Need thesis ideas

[Viktor77]

As part of the Honor's Program I'm required to write a thesis with the aid of a professor and which I will eventually present to a panel of experts from my local area. As my area of specialty is French and Spanish secondary education, my thesis needs to revolve around those subjects. It must also be an area of original research. Anyway, I'm torn for ideas.

A few I've been contemplating are:

The effectiveness of curriculum which teaches basic phonetics over unit chapters versus that which teaches basic phonetics as a prerequisite to grammatical study. Possibly also designing a curriculum for teaching French and Spanish phonetics at the secondary level.

Something within the category of second language acquisition of vocabulary or second language acquisition of idiomatic expressions (which is in itself quite vague).

I'm open to suggestions and/or advice narrowing down the topics I have above. Second language acquisition is something of a well-researched field so finding areas in need of original research is tricky.

[Culden]

Does it have to strictly relate to your major? My major is "Global Studies" or International Relations in normal people speak, but I can make a conlang for my Honors Thesis.

[roninbodhisattva]

Something within the category of second language acquisition of vocabulary or second language acquisition of idiomatic expressions (which is in itself quite vague).

This one personally sounds more interesting to me, though it is vague.

[Pthagnar]

The Cycle of Violence in North American Modern Language Education

[Xephyr]

The effectiveness of curriculum which teaches basic phonetics over unit chapters versus that which teaches basic phonetics as a prerequisite to grammatical study. Possibly also designing a curriculum for teaching French and Spanish phonetics at the secondary level.

Ehh.... are French and Spanish really the best case studies for an overview of this? Both of them have pretty friendly phonologies for Anglophones. If your major was, say, Arabic or Zulu secondary education then it'd be a different story. As is, though, I don't think it's a question even worth asking.

[bulbaquil]

The effectiveness of curriculum which teaches basic phonetics over unit chapters versus that which teaches basic phonetics as a prerequisite to grammatical study. Possibly also designing a curriculum for teaching French and Spanish phonetics at the secondary level.

Ehh.... are French and Spanish really the best case studies for an overview of this? Both of them have pretty friendly phonologies for Anglophones. If your major was, say, Arabic or Zulu secondary education then it'd be a different story. As is, though, I don't think it's a question even worth asking.

More anglophones study French and Spanish than study Arabic or Zulu.

More to the point, there are certain things that we take for granted because we're on a linguistics forum that heavily discusses such things, but to a monolingual teenager with no linguistic background or interest whatsoever who more likely than not is only taking the class because it's required for graduation, the phonology may not be as "friendly" as you think. It isn't a matter of "Indo-European vs. non-Indo-European" here; it's a matter of "English vs. non-English".

You actually do need to think about the fact that they might not pronounce final <e>'s in Spanish words, or that <v> is /b/, or all those other sort of things, and must consider the fact that it won't initially make sense to them.

[Viktor77]

The effectiveness of curriculum which teaches basic phonetics over unit chapters versus that which teaches basic phonetics as a prerequisite to grammatical study. Possibly also designing a curriculum for teaching French and Spanish phonetics at the secondary level.

Ehh.... are French and Spanish really the best case studies for an overview of this? Both of them have pretty friendly phonologies for Anglophones. If your major was, say, Arabic or Zulu secondary education then it'd be a different story. As is, though, I don't think it's a question even worth asking.

More anglophones study French and Spanish than study Arabic or Zulu.

More to the point, there are certain things that we take for granted because we're on a linguistics forum that heavily discusses such things, but to a monolingual teenager with no linguistic background or interest whatsoever who more likely than not is only taking the class because it's required for graduation, the phonology may not be as "friendly" as you think. It isn't a matter of "Indo-European vs. non-Indo-European" here; it's a matter of "English vs. non-English".

You actually do need to think about the fact that they might not pronounce final <e>'s in Spanish words, or that <v> is /b/, or all those other sort of things, and must consider the fact that it won't initially make sense to them.

Yea, that was where I was coming from. And yes, it must relate to my major otherwise I would do it over geographical population change in Detroit.

And wow, this was bumped from a long time ago haha. I almost forgot I ever asked it.

[Xephyr]

You actually do need to think about the fact that they might not pronounce final <e>'s in Spanish words, or that <v> is /b/, or all those other sort of things, and must consider the fact that it won't initially make sense to them.

Those are not issues of phonetics.

[dhok]

A reconstruction of Proto-Salish. Not that you can do it, but we will want to read it.

[roninbodhisattva]

A reconstruction of Proto-Salish. Not that you can do it, but we will want to read it.

SECONDED AND THIRDED.

[Viktor77]

A reconstruction of Proto-Salish. Not that you can do it, but we will want to read it.

SECONDED AND THIRDED.

Sorry, but if I was to reconstruct anything it would be Proto-Northern Tungusic.

[roninbodhisattva]

A reconstruction of Proto-Salish. Not that you can do it, but we will want to read it.

SECONDED AND THIRDED.

Sorry, but if I was to reconstruct anything it would be Proto-Northern Tungusic.

SECONDED AND THIRDED

[dhok]

Has there ever been anybody nutty enough to posit the existance of Proto-Salish-X, whatever X is?

[Bob Johnson]

I've been working on a theory of Proto-Vasco-Salishan.

[dhok]

"I have proven, to my knowledge, that Proto-Rotokas-Salish does, in fact, exist, based on such Greenburgian pairs as
putakuitovakudoku 'mother' vs. smq'xhlhgeqxnc'h 'laundry'
or
butukadaka 'tree' vs. tlh'tnekq'xhkshmlh 'bird'."
-Viktor's Ph. D. dissertation

[Tropylium⁺]

Has there ever been anybody nutty enough to posit the existance of Proto-Salish-X, whatever X is?

I'm currently having a discussion with someone on Nostratic-L who seems to believe in Uralo-Salish (or something along those lines, hard to tell)…

(…) I do not posit compounding or suffixation for fëlhöö \ fëlleg , simply
variation from 2 complex clusters. Appr. * pelYkXenWXWi > * pelYkeXWi > fëlhöö
, * pelYkXenWXWi > * pelYXeÑWi > fëlleg . The middle syl. was lost in most.

The changes in * usYXYaLYÑWa \ usYXYaRYÑWa > * sYyälNWa \ sYxYarNWa 'sunny'
(or sim.) > Hu sárga 'yellow' , Fn selvä 'clear' , etc. , might be due to L/R
alt., so I won't use them for what might be expected of -lN- here.

The same type of variation is seen medially in * asYXYunXWin > sYyäNWi \
sYXYuXWni \ sYyün?il \ etc. 'tendon/sinew/string/twine/hair' > Fn suoni , sää ;
Hu ina- , szöv- , etc.

The same type of variation is seen in Salishan :

* sXkW'iLY't*Y's-qWán*YXW > -nXW > -ÑXW > -Ñ?W in Kl sxW?i?c'ë´sëÑ 'hammer' ,
but -n*YXW > -yXW > -yw in Kl sxWi?c'ësáyu 'hammer'

* sXkW'iLY't*Y's-qWán*YXW > -nXW > -n?W in Kl sxWc!ë´qWën 'awl/piercer' , but
-n*YXW > -yXW > -yw in Kl sxWcë´!qWëyu 'awl/piercer / bit and brace'

* sXkW'iLY't*Y's-qWán*YXW > -nXW > -ÑXW > -mXW in Kl sxWkW'qWë´m 'axe' , but
-n*YXW > -yXW > -yw in Kl sxWq'a?Xë´yu 'clam fork' ; -n*YXW > -l*YXW > -l*Y?W >
-l? > -l' in Saa s^q'ëXel's 'clam fork'

This is about the Uralic word for "cloud" normally reconstructed as *pilŋi or *pilwi, which he seems to think would be better reconstructed *pelʲkχenʷχʷi (whether in PU or in Proto-Uralo-Salishan, I cannot tell).

In short, Poe's Law.

[roninbodhisattva]

There's a 'serious' linguist who posited Algonquian-Salish (or Algic-Salish), I'm pretty sure? But I can't remember who.

[Beli Orao]

My major is "Global Studies" or International Relations in normal people speak, but I can make a conlang for my Honors Thesis.

Ah, the humanities...

[Sevly]

You actually do need to think about the fact that they might not pronounce final <e>'s in Spanish words, or that <v> is /b/, or all those other sort of things, and must consider the fact that it won't initially make sense to them.

Those are not issues of phonetics.

Okay, but they are the issues of teaching learners how to pronounce the words and phrases of the language they are learning in a way that closely approximates that of a native speaker, and despite the similarities between English, French, and Spanish phonologies that stem from the fact that they are all Indo-European languages, the way you relate phoneme-grapheme correspondencies as well as phonotactic, prosodic, and allophonic rules to your students makes a big difference in how 'foreign' they will ultimately sound to those they speak to.

In my personal experience, I found school-level language instructors to be far too hesitant to give overviews of the phonologies of the languages they are teaching. Of course, this stems in part form the fact that I, with an interest in linguistics, am well-versed enough in relevant terminology to welcome such an overview, whereas fellow students may not be. Nonetheless, I find it ridiculous and frankly undermining that I went through three years of French instruction, grades 4 through 6, withough the nariest clue that tu and vous do not, in fact, rhyme. Moreover, French learners usually have the notion, and a step-by-step approach to pronunciation does too little to discourage this, that the language they are learning was specifically designed so that there would be as little correspondance between sound and writing as possible. I think Yiuel once mentioned that in Quebec even, when teaching native speakers to read and write, the current pedagogy encourages students to memorize words as "indivisible" units whose pronunciation cannot be otherwise predicted. This is exactly how second-language learners are tempted to do things and, as Yiuel said then and I repeat now, it does not work. French does have regular rules from which one can predict pronunciation from spelling--although almost never the other way round--and these are the rules that must be introduced to learners at the very start of their foray into both the written and spoken language (which will be around school-age for native speakers and immediately for L2s). Sure, they won't grasp all the rules or know exactly how to apply them in all situations, but at the very least they'll be intoduced to the concepts: which graphemes tend to represent which phonemes, and that there are such things is liaison and enchaînement.

Anywhom, back to the question of the research topic, while French and Spanish may not, strictly speaking, be the best languages to focus on when expounding the intricacies of teaching second-languages learners how to talk (from an English viewpoint), there are enough non-linguistics-savy learners out there to make it a worthwhile topic.

[Viktor77]

Okay, but they are the issues of teaching learners how to pronounce the words and phrases of the language they are learning in a way that closely approximates that of a native speaker, and despite the similarities between English, French, and Spanish phonologies that stem from the fact that they are all Indo-European languages, the way you relate phoneme-grapheme correspondencies as well as phonotactic, prosodic, and allophonic rules to your students makes a big difference in how 'foreign' they will ultimately sound to those they speak to.

In my personal experience, I found school-level language instructors to be far too hesitant to give overviews of the phonologies of the languages they are teaching. Of course, this stems in part form the fact that I, with an interest in linguistics, am well-versed enough in relevant terminology to welcome such an overview, whereas fellow students may not be. Nonetheless, I find it ridiculous and frankly undermining that I went through three years of French instruction, grades 4 through 6, withough the nariest clue that tu and vous do not, in fact, rhyme. Moreover, French learners usually have the notion, and a step-by-step approach to pronunciation does too little to discourage this, that the language they are learning was specifically designed so that there would be as little correspondance between sound and writing as possible. I think Yiuel once mentioned that in Quebec even, when teaching native speakers to read and write, the current pedagogy encourages students to memorize words as "indivisible" units whose pronunciation cannot be otherwise predicted. This is exactly how second-language learners are tempted to do things and, as Yiuel said then and I repeat now, it does not work. French does have regular rules from which one can predict pronunciation from spelling--although almost never the other way round--and these are the rules that must be introduced to learners at the very start of their foray into both the written and spoken language (which will be around school-age for native speakers and immediately for L2s). Sure, they won't grasp all the rules or know exactly how to apply them in all situations, but at the very least they'll be intoduced to the concepts: which graphemes tend to represent which phonemes, and that there are such things is liaison and enchaînement.

Anywhom, back to the question of the research topic, while French and Spanish may not, strictly speaking, be the best languages to focus on when expounding the intricacies of teaching second-languages learners how to talk (from an English viewpoint), there are enough non-linguistics-savy learners out there to make it a worthwhile topic.

Wow you totally just gave me my topic for my thesis! I want to explore creating an education-friendly curriculum for teaching straightforward French phonetic rules! Spanish may be put aside in my thesis as schools already use such a program for it, but for French AFAIK schools use the method of individual word memorization that Yiuel described. I believe there are technical terms for these in psychology, phoneme verses whole-word learning or something to that effect. The curriculum changes all the time with studies constantly pointing to the benefits of one method over the other than suddenly vice-versa. Still, it would be an interesting, albeit not completely unique, thesis idea.

[Pthagnar]

I want to explore creating an education-friendly curriculum

what a concept

[Viktor77]

I just got everything all set with my French profesor, so I'm hoping that within a semester's time I will be able to do my thesis on this French method of colorizing IPA sounds of French phonology to teach them to youth.

[Culden]

My major is "Global Studies" or International Relations in normal people speak, but I can make a conlang for my Honors Thesis.

Ah, the humanities...

Yeah, but the major required me to study abroad, so I was basically first in line for scholarships through the school for it. Otherwise I don't know that the major means anything, seeing as there's only one other school in the country with a major under the name of "Global Studies".

[Viktor77]

So I now have two ideas and I just need to choose one soon:

1). Teaching French phonetics through a method called color-coded phonemes. It avoids the IPA and ultimately I would design a mini lesson which could be taught before major language instruction.

2). Developing a mini lesson in general rules of grammar. Don't worry those who believe I have a terrible understanding of grammar, I'd work with an English professor. The idea is that students learning a foreign language lack an appropriate general grammatical knowledge which makes language learning difficult. If you can't break down English, how can you break down Spanish?

[Gulliver]

Teaching French phonetics through a method called color-coded phonemes. It avoids the IPA and ultimately I would design a mini lesson which could be taught before major language instruction.

Hmm… doesn't French have about ten or so vowel sounds? That might get unwieldy. I don't actually see a problem with French pronunciation… it's writing what you heard that's tricky, not reading what you've written. Also, you'd have to make sure that the colours are accessible to those who are colour-blind.

Perhaps you could do a corpus study of gender errors between English and Spanish learners writing in French, looking at whether Spanish learners are more likely to calque their own L1's gender onto French nouns than English speakers. Of course, such a corpus would have to exist.