Towards a Theory of Phonemic Orthography

Sgall, Petr

doi:10.1075/z.29.03sga

Cited by 12 publications

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“…Corresponding to our notions of universality (hypothesis 3) and ambiguity (hypothesis 2) are the Praguian notions of complexness and univocality (Sgall 1987). It has been shown elsewhere (Luelsdorff 1988b) that the Praguian scales of complexness (universality) and univocality (ambiguity) are powerful predictors of the Orders of accuracy and acquisition of the spellings of the entire array of the English inflectional and contracted allomorphs in the case of German learners of English orthography.…”

Section: Hypothesis 3'mentioning

confidence: 90%

“…To say that the degree of ambiguity of an Orthographie representation is in fact a determinant of its acquisition is to confirm the Praguian credo (Sgall 1987) to the effect that PGCs may be typologically displayed along an axis of univocality such that the later the PGC on the axis the more it is complex.…”

Section: Hypothesis 3'mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition to the confirmation of these effects, we found further determinants in school type, grade, and the perceived relatedness of dictated unfamiliar words to words, either native or foreign, that were familiär (the word effect). There is thus reason for optimism about the fruitful interaction of studies in Orthographie universals (Justeson 1976;Volkov 1981), scales of Orthographie complexity (Sgall 1987), and studies in language acquisition with special reference to the orthography, morphology, and phonology interface. .· = short <e> in <hem> • = short <e> in <speck> .…”

Section: Hypothesis 3'mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Notes and Discussion

1989

IRAL - International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching

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Since translations can be viewed on the surface level, they are convenient for linguistic examination. Any wrong deviations from the original text are assumed to reveal some lack in language proficiency. As the students translated into their "mother tongue", any mistrans-Brought to you by | Nanyang Technological University Authenticated Download Date | 5/31/15 6:43 AM 126 IRAL, VOL. XXVII/2, MAY 1989 lations would indicate some gap -linguistic, functional or cultural (Catford, 1965) -in their knowledge of the foreign language, English in this case. Indeed, translation is considered a good test of language proficiency for university students (Aarts, 1968, Pickett, 1968. It is also described äs an integrative exercise which can be used to bridge the gaps between Ll and L2 of the students (Kirkwood, 1966, Green, 1970, King, 1973, Rokkan, 1980, Titford, 1983.According to Widdowson, 1979, translation operates on three levels of the reader's understanding: the structural, the semantic and the pragmatic; and "whereas semantic equivalence has to do with the propositional content of the sentences, pragmatic equivalence has to do with the ülocutionary effect of utterances" (Widdowson, 1979, p. 105). A detailed analysis of the types and goals of translation from the viewpoints of both texts and translators is presented in Hartmann, 1980: eh. 5-7.Mistranslations were assumed, then, to reflect some linguistic difficulty for the students. However, the source of this difficulty was not always clear to us. (This problem often troubles many teachers who have to evaluate students' papers.) In this study our purpose was to compare scoring for micro-level mistranslations with macro-level mistranslations, in order to be able to evaluate the students' comprehension of the original text and to compare the reliability of either evaluation method for the language teacher. We constructed a model for mistranslation categories, with two major parts, macro-level and micro-level structures. The macro-level part included Propositional Content, and Communicative Function. The latter included two sub-groups, namely Explicit and Implicit Communicative Functions. The micro-level structures included elements on the level of words, that is to say Vocabulary and Expressions, Parts of Speech/Verb Tense, Reference, Cohesion elements, and Register. In addition we took note of Unacceptable Translations in the Native Language, that is grammatical errors in Arabic.We used the technique of "backtranslation" to arrive at the evaluation of each of the 19 selected units in the students' understanding of the original text. Counts were made of the sum of mistranslations per category (see Table 1).As a separate evaluation, each student's translation was given a grade by three independent judges on a threefold scale: 2 points for correct translation, l point for partially correct translation, and 0 for an entirely wrong translation. Units correctly translated by few students were considered more dif ficult than units correctly translated by many students. As t...

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Section: Hypothesis 3'mentioning

confidence: 90%

Section: Hypothesis 3'mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Hypothesis 3'mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Notes and Discussion

1989

IRAL - International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching

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“…Although Vachek does not pay systematic attention to the difficulties which regularly are connected with writing systems displaying large or idiosyncratic differences from phonemics (cf. Tauli, 1977; also the possibilities of a classification of these differences in Sgall, 1987), his work belongs to the most important results of European structural linguistics. The autonomy of the writing norm and the necessity to describe it as one of the basic subsystems of natural language, which has its own relationships not only to phonemics, but also to morphemics and other layers of the language system, is now, thanks to Josef Vachek, beyond any doubt.…”

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confidence: 99%

Review of Josef Vachek: Written Language Revisited.

Hajičová¹

1990

Theoretical Linguistics

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It is not easy to realize how complex and manysided the issues of written (and printed) language, of spelling and orthography are; if the relationships of the graphemic subsystem to the other parts of the language are to be accounted for, then, however, this complexity does become apparent. The volume under review recalls and illustrates the development of the research and of the various discussions which, within the Prague School, have led to a deepened elaboration of these issues. Vachek's selected writings, published at the occasion of his 80's birthday, document the history of this branch of research, of which the author has been the main protagonist; although he stresses the role of A. Artymovyc as that of his predecessor, and presents also comments on insights published by A. Frinta, D. L. Bolinger, W. Haas, H. Glück and many others, it is clear and well known that the main role in the elucidation of the status of written language has belonged to his own contributions.The first part of the volume, introduced by a short, although highly instructive and convincing summary by P. A. Luelsdorff, includes three of Vachek's papers from the years 1945 through 1965. In the first of them writing is compared with phonetic transcription, the main point consisting in the inadequacy of considering the former just to represent an imperfect alternative to the latter; the functions proper to writing are pointed out here, which lead to the estimation of writing systems as specific parts of language. A functional differentiation between written and printed language is the objective of the second included paper, where Buhler's tripartition of the functions of the utterance is applied in the sense that written texts differ from printed ones in their primary means serving to fulfil the function of expression, while with printed texts those of appeal and reference are the main ones. The third paper concerns the functional autonomy of written language; Vachek argues here that languages having no written norm should not be understood as the normal, or prototypical, cases, since they cannot serve as a suitable starting point for a general linguistic investigation; they Brought to you by | Nanyang Technological University Authenticated Download Date | 6/8/15 2:16 PM

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“…Some writing systems are called 'deeper' and others more 'shallow', reflecting the derivational level relevant for writing. Systems based on morphosyntactic structure are called deeper than systems based on phonological or phonetic representations (Haas 1976, Sampson 1985, Sgall 1987, Asher & Simpson 1994, Daniels & Bright 1996, Meisenburg 1996. The claim is that the written mode of expression follows a route different from the oral mode only in the final stage of processing.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Interfaces of Writing and Grammar

Neijt¹

2002

The Relation of Writing to Spoken Language

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Towards a Theory of Phonemic Orthography

Cited by 12 publications

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Notes and Discussion

Notes and Discussion

Review of Josef Vachek: Written Language Revisited.

The Interfaces of Writing and Grammar

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