still waits to be thought. So we follow Freud, a Jew, who wants to die in freedom and is about to embark on a journey from Vienna to London, where he will rejoin his family. London, for Freud, is a place where language, freedom, and death somehow come together, where they will meet in the future. It is a substitute home. A substitute because Freud departs toward it. And a home because it offers shelter. Moreover, since London is also the place of Freud’s death, his departure towards it is not a simple forward movement but also what Caruth would call a return—a return to inanimate matter.If Freud’s return/departure speaks to “us” “today,” as Caruth suggests, this is not only because of the literal or figurative itinerary Freud covers but also because there are other departures that themselves inform the way we hear Freud. Indeed, Freud’s desire for freedom, a desire, as Caruth says at one point, to bring “his voice to another place” [UE 23], invokes the fundamental American myth of freedom. The phrase “to die in freedom” unwittingly carries with it... (shrink)

George Grant's magnificent four-part meditation sums up much that is central to his own thought, including a critique of modern liberalism, an analysis of John Rawls's Theory of Justice, and insights into the larger Western philosophical ...

This paper explores the main contours of recent work in English-speaking philosophy of religion on the justification of religious belief. It sets out the main characteristics of the religious epistemologies of such writers as Alston, Plantinga, and Swinburne. It poses and seeks to answer the question of how far any or all of these epistemologies are indebted or similar to the epistemology of the Scottish Enlightenment thinker Thomas Reid. It concludes that while there are some links to Reid in (...) recent writing, contemporary approaches depart from Reid’s views on the specific topic of the justification of religious belief. (shrink)

Imagine that you possess an indicator for a disease or illness that has nothing to do with your body. It is not a genetic predisposition to acquire cancer or a vice that raises the probability of contracting some dread disease, though estimates of its health risks have placed it on par with having diabetes. It has nothing to do with the environmental pollutants you are exposed to or whether you can afford health care. It is not a physical susceptibility that (...) renders you more easily reachable by the clutches of pathology. No, this indicator of health hinges on certain learned abilities and skills, and it is a barrier to health that is totally within the health field's power and resources to lift.The condition hinted at above is the inability to speak English proficiently in the United States. Today, more than one-sixth of the United States population speaks a language other than English at home, and this number is increasing rapidly. (shrink)

En la educación médica cubana se ha diseñado un currículo para el cumplimiento de su encargo social donde se inserta la enseñanza del inglés. Actualmente constituye una prioridad trabajar en la búsqueda de estrategias que favorezcan el perfeccionamiento idiomático de los egresados, en este sentido se desarrolló una investigación en la Filial de Ciencias Médicas de Colón con el objetivo de desarrollar la expresión oral en el inglés con fines específicos en el tercer año de la carrera de Medicina. Se (...) emplearon métodos como el análisis de documentos, la observación participante, y los registros anecdóticos. El sistema de actividades aplicado favorece la negociación de significados, toma de riesgos, mayor precisión al expresar ideas, así como el acercamiento del uso del idioma en situaciones reales con lo cual se logra mayor motivación, objetividad del aprendizaje e independencia, al emplear las habilidades lingüísticas para su desempeño profesional. In Cuban medical education, a curriculum in which English is integrated, is designed to fulfill a social mission. Presently, it is a priority to identify strategies that support the idiomatic improvement of graduates. To this end, an investigation was developed in the University of Medical Sciences of Matanzas at Colon Campus with the objective of developing speaking in English for Specific Purposes in the third-year of the medical program of study. Methods such as document analysis, participant observation, and review of anecdotal records were used. The resulting system of activities favors the negotiation of meaning, risk-taking, improved precision to express ideas and the expanded use of English language in real situations. This results in greater motivation, learning objectivity and independence to use language skills for their professional performance. (shrink)

This volume explores the attention awarded in the English-speaking world to German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Complete with an introductory overview, the book collects fourteen essays that consider Leibniz’s connections with his English-speaking contemporaries and near contemporaries as well as the later reception of his thought in Anglo-American philosophy. It sheds new light on Leibniz's philosophy and that of his contemporaries.

Deictic words are considered the earliest words which children acquire at the stage of two-word-utterance. However, mastering them like adults may take more time. This paper investigates how L2 children comprehend and produce English spatial deixis ‘here’, ‘there’, ‘this’, and ‘that’ by observing and documenting their responses and reactions in hide-and-seek game. It also aims to find out the children’s obstacles in acquiring these words, such as proximity bias and egocentrism. The subjects are Arabic children of ages four, five, (...) and six who acquire English as a second language in international schools in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. They performed two types of tasks: comprehension task and production task. Both tasks contained two trials: same perspective and the different perspective. Based on the results, children did better in comprehending the spatial deixis than in producing them. Moreover, the results showed that there was no proximity bias happened with children in this study. In addition, the results of the two trials in both tasks illustrated that changing the deictic center improves with age. Although the study provides some significant results, there should be an increase in the number of the samples in order to make the results generalized. (shrink)

Sound-symbolism is the nonarbitrary link between the sound and meaning of a word. Japanese-speaking children performed better in a verb generalization task when they were taught novel sound-symbolic verbs, created based on existing Japanese sound-symbolic words, than novel nonsound-symbolic verbs (Imai, Kita, Nagumo, & Okada, 2008). A question remained as to whether the Japanese children had picked up regularities in the Japanese sound-symbolic lexicon or were sensitive to universal sound-symbolism. The present study aimed to provide support for the latter. In (...) a verb generalization task, English-speaking 3-year-olds were taught novel sound-symbolic verbs, created based on Japanese sound-symbolism, or novel nonsound-symbolic verbs. English-speaking children performed better with the sound-symbolic verbs, just like Japanese-speaking children. We concluded that children are sensitive to universal sound-symbolism and can utilize it in word learning and generalization, regardless of their native language. (shrink)

Informed consent may be seriously compromised if patients fail to understand the experimental nature of the trial in which they are participating. Using focus groups, the authors explored how prospective trial participants interpret and understand the science of clinical trials by using patient information sheets relative to their medical condition. An opportunity was provided to hear in the patients’ own words how they interpret the information and why there is variable understanding. Respondents struggled to comprehend the meaning and purpose of (...) concepts such as randomisation and double blinding, and found them threatening to their ideas of medical care. Suggestions are made about how to improve the national guidelines on written information for trial participants and pretesting of the information sheets is advocated. (shrink)

Despite a continued focus exploring the factors related to plagiarism, the relationship between English language ability and plagiarism occurrences is not fully understood. Multiple studies involving student or faculty self-reporting of plagiarism have shown that students often claim English language ability is one of the main reasons why they commit plagiarism offences; however, little research has tested these claims in a rigorous, quantitative manner. This paper presents the findings of an analysis of data collected in a private, international (...) university located in Vietnam, from non-native English speaking students studying business degrees. Analysis of the data builds on previous studies by showing that there are statistically significant differences in the English language abilities of students who have previously committed plagiarism offences, compared to students who have not, suggesting that programmes designed to improve the academic English skills of non-native English speaking students may help reduce incidences of plagiarism. (shrink)

In the paper, I have presented a portrait of Jerzy Pelc as a teacher. He followed in the footsteps of Kazimierz Twardowski and his direct disciples and tried to develop his students’ skills of critical thinking and clear speaking—the basics of good work in philosophy. These skills are connected with methodological postulates of criticism and precision which were shared by all the members of the Lvov-Warsaw School. Jerzy Pelc treated these postulates also as didactic postulates arising out of the conceptions (...) of logical culture and general logic. In my article, I have sketched a general picture of the relation between logic and didactics, I have presented the aforementioned postulates, the concepts of logical culture and general logic and its curriculum. (shrink)

The political concern of the Church towards an authentic political development of man and society has always been expressed by the Church. One of the means of doing this is the teaching Magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs begun with the Encyclical Rerum novarurn of Leo XIII. John Paul II had called for reforms of political institutions in the world in his Sollicitudo rei socialis. The political situation in Africa is one of great concern, characterised by dictatorial military regimes. Even the (...) democratically elected Governments turned out to be corrupt and are be-devilled with bad governance. This work focuses on the pronouncements indicated in the Pastoral Communiques of the Bishops under the aegis of SECAM in imitation of the Roman Pontiffs to advance the Social Teaching of the Church in the era of globalisation. In agreement with the tradition of the Roman Pontiffs and the Social Teaching of the Church, the thesis draws attention to ways of ameliorating the deteriorating political situation in Africa. The Bishops condemned corrupt regimes and offered solutions for a better political future for Africa. This book finally indicates much of the way forward for Africa. (shrink)

The five English words—sentence, proposition, judgment, statement, and fact—are central to coherent discussion in logic. However, each is ambiguous in that logicians use each with multiple normal meanings. Several of their meanings are vague in the sense of admitting borderline cases. In the course of displaying and describing the phenomena discussed using these words, this paper juxtaposes, distinguishes, and analyzes several senses of these and related words, focusing on a constellation of recommended senses. One of the purposes of this (...) paper is to demonstrate that ordinary English properly used has the resources for intricate and philosophically sound investigation of rather deep issues in logic and philosophy of language. No mathematical, logical, or linguistic symbols are used. Meanings need to be identified and clarified before being expressed in symbols. We hope to establish that clarity is served by deferring the extensive use of formalized or logically perfect languages until a solid “informal” foundation has been established. Questions of “ontological status”—e.g., whether propositions or sentences, or for that matter characters, numbers, truth-values, or instants, are “real entities”, are “idealizations”, or are “theoretical constructs”—plays no role in this paper. As is suggested by the title, this paper is written to be read aloud. -/- I hope that reading this aloud in groups will unite people in the enjoyment of the humanistic spirit of analytic philosophy. (shrink)

The results of numerous research studies have revealed that the style in which people deliver their speech impacts on the way they are perceived by others. This is particularly so in the adversarial courtroom, where witnesses' credibility is crucial for winning a case. When witnesses do not speak the language of the courtroom, interpreters are employed to interpret the proceedings accurately. The meaning of `accuracy', however, may not be fully understood by all involved. This article presents the results of (...) a data-based study of Spanish—English court proceedings where it was found that interpreters tend to accurately interpret only the content of witnesses' answers, but constantly alter the style of testimony, either favourably or detrimentally, thus potentially changing the outcome of the case. (shrink)

Many students who are doing their majors in English often suffer from English speaking anxiety. The purpose of this study was to examine the reasons that hinder the process of speaking English in the students who had English as their major course of studies in a public sector university in Karachi. The study was conducted using qualitative research approach and the data was collected using focus group discussion. The participants of this study were selected using convenient (...) sampling technique for focus group discussion. The findings revealed that the pronunciation, syntactic structures, insufficient lexical knowledge, fear of negative evaluation, role of a teacher, financial and social factors are the main causes of English-speaking anxiety among English majors. Recommended measures by the students disclosed that if the institution provides them with the suggested speaking opportunities, it could help them improve their anxiety towards speaking in English. (shrink)

Although the efficacy of teacher written feedback has been widely investigated, relatively few studies have been conducted from feedback practitioners' perspectives to investigate teachers' beliefs regarding it, particularly compare beliefs held by teachers with different sociocultural and linguistic backgrounds. Consequently, much remains to be known about teachers' conceptions about written feedback, who has different first languages. To bridge such a gap, we conducted this qualitative study to examine the similarities and differences between native English-speaking and non-native English-speaking teachers' (...) beliefs in Chinese University EFL settings. We analyzed the in-depth interviews with eight teachers through thematic analysis. The findings showed that NES and NNES teachers espoused a range of beliefs in relation to the five themes of written feedback: Purpose, scope, focus, strategy, and orientation. While they shared similar beliefs with regard to feedback focus, their beliefs differed in terms of feedback scope. Important implications are discussed for educational practices. (shrink)

How can English language teachers contribute to peace locally and globally? English language teachers and learners are located in the global civil society – an international network of civil organizations and NGOs related to human rights, the environment, and sustainable peace. English, with its special role as an international language, is a major tool for communication within this network. On the local level, many teachers are interested in promoting reconciliation and sustainable peace, but often do not know (...) how to do so. This book provides information, analysis, and techniques to help teachers around the world take action toward this goal. Balancing, in a readable and accessible way, the global and the local, core and periphery, cultural diffusion and resistance, theory and practice, pessimism and optimism, outsider and insider perspectives, the expert role and the apprentice role, and prescriptive and elicitive methods, it offers an alternative to literature about critical applied linguistics, globalization, and peace education that is simply too complex and wordy to spread easily from theoretician to the classroom teacher. _The English Teacher in Global Civil Society_: synthesizes threads from many fields and topics into a coherent and empowering argument for the activist role English language teachers can take to promote social change draws on humanistic education, peace education, cross-cultural understanding, problem-posing, cooperative learning, and critical thinking methodologies to help English language teachers learn how to teach conflict resolution skills in their classrooms covers issues in critical applied linguistics, approaches and methodologies in ESL/EFL, global and local curricular issues, and specific skill areas such reading, writing, and speaking suggests a new goal for English language teachers: global citizenship. This engaging, informative, provocative, and highly readable book is a welcome resource for English language teacher trainers, pre-service teachers, practicing classroom teachers, and Peace Corps workers around the world. (shrink)

This study adapts a Medical English Language Anxiety Scale based on Horwitz’s Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale and examines students’ anxiety in medical English vocabulary, listening and speaking, communication, literature reading, and academic paper writing. The biographical factors related to medical English language anxiety were also tested. The questionnaire sets including five dimensions were distributed to the students from a medical university in Sichuan, China, and were statistically analyzed by using SPSS 22.0 and AMOS 21.0. By employing (...) the adapted MELAS, it was found that 85.2% of the medical students surveyed suffered moderate and higher anxiety. Among all dimensions, students with listening and speaking anxiety recorded the highest, followed by literature reading anxiety, English academic writing anxiety, communication anxiety, and vocabulary learning anxiety. We also found that the anxiety of rural medical students in each dimension was higher than that of urban medical students. This study suggests that English teachers should be fully aware of their students’ language anxiety situation, design interesting class activities, and create a relaxed English learning atmosphere in classroom teaching to make students less nervous when learning medical English in class. (shrink)

This study investigates the strategies for learning Cantonese that are adopted by non-Chinese English-speaking ethnic minority university students in Hong Kong. The aim is to identify the challenges these students face in applying their strategies to learn Cantonese and to explore their learning experiences when implementing them. Drawing on questionnaire surveys and semi-structured interviews with 30 EM students at a university in Hong Kong, this study identifies these learners’ strategies, elicits their views on the use of these strategies and (...) examines their learning experiences. The findings suggest that EM students are “medium strategy users,” with social strategies being their most commonly used types of learning strategies, followed by compensation and metacognitive strategies. The more proficient Cantonese users tend to use metacognitive strategies that promote planning and are goal-oriented. Taken together, this study sheds light on the complex interplay of sociocultural variables in shaping EM university students’ Cantonese learning experience in Hong Kong. It also highlights the importance of analysing EM students’ linguistic repertoire and the local language ecology in understanding Cantonese learning in a multilingual context like Hong Kong. (shrink)