World Englishes Reflection on Text Complexity
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Periódico do Núcleo de Estudos e Pesquisas sobre Gênero e Direito Centro de Ciências Jurídicas - Universidade Federal da Paraíba V. 8 - Nº 07 - Ano 2019 – Special Edition ISSN | 2179-7137 | http://periodicos.ufpb.br/ojs2/index.php/ged/index 122 WORLD ENGLISHES: REFLECTION ON TEXT COMPLEXITY PROSPECTIVE STUDIES Olesya A. Yarullina 1 2 Fanuza H. Tarasova Elena V. Varlamova 3 Olga S. Safonkina 4 Elena V. Sazhyna 5 Abstract: The following study aims at need, as we perceive it, to distinguish the highlighting new directions of text features of authentic and Russian complexity studies, giving way to more English newspaper texts. The research advanced and varied research in the area. question of upcoming studies can be It has become the tradition in Russian accomplished as follows: Are English- linguistics as well as foreign one to language newspapers written by Russian assess predominantly the complexity of speakers of English as ELF comparable educational texts, thus allowing the with the texts of authentic publications? learners to boost text comprehension and The results of this study will be better material recognition [1], [2], [3], interesting in terms of studying the [4]. Text complexity studies can be Russian version of the English language directed at other types of texts (fiction or as one of the World Englishes in order to newspaper articles) in order to raise the demonstrate whether the differences level of awareness and desire to read in between the English variants are general. Bearing in mind that newspaper significant. For this purpose, two tools of articles in English can be written by computational linguistic analysis can be native and non-native speakers, and both applied: Coh-Metrix, a computational types of newspapers can be used in tool that produces indices of the educational purposes, there is urgent linguistic and discourse representations 1 1Kazan Federal University. 2 1Kazan Federal University. 3 1Kazan Federal University. [email protected] . +7(927)035-85-35. 4 2National Research Mordovia State University. 5 3Gomel State University. Periódico do Núcleo de Estudos e Pesquisas sobre Gênero e Direito Centro de Ciências Jurídicas - Universidade Federal da Paraíba V. 8 - Nº 07 - Ano 2019 – Special Edition ISSN | 2179-7137 | http://periodicos.ufpb.br/ojs2/index.php/ged/index 123 (developed by Arthur C. Graesser and people. According to the "Linguistic Danielle McNamara ), and L2 Syntactical Encyclopedic Dictionary" by V.V. Complexity Analyzer (L2SCA) Vinogradov, lingua franca ( from Italian: developed by Xiaofei Lu at Pennsylvania Lingua franca - Frankish language ) is a State University (a computational tool functional type of language, which is an which produces syntactic complexity instrument of interethnic communication indices of written English language in certain areas of social contacts. texts). Initially, the term “lingua franca” meant Keywords: text complexity, assessment, a specific language, more precisely, a World Englishes, L2, computational form of language that appeared in the analysis Middle Ages in the Mediterranean region in the Levant and represents a mixture of Italian and French 1 Introduction vocabulary. The lingua franca of that According to D. Crystal, the time predominantly served as a linguistic number of people who speak English in means of trade between Arabs and the world is more than 1 billion 100 Europeans, which in the Levant were million people, and only one quarter of called Franks, after whom the language them recognize it as their native got its name [6]. language [5]. Due to the fact that at the It should be noted that at moment the number of people who speak different historical stages and in different English at one level or another is three territories the role of lingua franca was times higher than the number of "native performed by different international speakers", the globalization process languages. Thus, the ancient Greek was involves not only the spread of English the international language of antiquity and, above all, English-speaking culture [7]. Then, for a long time, the dominant throughout the world, but also changes in language of the Mediterranean and the English language influenced by other western Europe was Latin, which was cultures. used in all spheres of human activity. At Many people around the world the time of the Arab Caliphate in the vast use English as a lingua franca (ELF), i.e. territory - from India in the east to a tool for communication between Periódico do Núcleo de Estudos e Pesquisas sobre Gênero e Direito Centro de Ciências Jurídicas - Universidade Federal da Paraíba V. 8 - Nº 07 - Ano 2019 – Special Edition ISSN | 2179-7137 | http://periodicos.ufpb.br/ojs2/index.php/ged/index 124 Portugal in the west - the Arabic validity of using ELF in language language performed a similar function. teaching is still controversial, since until Later, beginning with the Enlightenment now its features have not been (18th century), French became the formalized anywhere [8]. dominant language in Europe. In the As a result of such linguistic 19th century, thanks to the outstanding processes, new variants of the English activities of German scientists, German language appeared, called World language acquired great importance. But Englishes, or New Englishes. The term none of the above-mentioned languages World Englishes means new national had such a wide distribution and variants of English in countries where influence throughout the world as English is not the first language. The English has nowadays. term was first mentioned by American The concept of ELF itself does linguist B. Kachru in “Standards, not imply a single standard of English. codification and sociolinguistic realism: ELF researchers do not even consider the the English language in the outer circle” possibility of the existence of a single in 1985. According to Kachru, English monolithic form of language either at the was “nativized” in India, Singapore, present moment or sometime in the Nigeria and other countries. Along with future. And although participants of this term, such terms as “nativised intercultural communication should English”, “indigenized Engish”, possess common phonetic and lexical- “institutionalized English”, and also grammatical structures of the English “New Englishes” [9] are equally used. At language for productive communication present, all these terms are widely used with all users, ELF researchers allow the in their works by British linguists E. use of local variations of the English Erling and T. MacArthur [10], [11]. language in various communicative situations [8]. 2 Methods Despite the lack of consensus Newspapers in English can be among the linguists on the status of ELF, divided into those that are produced in this phenomenon is gradually gaining Russia and abroad. Foreign newspapers recognition from social linguists, but the in English are divided into newspapers Periódico do Núcleo de Estudos e Pesquisas sobre Gênero e Direito Centro de Ciências Jurídicas - Universidade Federal da Paraíba V. 8 - Nº 07 - Ano 2019 – Special Edition ISSN | 2179-7137 | http://periodicos.ufpb.br/ojs2/index.php/ged/index 125 written for native speakers and for those of a text. Developed by Arthur C. who learn English as a second language Graesser and Danielle McNamara , Coh- (ESL learners). Newspapers published in Metrix calculates the coherence of texts the United States or Great Britain are in on many different measures. one way or another the standard for non- Coh-Metrix can be used in native speakers, since the texts of such many different ways to investigate the newspapers have lexical and cohesion of the explicit text and the grammatical characteristics inherent in coherence of the mental representation authentic texts. The research question of of the text. "The definition of cohesion upcoming studies can be accomplished consists of characteristics of the explicit as follows: Are English-language text that play some role in helping the newspapers written by Russian speakers reader mentally connect ideas in the text" of English as ELF (Russian newspapers: [12]. The definition of coherence is the The Moscow News, The Moscow Times, subject of much debate. Theoretically, The St.Petersburg Times) comparable the coherence of a text is defined by the with the texts of authentic publications interaction between linguistic such as The New York Times, The Wall representations and knowledge Street Journal, The Washington Post, representations. While coherence can be Los Angeles Times (American defined as characteristics of the text (i.e., newspapers) or Financial Times, Times, aspects of cohesion) that are likely to Telegraph, the Guardian (British contribute to the coherence of the mental newspapers)? The results of this study representation, Coh-Metrix will be interesting in terms of studying measurements provide indices of these the Russian version of the English cohesion characteristics. language as one of the World Englishes L2 Syntactical Complexity in order to demonstrate whether the Analyzer (L2SCA) developed by differences between the English variants Xiaofei Lu at the Pennsylvania State are significant. University , is a computational tool which Coh-Metrix is a computational produces syntactic complexity indices of tool that produces indices of the written English language texts. Along linguistic and discourse representations with Coh-Metrix , the L2SCA is one of Periódico do Núcleo de Estudos e Pesquisas sobre Gênero e Direito Centro de Ciências Jurídicas - Universidade Federal da Paraíba V. 8 - Nº 07 - Ano 2019 – Special Edition ISSN | 2179-7137 | http://periodicos.ufpb.br/ojs2/index.php/ged/index 126 the most extensively used computational language for meeting new tools to compute indices of second communication needs” [17]. language writing development. The Such a variety of changes in L2SCA has been used in numerous local language versions led to the fact studies in the field of second language that the mistakes made were considered writing development to compute indices the norm, and the native speakers of the of syntactic complexity (syntactic language lost the ability to control structures, length of production units, changes in the language.