Slavic, German, and Eurasian Studies
https://hdl.handle.net/1808/735
2024-03-28T18:20:44ZData-driven learning beyond English: Insights and implications from three monographs
https://hdl.handle.net/1808/34955
Data-driven learning beyond English: Insights and implications from three monographs
Forti, Luciana; Vyatkina, Nina; Schaeffer-Lacroix, Eva
Despite the growth of DDL in second language (L2) research and education in many languages, its focus has largely been on English. As a result, the knowledge about the applicability of DDL for learning LOTE remains limited. This hinders the validity and generalizability of DDL as a whole, and conceals the important implications related to bridging the research vs. practice gap in such contexts where the focus is on LOTEs. The monographs introduced in this paper demonstrate the relevance of DDL for learning LOTEs by discussing corpus-based resources, pedagogical applications, and empirical research from three perspectives.
This paper stems from the 2023 CorpusCALL SIG Symposium on Data-Driven Learning (DDL) for Languages Other Than English (LOTE). Three monographs on DDL for LOTE were presented and are briefly illustrated in this paper (Forti, 2023; Vyatkina, 2024; Schaeffer-Lacroix, 2019).
2023-08-01T00:00:00ZPoskus razlage razvoja stalnih naglasnih sistemov v slovanskih jezikih
https://hdl.handle.net/1808/34899
Poskus razlage razvoja stalnih naglasnih sistemov v slovanskih jezikih
Greenberg, Marc L.
The paper provides a brief overview of existing research on continuous accent systems and highlights past findings. Building on these insights the author makes suggestions for further consideration as well as proposes some new solutions. The discussion includes typological comparisons and an overview of possible phonetic mechanisms as factors that have pushed the Slavic accent system from the inherited Proto-Slavic to the various fixed-accent systems. In the proposed solutions, the starting point is the systemic changes of inherent properties in the Slavic prosodic system at the word level, without initially seeking external causes in language contact. However, this does not exclude the possibility that language contact played a role, but according to the principles of the comparative method, the possibilities of internal explanation are to be exhausted before resorting to external causes.
The following points recapitulate the proposals in this paper:
1. As a general observation, Proto-Slavic was a true pitch-accent system akin to modern Japanese, i.e., it contained word forms that are to be analyzed as accentless. As Slavic dialects moved from the pitch-accent type to stress-accent, the stage was set for fixed-stress systems to develop, which is a not uncommon outcome in languages of the world.
2. Two general trends have “loaded the dice” in favor of fixed-stress systems in Slavic: (a) the possibility of generalizing the default initial stress (“unaccented” forms) in Proto Slavic, and (b) the tendency to remove/retract final stress.
3. Some tendencies that were generalized in the emergence of fixed-stress systems can be detected in the connections between West and South Slavic dialects, including the evidence from erstwhile Pannonian Slavic. These include traces of intonational patterns and quantity relations that connect Proto-Czecho-Slovak with Proto-Western South Slavic, such as differential reflexes of the “old acute” stress (a result, in our view, of a glottal feature) as well as the possibility of an initial glottal stop as a relic of the prosodic shape of the “unaccented” Proto-Slavic word forms. This feature is seen in the Czech initial glottal stop (Cz. ráz), the české zpívání found in SW Bohemian dialects and which is akin to both penultimate fixed stress in Polish and Slovak (where it is in free variation with initial fixed stress), as well as rising-pitch patterns in Slovene.
4. Although in Western South Slavic (Slovene, BCMS) there is a trend towards innovative systems with distinctive pitch, which, together with quantity contrasts can increase the functional load of suprasegmental features, there is also a countervailing trend towards reduction of functional load by the elimination of quantity contrasts outside of stress (Slovene, Kajkavian, and peripheral dialects of Štokavian) and retraction of stress leftward.
5. The interaction of general Western South Slavic phonological trends mentioned in (4) with the morphological restructuring of morphology characteristic of Balkan Slavic has weighted the outcome in favor of patterns of generalized fixed stress, exemplified by Macedonian, which has systems of fixed penultimate and antepenultimate stress. In neighboring Serbian (Torlak) dialects the as yet incomplete trend towards fixed stress, i.e., a narrowing window of stress placement, can already be detected.
2023-01-01T00:00:00ZАкцентологические наблюдения к реконструкции праславянского диалекта в Паннонии
https://hdl.handle.net/1808/34895
Акцентологические наблюдения к реконструкции праславянского диалекта в Паннонии
Greenberg, Marc L.; Habijanec, Siniša; Гринберг, Марк Л.; Хабиянец, Синиша
The paper represents the authors’ first attempt to collect the accentual peculiarities recoverable from the extinct Late Common Slavic dialect traditionally named “Pannonian” Slavic as a prequel to their entry the topic for the Encyclopedia of Slavic Languages and Linguistics. The difficulty of defining this dialect is acknowledged (distinct, transitional), for which reason the authors take an agnostic view, focusing not just on the traditional notion of the Slavic speech community that disappeared from the Carpathian Basin with language shift to Hungarian from the 9–12 cc., but also the surviving dialect areas that might be provisionally labeled “circum-Pannonian,” which potentially includes the Czecho-Slovak areal, SW Ukrainian, Slovene, Kajkavian, and W peripheral areas of Štokavian.
2023-01-01T00:00:00ZThe Auschwitz Report
https://hdl.handle.net/1808/34789
The Auschwitz Report
Baron, Frank
The escape of Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler from Auschwitz on April 7, 1944, was extraordinary in its daring, courageous execution, and impact. The challenging task of the two escapees was to inform the world of previously unimaginable crimes, and to do so in a way that made the unbelievable believable. Because the deportations to Auschwitz were still in progress, it was essential to inform the threatened Jewish populations that they were slated by the Germans to be part of the “final solution.” When and how the transmission of the resulting Auschwitz Report took place, made all the difference, and that is this paper’s focus. Decisive transmissions involved secret networks in Switzerland and Hungary, taking place independently. Despite the presence of the Gestapo and the German army, finally, in early July, 1944, two independent, increasingly powerful efforts engendered by the report converged in Budapest. Only then could one of the most remarkable rescues of World War II take place. fbaron@ku.edu
2023-09-06T00:00:00Z