School of Languages and Linguistics - Research Publications

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    Fatal flaws? Investigating the effects of machine translation errors on audience reception in the audiovisual context
    Qiu, J ; Pym, A (Taylor & Francis, 2024-03-13)
    This study reports on an experiment where machine translation errors in subtitling are evaluated from the perspective of nine viewers who did not know the source language and seven viewers who were studying the source language. Screen recordings, think-aloud protocols, comprehension tests, and interviews were employed to explore participants’ responses and reactions to erroneous subtitles and to investigate how specific errors impacted comprehension and immersion in the viewing experience. The analysis identifies which errors were most noticed and to what extent those errors affected viewers’ trust in the subtitles. Errors causing significant misunderstanding and distrust are initially considered ‘fatal’, as they may halt viewer immersion and prompt disengagement from the audiovisual product. However, the findings highlight a remarkable tolerance of the uncertainty that results from errors, as viewers filter out misinformation or draw on other sources of information to construe and rectify their interpretations. This tolerance is explained in terms of a general trade-off with the enjoyment of the viewing experience, which varies in accordance with the viewer’s knowledge of the source language.
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    Gender and its metaphors in Bigas Luna's posthumous film Segon origin
    Martinez-Exposito, A (ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2023-04-03)
    The classic of children’s literature in Catalan has been translated into several languages and has been adapted for radio, television and cinema. The prematurely deceased director Bigas Luna showed interest in adapting it to the cinema in the eighties, but the project did not succeed until two decades later. The relationship established between Alba and Dídac, both in Pedrolo’s novel and in the film by Bigas, has usually been interpreted as a sexual awakening with multiple metaphorical resonances. This article re-examines the metaphorical configurations of gender dynamics in the film, an aspect in which Bigas Luna’s authorial voice is not limited to adapting Pedrolo’s story, but also manages to rewrite important facets of the characters. While most of these facets can be traced back to Bigas Luna’s previous films, Second Origin can be read as an attempt to recalibrate gender identity as an epiphenomenon of cultural, territorial, and national identities.
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    First and second language speakers’ sensitivity to the distributional properties of wh-clauses: Effects of proficiency, acquisitional context, and language experience
    Domazetoska, I ; Zhao, H (John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2023)
    The present study investigates L1 and L2 English speakers’ knowledge of the wh-clausal construction along the parameters of (a) conventionality, distinguishing between high-frequency conventional and low-frequency unconventional formulations (I asked him why they agreed/why did they agree), and (b) proposition type, differentiating between interrogative versus non-interrogative proposition types (I asked / told him why they agreed). We also consider the extent to which L2 speakers’ constructional knowledge is influenced by learners’ target language experience, such as L2 proficiency, context of L2 learning (ESL or EFL), and target language exposure. Results from a judgment task revealed nuances in L1-L2 discriminatory capacities, and more importantly, differences in sensitivity to proposition type between the ESL and EFL group, but no L2 differences in sensitivity to conventionality. L2 proficiency, speakers’ length of target immersion experience, and classroom exposure were shown to also impact linguistic sensitivity, highlighting a moderating effect of target language exposure and an important role for classroom instruction.
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    Dislocation and liminality in Andrei Zvyagintsev's Leviathan and Loveless
    McGregor, A ; Lagerberg, R (University of Canterbury, 2023)
    This article compares and contrasts two of Andrey Zvyagintsev’s most recent films, Leviathan (2014) and Loveless (2017). Although there are clear differences in structure and plot between the two films, by using the concepts of liminality and non-place, a number of parallels and shared themes are brought to light. In both films similar framing techniques are used in order to highlight domestic space and its role: in Leviathan it exposes the vulnerability to outside societal forces, while in Loveless it highlights the dysfunctionality of Alesha’s immediate world. Identity is closely linked to domestic spaces in both films. In Leviathan Nikolai’s existence is rendered liminal by the expropriation of his home, while in Lovless the parents’ search for new identities results in Alesha’s liminal existence, and, in turn, their own, as they acquire new partners and domestic spaces.
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    Active Translation Literacy in the Literature Class
    Pym, A (Cambridge University Press, 2023-09-12)
    Imagine you are spying on your town or city, peering into malls, homes, computers, bookshelves, electronic devices carried on public transport. Where is literature? And if you can find it, where are liter- ary translations? Where might they be read, talked about, or pro- duced, if at all?
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    Impact of Cultural and Linguistic Maintenance on Mental Health Outcomes in Migrant Adolescents: Protocol for a Scoping Review
    Hasnain, A ; Hajek, J ; Borschmann, R (JMIR PUBLICATIONS, INC, 2023)
    BACKGROUND: There is no consensus on how the disruption or maintenance of heritage culture and language affect mental health outcomes in adolescents with a migrant (also known as "immigrant" or "international migrant") background. Even though previous literature reviews have investigated the association between acculturation and mental health in migrants, none have explicitly focused on adolescents. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the scoping review described in this protocol is to understand (1) the focus, scope, and nature of quantitative empirical research investigating heritage cultural maintenance, including linguistic maintenance, and mental health outcomes in adolescents with a migrant background worldwide and (2) the potential effects of cultural and linguistic maintenance or disruption on migrant adolescent mental health outcomes. METHODS: A total of 11 key electronic health, medical, social science, and language databases (APA PsycArticles Full Text; Embase Classic+Embase; Ovid MEDLINE All and Epub Ahead of Print, In-Process, In-Data-Review and Other Non-Indexed Citations and Daily; Ovid MEDLINE All; APA PsycInfo; University of Melbourne full-text journals; Science Citation Index Expanded; Social Sciences Citation Index; Arts & Humanities Citation Index; Scopus; Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts) were searched. Databases were searched without time restrictions from the beginning of their coverage. Publication date, location, and quantitative study design (except for literature reviews) were not restricted; however, the search was only conducted in English. Data from included studies will be extracted using a template with predefined data items, and results will be summarized in a structured, narrative summary. RESULTS: A search was conducted on April 20, 2021, returning 2569 results. We are currently at the final stages of screening titles and abstracts of our search results, which will be followed by a full-text review and the data extraction of included studies. We expect to submit the full review for publication by the end of 2023. CONCLUSIONS: The scoping review aims to provide a better understanding of existing research on the association between cultural (including linguistic) maintenance and mental health in migrant adolescents. It will help identify gaps in the existing literature and develop hypotheses that could inform future research, eventually facilitating the development of targeted prevention initiatives and improving migrant adolescents' well-being. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): DERR1-10.2196/40143.
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    Recognising the SAE language learning needs of Indigenous primary school students who speak contact languages
    Steele, C ; Wigglesworth, G (ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2023-01-01)
    Most Indigenous peoples live in urban and regional locations across Australia and no longer speak their traditional languages fluently. Instead contact languages, creoles and dialects, are widely spoken. In many educational settings, educators may know little about the first languages of the Indigenous children they teach, and not recognise these as different languages or dialects. Consequently, these students may not be treated as second language learners of Standard Australian English (SAE) and their language learning requirements are not considered. From a sociocultural perspective, language is crucial to students’ learning. In this paper, we quantitatively analyse the SAE learning needs of Indigenous primary school aged children in Far North Queensland using oral elicited imitation of simple sentences in SAE as a research method. Using one-way ANOVA, the results are compared with native monolingual SAE speakers showing significant differences between the two. This finding has important implications for classroom teaching practices and educational policies.
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    Stop contrast acquisition in child Kriol: Evidence of stable transmission of phonology post Creole formation.
    Bundgaard-Nielsen, RL ; Baker, BJ ; Bell, EA ; Wang, Y (Cambridge University Press (CUP), 2023-07-26)
    Many Aboriginal Australian communities are undergoing language shift from traditional Indigenous languages to contact varieties such as Kriol, an English-lexified Creole. Kriol is reportedly characterised by lexical items with highly variable phonological specifications, and variable implementation of voicing and manner contrasts in obstruents (Sandefur, 1986). A language, such as Kriol, characterised by this unusual degree of variability presents Kriol-acquiring children with a potentially difficult language-learning task, and one which challenges the prevalent theories of acquisition. To examine stop consonant acquisition in this unusual language environment, we present a study of Kriol stop and affricate production, followed by a mispronunciation detection study, with Kriol-speaking children (ages 4-7) from a Northern Territory community where Kriol is the lingua franca. In contrast to previous claims, the results suggest that Kriol-speaking children acquire a stable phonology and lexemes with canonical phonemic specifications, and that English experience would not appear to induce this stability.
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    Sociophonetic Variation in Vowel Categorization of Australian English
    Loakes, D ; Clothier, J ; Hajek, J ; Fletcher, J (SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD, 2023-10-13)
    This study involves a perceptual categorization task for Australian English, designed to investigate regional and social variation in category boundaries between close-front vowel contrasts. Data are from four locations in southeast Australia. A total of 81 listeners from two listener groups took part: (a) so-called mainstream Australian English listeners from all four locations, and (b) L1 Aboriginal English listeners from one of the locations. Listeners heard front vowels /ɪ e æ/ arranged in 7-step continua presented at random. Varied phonetic contexts were analyzed, with a focus on coda /l/ because of a well-known prelateral merger of /e æ/ through mid-vowel lowering (e.g., celery-salary) reported to occur in some communities in this part of Australia. The results indicate that regional variation in Australian English is evident in perception. In particular, merging of /el/-/æl/ is shown to occur in the southernmost regions analyzed, but rarely in the northern regions of the geographical area under investigation. Aside from regional variation observed, age was also a factor in how participants responded to the task: older speakers had more merger than younger speakers in many locations, which is a new finding-previously, the merger was thought to be increasing in frequency over time, yet here we see this in only one location. Aboriginal English listeners also responded differently when compared with mainstream Australian English listeners. By analyzing the perception results across a variety of regional locations, with data from two different Australian social groups in the same location, this study adds a new dimension to our understanding of regional and social variations in Australian English.
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    A counter-memory of the BUMIDOM through documentary: L’Avenir est ailleurs (2007) and BUMIDOM: des Français venus d’outre-mer (2010)
    Wimbush, A (Liverpool University Press, 2023-09-05)
    This article questions the extent to which documentary films can be considered sites of counter-memory, a memorial practice which challenges official versions of histories and memories. It analyzes two francophone documentary films: L’Avenir est ailleurs (2007), directed by Antoine Léonard-Maestrati, and BUMIDOM, des Français venus d’outre-mer (2010), directed by Jackie Bastide. These films address the phenomenon of the BUMIDOM (Bureau pour le développement des migrations dans les départements d’outre-mer). The BUMIDOM was a state-run migration bureau in operation between 1963 and 1982, and it organized the recruitment, transportation, and accommodation of workers from Martinique, Guadeloupe, Réunion, and French Guiana arriving in mainland France. Despite the huge numbers from the overseas departments who arrived through this scheme, the BUMIDOM has not yet entered the official French national narrative. I argue, then, that documentary filmmakers use specific cinematic techniques to counter the official state-sanctioned discourse about the Bureau and allow those directly involved in its activities to share their personal experiences of migration.