Evaluation and point of view in the oral Evaluation and point of view in the oral production of Italian learners of Englishproduction of Italian learners of English

Virginia Pulcini (University of Turin, Italy)Virginia Pulcini (University of Turin, Italy)

Spoken Learner Corpus ColloquiumSpoken Learner Corpus Colloquium24-25 January 200824-25 January 2008Université catholique de Louvain, Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, BelgiumLouvain-la-Neuve, Belgium

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Overview of researchOverview of research

• Pulcini, V. Pulcini, V. (2004) “A corpus of ‘informal (2004) “A corpus of ‘informal academic interviews’: the Italian Component of academic interviews’: the Italian Component of the LINDSEI project” the LINDSEI project”

• situational setting, subjects, structure of the situational setting, subjects, structure of the interviewinterview

• characteristics of this genre: characteristics of this genre:

goal-orientedgoal-oriented, , semi-structuredsemi-structured, , asymmetricasymmetric, , institutionalinstitutional and and cross-cross-linguisticlinguistic..

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Pulcini,V. and C. Furiassi (2004) “Spoken interaction and discourse markers in a corpus of learner

English”

• teachers use twice as many discourse markers than students

• Teachers: backchannels (mhm, uhu, I see, oh), please, now, right (comprehension and agreement), textual markers of option and contrast (or, but)

• Students: response forms (yeah, no), fillers and hedges (I mean, I think), phatic devices (you know), markers of addition and continuity (and, so)

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students’ pragmatic competence in conversational

management seems to be limited

Closings:31% reply to a thanking or closing expression with a standard form (okay, you’re welcome)

53% do not respond at all

16% violate the standard English norm

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Furiassi, C. (2004) “Spoken and written learner English: A quantitative analysis of ICLE-IT and

LINDSEI-IT” • the same differences that exist

between spoken and written modes of communication in native use are also present in ICLE-it and LINDSEI-it

• short words (functional words and core lexical items), less varied and more repetitive vocabulary, verbal fillers, discourse markers, contracted forms

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The expression of evaluation and attitudinal stance

(Thompson and Hunston, 2000)

• “the expression of the speaker or writer’s attitude or stance towards, viewpoint on, or feelings about the entities or propositions that he or she is talking about”

• parameters: goodness or badness, likelihood/certainty expectedness, importance

• conceptual: markers of subjectivity (I think, in my opinion, etc.), comparison (more…than)

• lexical: evaluative adjectives, evaluative verbs, discourse labels (problem), hedges (maybe)

• grammatical: modals, connectors, subordinators

• textual: discourse markers

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Focus on the following linguistic signals:

• Markers of subjectivity personal pronouns, phrases

• Evaluative and private verbs

• Evaluative adjectives

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Table 1. Personal pronouns and possessives in Lindsei-it

I 2,922 my memine

32613415

475

she 668 herhers

3150

315

they 617 them their 9266

158

you 499 youryours

660

66

he 469 his 135 135

we 430 ourusours

41273

98

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Table 2. Evaluative phrases in the Lindsei-it B-turns

in my opinion 7

personally 3

it seems to me 2

as far as I… 1

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Table 3. Verbs expressing evaluation along the good/bad parameter

I like I liked

8723

111

I prefer I preferred

241

25

I love I loved

143

17

I enjoyed I enjoy

70

7

I (‘ve) appreciated I appreciate I don’t appreciate

221

5

I hate I hated

20

2

I don’t like I do not like I didn’t like I did not like

2000

2

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Table 4. Most frequent private verbs in the Lindsei-it B-turnsI think I thought

33819

357

I would like I’d like

2016

36

I know 27 27

I find I found

920

29

I think so 16 16

I remember 11 11

I hope 9 9

I find 9 9

I agree I don’t agree

40

4

I guess I guessed

40

4

I believe I believed

30

3

I imagine I imagined

10

1

12

(1) er every I think every every week and eh so they are erm always eh studying something every week and eh while in I think in Italy er when we prepare an examination a university examination we don’t er study erm so much

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Table 5. Most frequent private verbs in the negative forms in the Lindsei-it B-turns

I don’t know I do not know

680

68

I don’t remember I do not remember

41

5

I don’t think I do not think I didn’t think I did not think

5000

5

I don’t think so I do not think so I didn’t think so

300

3

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(2) when we have when we had to take decision they mm . I mean English people eh they eh . they were I don't know mm . they tended to be isolated from the rest of the group erm

(3) well this is probably the story of a a painter that in the first picture is erm painting erm . ma I I don't know the name of eh of it's a mm .. I I don't know the

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Table 6. Evaluative adjectives in the Lindsei-it B-turns (1)

good 153 0.26 very (33) really (12)

different 132 0.22 very (12), completely (4), quite (3), really (3), totally (3), a little (1), practically (1)

beautiful 100 0.17 more (23), very (14), really (3), not so (3), the most (1), so (1)

important 64 0.11 very (12), most (8), more (2), not (2), particularly (2), so (2), not so much (1), quite (1), not so (1)

interesting 64 0.11 very (22), really (5), quite (3), particularly (1), the most (1)

better 53 0.09 much (5)

happy 50 0.08 very (16), not so (3) quite (3), a bit (1)

difficult 48 0.08 very (8), quite (3), a little (2), more (2), a bit (1), a little bit (1), extremely (1), less (1), not (1), really (1), the most (1), too (1)

real 44 0.07 not (1), too (2)

young 40 0.07 really (3), very (1)

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Table 6. Evaluative adjectives in the Lindsei-it B-turns (2)

bad 39 0.07 very (4), really (2), not (2), quite (1)

funny 38 0.06 very (6), quite (2), extremely (1)

satisfied 37 0.06 very (5), really (2), extremely (1)

strange 37 0.06 really (9), very (2). a bit (1), so (1)

nice 32 0.05 very (9), not so (4), really (3), quite (2)

impressive 27 0.05 particularly (10), very (6), more (2), really (2), the most (2), so (1)

particular 27 0.05 quite (2), really (1), every (1),

great 25 0.04 -

wonderful 23 0.04 really (4), extremely (1)

easy 21 0.04 not so (7), very (3), not (6), quite (1), not

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Table 7. Adjectives used with the word “film”

film 144 good (11)particularly good (9)really good (2)very good (10)badinterestingreally frightening (1)funnynewnice beautiful (1)the most beautiful (1)

3110103322

2

greatimpressivefavouritelongoldparticularly importantromanticvery serious

11111111

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Table 8. Adjectives used with the word “movie”

movie 41 interesting (2)really interesting (1)really boring (2) really really boring (1)really moving (2)particularly important really strangereally really astonishing and beautiful long quite nice not boring

3

321111111

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Table 9. Adjectives used with the word “play”

play 43 the most interesting and beautiful 1

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Table 10. Adjectives used with the word “country”

country 82 impressivebeautiful strong very weird very old very poor

1411111

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Table 11. Adjectives used with the word “experience”

experience 70 badinteresting dramaticgoodimportantgreatniceamazingbeautiful different negative romanticsadstrongterrifyingtraumaticwonderfulvery nice very unpleasantnot very nice

33222221111111111111

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Table 12. Adjectives used with the word “woman”

woman 165 youngbeautifulrichattractivegood-lookingprettysadhappy*snob

12

2

2

1

1

1

1

1

1

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Table 13. Adjectives used with the word “girl”

girl 82 beautiful young angry good-looking satisfied *wonderful proud a bit ugly a little bit ugly content glad happy mad much more beautiful strange very very pretty very beautiful

853332221111111111

very dissatisfied very glad

not satisfied not so beautiful not very very beautiful not happy not very happy not so happy not so ugly

11

3311111

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Table 14. Adjectives used with the word “lady”

lady 35 angrynot very beautiful*wonderfulgood-lookingprettieryoungersillydisappointednot that prettysatisfied

5421111111

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Conclusions

• Predictable results: high frequency of the first person pronoun I and core evaluative and private verbs

• Features of Italian learner English:– limited variety of private verbs (I think, I

prefer, I love) and evaluative adjectives (good, beautiful, important, interesting)

– preference for not+ positive adjectives (not so beautiful, not satisfied), mitigation of negative adjectives (a little bit ugly)

• Need to compare results with other corpora and the control native corpus