Search results for: language practices
1491 Bilingual Gaming Kit to Teach English Language through Collaborative Learning
Authors: Sarayu Agarwal
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This paper aims to teach English (secondary language) by bridging the understanding between the Regional language (primary language) and the English Language (secondary language). Here primary language is the one a person has learned from birth or within the critical period, while secondary language would be any other language one learns or speaks. The paper also focuses on evolving old teaching methods to a contemporary participatory model of learning and teaching. Pilot studies were conducted to gauge an understanding of student’s knowledge of the English language. Teachers and students were interviewed and their academic curriculum was assessed as a part of the initial study. Extensive literature study and design thinking principles were used to devise a solution to the problem. The objective is met using a holistic learning kit/card game to teach children word recognition, word pronunciation, word spelling and writing words. Implication of the paper is a noticeable improvement in the understanding and grasping of English language. With increasing usage and applicability of English as a second language (ESL) world over, the paper becomes relevant due to its easy replicability to any other primary or secondary language. Future scope of this paper would be transforming the idea of participatory learning into self-regulated learning methods. With the upcoming govt. learning centres in rural areas and provision of smart devices such as tablets, the development of the card games into digital applications seems very feasible.
Keywords: English as a second language, vocabulary-building, learning through gamification.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 13561490 The Pragmatist Basis of Material Hermeneutics
Authors: Juho Lindholm
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Practical hermeneutics explores the emergence of meaning in scientific practice. Visual hermeneutics is its subclass which explores the emergence of meaning in instrumentally mediated interactions with scientific objects. There remains to be explained, upon what theory of meaning their discussions are based. Linguistic theories of meaning seem utterly inappropriate for the analysis of the non-linguistic meanings that such hermeneutics invoke. In this article, it will be shown by conceptual analysis that the so-called “pragmatic maxim” provides sufficient resources for the philosophical analysis of such meanings. The “pragmatic maxim” states that the meaning of a thing consists in the potential practical effects of that thing. Because this notion is not confined to language, it can be broadly applied to anything meaningful, including practices and the instruments which are part of practices.
Keywords: Hermeneutics, philosophy of science, pragmatism, theory of meaning.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 5041489 A NXM Version of 5X5 Playfair Cipher for any Natural Language (Urdu as Special Case)
Authors: Muhammad Salam, Nasir Rashid, Shah Khalid, Muhammad Raees Khan
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In this paper a modified version NXM of traditional 5X5 playfair cipher is introduced which enable the user to encrypt message of any Natural language by taking appropriate size of the matrix depending upon the size of the natural language. 5X5 matrix has the capability of storing only 26 characters of English language and unable to store characters of any language having more than 26 characters. To overcome this limitation NXM matrix is introduced which solve this limitation. In this paper a special case of Urdu language is discussed. Where # is used for completing odd pair and * is used for repeating letters.
Keywords: cryptography, decryption, encryption, playfair cipher, traditional cipher.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 21641488 Natural Language Database Interface for Selection of Data Using Grammar and Parsing
Authors: N. D. Karande, G. A. Patil
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Databases have become ubiquitous. Almost all IT applications are storing into and retrieving information from databases. Retrieving information from the database requires knowledge of technical languages such as Structured Query Language (SQL). However majority of the users who interact with the databases do not have a technical background and are intimidated by the idea of using languages such as SQL. This has led to the development of a few Natural Language Database Interfaces (NLDBIs). A NLDBI allows the user to query the database in a natural language. This paper highlights on architecture of new NLDBI system, its implementation and discusses on results obtained. In most of the typical NLDBI systems the natural language statement is converted into an internal representation based on the syntactic and semantic knowledge of the natural language. This representation is then converted into queries using a representation converter. A natural language query is translated to an equivalent SQL query after processing through various stages. The work has been experimented on primitive database queries with certain constraints.
Keywords: Natural language database interface, representation converter, syntactic and semantic knowledge
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 27051487 The Predictability and Abstractness of Language: A Study in Understanding and Usage of the English Language through Probabilistic Modeling and Frequency
Authors: Revanth Sai Kosaraju, Michael Ramscar, Melody Dye
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Accounts of language acquisition differ significantly in their treatment of the role of prediction in language learning. In particular, nativist accounts posit that probabilistic learning about words and word sequences has little to do with how children come to use language. The accuracy of this claim was examined by testing whether distributional probabilities and frequency contributed to how well 3-4 year olds repeat simple word chunks. Corresponding chunks were the same length, expressed similar content, and were all grammatically acceptable, yet the results of the study showed marked differences in performance when overall distributional frequency varied. It was found that a distributional model of language predicted the empirical findings better than a number of other models, replicating earlier findings and showing that children attend to distributional probabilities in an adult corpus. This suggested that language is more prediction-and-error based, rather than on abstract rules which nativist camps suggest.
Keywords: Abstractness, child psychology, language acquisition, prediction and error.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 20961486 The Folksongs of Jharkhand: An Intangible Cultural Heritage of Tribal India
Authors: Walter Beck
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Jharkhand is newly constituted 28th State in the eastern part of India which is known for the oldest settlement of the indigenous people. In the State of Jharkhand in which broadly three language family are found namely, Austric, Dravidian, and Indo-European. Ex-Mundari, kharia, Ho Santali come from the Austric Language family. Kurukh, Malto under Dravidian language family and Nagpuri Khorta etc. under Indo-European language family. There are 32 Indigenous Communities identified as Scheduled Tribe in the State of Jharkhand. Santhal, Munda, Kahria, Ho and Oraons are some of the major Tribe of the Jharkhand state. Jharkhand has a Rich Cultural heritage which includes Folk art, folklore, Folk Dance, Folk Music, Folk Songs for which diversity can been seen from place to place, season to season and all traditional Culture and practices. The languages as well as the songs are vulnerable to dominant culture and hence needed to be protected. The collection and documentation of these songs in their natural setting adds significant contribution to the conservation and propagation of the cultural elements. This paper reflects to bring out the Originality of the Collected Songs from remote areas of the plateau of Sothern Jharkhand as a rich intangible Cultural heritage of the Country. The research was done through participatory observation. In this research project more than 100 songs which were never documented before.
Keywords: Cultural heritage, India, Indigenous people, songs.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 21931485 Mobile Learning Implementation: Students- Perceptions in UTP
Authors: Ahmad Sobri bin Hashim, Wan Fatimah Bt. Wan Ahmad, Rohiza Bt. Ahmad
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Mobile Learning (M-Learning) is a new technology which is to enhance current learning practices and activities for all people especially students and academic practitioners UTP is currently, implemented two types of learning styles which are conventional and electronic learning. In order to improve current learning approaches, it is necessary for UTP to implement m-learning in UTP. This paper presents a study on the students- perceptions on mobile utilization in the learning practices in UTP. Besides, this paper also presents a survey that was conducted among 82 students from System Analysis and Design (SAD) course in UTP. The survey includes basic information of mobile devices that have been used by the students, opinions on current learning practices and also the opinions regarding the m-learning implementation in the current learning practices especially in SAD course. Based on the results of the survey, majority of the students are using the mobile devices that can support m-learning environment. Other than that, students also agreed that current learning practices are ineffective and they believe that m-learning utilization can improve the effectiveness of current learning practices.Keywords: m-learning, conventional learning, electronic learning, mobile devices.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 22341484 Turkic - Indian Lexical Parallels in the Framework of the Nostratic Language's Macrofamily
Authors: Z. E. Iskakova, B. S. Bokuleva, B. N. Zhubatova, U. T. Alzhanbayeva
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From ancient times Turkic languages have been in contact with numerous representatives of different language families. The article discusses the Turkic - Indian language contact and were shown promise and necessity of this trend for the Turkic linguistics, were given Turkic - Indian lexical parallels in the framework of the nostratic language's macro family. The research work has done on the base of lexical parallels (LP) -of Turkic (which belong to the Altaic family of languages) and Indian (including Dravidian and Indo-Aryan languages).Keywords: Language communications, lexical parallels, Nostratic languages, Turkic languages.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 22291483 On a Theoretical Framework for Language Learning Apps Evaluation
Authors: Juan Manuel Real-Espinosa
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This paper addresses the first step to evaluate language learning apps: what theoretical framework to adopt when designing the app evaluation framework. The answer is not just one, since there are several options that could be proposed. However, the question to be clarified is to what extent the learning design of apps is based on a specific learning approach, or on the contrary, on a fusion of elements from several theoretical proposals and paradigms, such as m-learning, Mobile Assisted Language Learning and a number of theories about language acquisition. The present study suggests that the reality is closer to the second assumption. This implies that the theoretical framework against which the learning design of the apps should be evaluated, must also be a hybrid theoretical framework, which integrates evaluation criteria from the different theories involved in language learning through mobile applications.
Keywords: Action-oriented approach, apps evaluation, mobile-assisted language learning, post-method pedagogy.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 5851482 Interfacing C and TMS320C6713 Assembly Language (Part-I)
Authors: Abdullah A. Wardak
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This paper describes an interfacing of C and the TMS320C6713 assembly language which is crucially important for many real-time applications. Similarly, interfacing of C with the assembly language of a conventional microprocessor such as MC68000 is presented for comparison. However, it should be noted that the way the C compiler passes arguments among various functions in the TMS320C6713-based environment is totally different from the way the C compiler passes arguments in a conventional microprocessor such as MC68000. Therefore, it is very important for a user of the TMS320C6713-based system to properly understand and follow the register conventions when interfacing C with the TMS320C6713 assembly language subroutine. It should be also noted that in some cases (examples 6-9) the endian-mode of the board needs to be taken into consideration. In this paper, one method is presented in great detail. Other methods will be presented in the future.Keywords: Assembly language, high level language, interfacing, stack, arguments.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 25211481 Choosing an Ontology Language
Authors: Anna V. Zhdanova, Uwe Keller
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We summarize information that facilitates choosing an ontology language for knowledge intensive applications. This paper is a short version of the ontology language state-of-the-art and evolution analysis carried out for choosing an ontology language in the IST Esperonto project. At first, we analyze changes and evolution that took place in the filed of Semantic Web languages during the last years, in particular, around the ontology languages of the RDF/S and OWL family. Second, we present current trends in development of Semantic Web languages, in particular, rule support extensions for Semantic Web languages and emerging ontology languages such as WSMO languages.Keywords: OWL, RDF/S, Semantic Web Languages, WSML
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 17531480 Evaluating the Role of Multisensory Elements in Foreign Language Acquisition
Authors: Sari Myréen
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The aim of this study was to evaluate the role of multisensory elements in enhancing and facilitating foreign language acquisition among adult students in a language classroom. The use of multisensory elements enables the creation of a student-centered classroom, where the focus is on individual learner’s language learning process, perceptions and motivation. Multisensory language learning is a pedagogical approach where the language learner uses all the senses more effectively than in a traditional in-class environment. Language learning is facilitated due to multisensory stimuli which increase the number of cognitive connections in the learner and take into consideration different types of learners. A living lab called Multisensory Space creates a relaxed and receptive state in the learners through various multisensory stimuli, and thus promotes their natural foreign language acquisition. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected in two questionnaire inquiries among the Finnish students of a higher education institute at the end of their basic French courses in December 2014 and 2016. The inquiries discussed the effects of multisensory elements on the students’ motivation to study French as well as their learning outcomes. The results show that the French classes in the Multisensory Space provide the students with an encouraging and pleasant learning environment, which has a positive impact on their motivation to study the foreign language as well as their language learning outcomes.
Keywords: Foreign language acquisition, foreign language learning, higher education, multisensory learning, pedagogical approach, transcultural learning.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 13791479 Expressive Modes and Species of Language
Authors: Richard Elling Moe
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Computer languages are usually lumped together into broad -paradigms-, leaving us in want of a finer classification of kinds of language. Theories distinguishing between -genuine differences- in language has been called for, and we propose that such differences can be observed through a notion of expressive mode. We outline this concept, propose how it could be operationalized and indicate a possible context for the development of a corresponding theory. Finally we consider a possible application in connection with evaluation of language revision. We illustrate this with a case, investigating possible revisions of the relational algebra in order to overcome weaknesses of the division operator in connection with universal queries.Keywords: Expressive mode, Computer language species, Evaluation of revision, Relational algebra, Universal database queries
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 13261478 Evidence Based Practice for Oral Care in Children
Authors: T. Turan, Ç. Erdoğan
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As far as is known, general nursing care practices do not include specific evidence-based practices related to oral care in children. This study aimed to evaluate the evidence based nursing practice for oral care in children. This article is planned as a review article by searching the literature in this field. According to all age groups and the oral care in various specific situations located evidence in the literature were examined. It has been determined that the methods and frequency used in oral care practices performed by nurses in clinics differ from one hospital to another. In addition, it is seen that different solutions are used in basic oral care, oral care practices to prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia and evidence-based practice in mucositis management in children. As a result, a standard should be established in oral care practices for children and education for children is recommended.
Keywords: Children, evidence based practice, nursing, oral care.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 13341477 Communication and Devices: Face to Face Communication versus Communication with Mobile Technologies
Authors: Nuran Öze
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With the rapid changes occurring in the last twenty five years, mobile phone technology has influenced every aspect of life. Technological developments within the Internet and mobile phone areas have not only changed communication practices; it has also changed the everyday life practices of individuals. This article has focused on understanding how people’s communication practices and everyday life practices have changed with the smartphone usage. The study was conducted by using in-depth interview method and the research was conducted on twenty Turkish Cypriots who live in Northern Cyprus. According to the research results, communicating via Internet has rapidly replaced face to face communication in recent years. However, results have changed according to generations. Younger generations can easily adapt themselves to technological changes because they are already gaining everyday life practices right now. However, the older generations practices are already present in their everyday life.
Keywords: Face to face communication, internet, mobile technologies, North Cyprus.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 14331476 Teaching English under the LMD Reform: The Algerian Experience
Authors: Naouel Abdellatif Mami
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Since its independence in 1962, Algeria has struggled to establish an educational system tailored to the needs of the population it may address. Considering the historical connection with France, Algeria has always looked at the French language as a cultural imperative until late in the seventies. After the Arabization policy of 1971 and the socioeconomic changes taking place worldwide, the use of English as a communicating vehicle started to gain more space within globalized Algeria. Consequently, disparities in the use of French started to fade away at the cross-roads leaving more space to the teaching of English as a second foreign language. Moreover, the introduction of the Bologna Process and the European Credit Transfer System in Higher Education has necessitated some innovations in the design and development of new curricula adapted to the socioeconomic market. In this paper, I will try to highlight the important historical dimensions Algeria has taken towards the implementation of an English language methodology and to the status it acquired from second foreign language, to first foreign language to “the language of knowledge and sciences". I will also propose new pedagogical perspectives for a better treatment of the English language in order to encourage independent and autonomous learning.Keywords: Teaching English as a foreign language, Globalization, post-colonial Algeria. the educational system.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 55301475 Japanese Language Learning Strategies Based on Gender by Japanese Learners in North Sulawesi Indonesia
Authors: Sherly Ferro Lensun
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Strategies influence the language abilities of both male and female learners in the learning process. Therefore, learning strategies are one of the critical factors for improving language learning and are essential as part of the initial learning effort. In general, language learning strategies differ between boys and girls. Therefore, this research aims to obtain a model that investigates the relationship between the selection of learning strategies, their frequency of use, and the learner's gender. In addition, we found differences in strategy use and their impact on language ability between males and females. 137 students participated and completed the questionnaire. There were 48 males (35%) and 90 females (65.7%). It was clear that most of the Japanese learners were women. Findings show that most Japanese learners in North Sulawesi used cognitive and social strategies and methods of involving others in learning Japanese.
Keywords: Learning strategies, Japanese Language, Gender by Japanese Learners, North sulawesi.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2211474 The Secrecy Underlying Young Language Learners- Learning
Authors: Nima Shakouri Masouleh, Razieh Bahraminezhad Jooneghani
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The study investigated the educational implications that can be derived from the work of a variety of celebrated figures such as Piaget, Vygotsky, and Bruner that will be helpful in the field of language learning. However, the writer believed these views were previously expressed not full–fledged by Comenius who has been described by Howatt (1984) as a genius–the one that the history of language teaching can claim. And we owe to him more than anyone.Keywords: restructuring, assimilation, equiliberation
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 18031473 Factors Influencing Environmental Management Practices Among Hotels in Malaysia
Authors: Zaiton Samdin, Kasimu Abdu Bakori, Hamimah Hassan
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This paper attempts to investigate the factors that influence hotel managers- attitudes towards sustainable tourism practices (STP) in Kuala Lumpur and the state of Selangor in Malaysia. The study distributes 104 questionnaires to hotels ranging from one star to five-star categories including budget hotels. Out of this figure, 60 copies of the questionnaires were returned and analyzed. The finding revealed that of all the seven factors investigated, only the variables measuring incentives and knowledge have significantly influenced sustainable tourism practices in the country. Therefore, government and other green bodies within the country should continue to provide hotels with incentives for sound technologies. Moreover, the government agencies should continue to educate hoteliers on the relevance of environmental protection for the successful implementation of sustainable tourism practices.
Keywords: Attitude, incentive, knowledge, sustainable tourism practices
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 41051472 The Importance of Theatrical Language in the Creativeness of the Actor
Authors: Ordabek Khozhamberdiyev
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In this article, some methods are mentioned for developing the theatrical language by giving information of “theatrical language" since the arising of the language in obsolete terms, and today, and also by examining the problems. Being able to talk meaningfully in the theater stage is a skillful art. Maybe, to be able to convey the idea of the poet, his/her world outlook and his/her feelings from the bottom of the heart as such, also conveying the speech norms without breaking them to the ear of audience in a fascinating way in adverse of a repellent way is the most difficult one. Because of this, “the word is the mirror of the idea". The importance of the theatrical language should not be perceived as only a post, it is “as the yarn that the culture carpet is weaved from". Thereby, it is a tool which transposes our culture and our life style from generation to generation. At the time of creativeness, the “word" comes out from the poet, “the word and feeling" art comes out from the actor. If it was not so, the audience could read the texts of the work himself/herself instead of going to the theater in order to see the performance. The fundamental works by the Turkish, Kazakh and English scientists have been taken as a basis for the research done.
Keywords: language, sound, stage, theatrical language, voice
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 13461471 LOWL: Logic and OWL, an Extension
Authors: M. Mohsenzadeh, F. Shams, M. Teshnehlab
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Current research on semantic web aims at making intelligent web pages meaningful for machines. In this way, ontology plays a primary role. We believe that logic can help ontology languages (such as OWL) to be more fluent and efficient. In this paper we try to combine logic with OWL to reduce some disadvantages of this language. Therefore we extend OWL by logic and also show how logic can satisfy our future expectations of an ontology language.
Keywords: Logical Programming, OWL, Language Extension.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 15601470 From Separatism to Coalition: Variants in Language Politics and Leadership Pattern in Dravidian Movement
Authors: Subramaniam Chandran
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This paper describes the evolution of language politics and the part played by political leaders with reference to the Dravidian parties in Tamil Nadu. It explores the interesting evolution from separatism to coalition in sustaining the values of parliamentary democracy and federalism. It seems that the appropriation of language politics is fully ascribed to the DMK leadership under Annadurai and Karunanidhi. For them, the Tamil language is a self-determining power, a terrain of nationhood, and a perennial source of social and political powers. The DMK remains a symbol of Tamil nationalist party playing language politics in the interest of the Tamils. Though electoral alliances largely determine the success, the language politics still has significant space in the politics of Tamil Nadu. Ironically, DMK moves from the periphery to centre for getting national recognition for the Tamils as well as for its own maximization of power. The evolution can be seen in two major phases as: language politics for party building; and language politics for state building with three successive political processes, namely, language politics in the process of separatism, representative politics and coalition. The much pronounced Dravidian Movement is radical enough to democratize the party ideology to survive the spirit of parliamentary democracy. This has secured its own rewards in terms of political power. The political power provides the means to achieve the social and political goal of the political party. Language politics and leadership pattern actualized this trend though the movement is shifted from separatism to coalition.Keywords: Language politics, cultural nationalism, leadership, social justice
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 19621469 Auditor with the Javanese Characters and Non Javanese in Audit Firm: Conflict of Interest
Authors: Krisna Damayanti, Lilis Ardini
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Many issues about the relationship between auditors in auditing practices with its stakeholders often heard. It appears in perspectives of bringing out the variety of phenomena affecting from the audit practice of greed and not appreciating from the independency of the audit profession and professional code of ethics. It becomes a logical consequence in practicing of capitalism in accounting. The main purpose of this article would like to uncover the existing auditing practices in Indonesia, especially in Java that associated with a strong influence of Javanese culture with reluctant /”shy", politely, "legowo (gratefully accepted)", "ngemong" (friendly), "not mentholo" (lenient), "tepo seliro" (tolerance), "ngajeni" (respectful), "acquiescent" and also reveals its relationships with Non Javanese culture in facing the conflict of interest in practical of auditing world. The method used by interpretive approach that emphasizes the role of language, interpret and understand and see social reality as something other than a label, name or concept. Global practices in auditing of each country have particular cultures that affect the standard set by those regulatory standards results the adaptation of IAS. The majority of parties in Indonesia is dominated by Javanese racial regulators, so Java culture is embedded in every audit practices and those conditions in Java leads auditors in having similar behaviour, sometimes interfere with standard Java code of conduct must be executed by an auditor. Auditors who live in Java have the characters of Javanese culture that is hard to avoid in the audit practice. However, practically, the auditors still are relevant in their profession.
Keywords: Auditors, java, character, profession, code of ethics, client.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 23311468 Organizational Involvement and Employees’ Consumption of New Work Practices in State-owned Enterprises: The Ghanaian Case
Authors: M. Aminu Sanda, K. Ewontumah
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This paper explored the challenges faced by the management of a Ghanaian state enterprise in managing conflicts and disturbances associated with its attempt to implement new work practices to enhance its capability to operate as a commercial entity. The purpose was to understand the extent to which organizational involvement, consistency and adaptability influence employees’ consumption of new work practices in transforming the organization’s organizational activity system. Using selfadministered questionnaires, data were collected from one hundred and eighty (180) employees and analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The results showed that constraints in organizational involvement and adaptability prevented the positive consumption of new work practices by employees in the organization. It is also found that the organization’s employees failed to consume the new practices being implemented, because they perceived the process as non-involving, and as such, did not encourage the development of employee capability, empowerment, and teamwork. The study concluded that the failure of the organization’s management to create opportunities for organizational learning constrained its ability to get employees consume the new work practices, which situation could have facilitated the organization’s capabilities of operating as a commercial entity.Keywords: Organizational transformation, new work practices, work practice consumption, organizational involvement, state-owned enterprise, Ghana.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 15761467 Using Different Aspects of the Signings for Appearance-based Sign Language Recognition
Authors: Morteza Zahedi, Philippe Dreuw, Thomas Deselaers, Hermann Ney
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Sign language is used by the deaf and hard of hearing people for communication. Automatic sign language recognition is a challenging research area since sign language often is the only way of communication for the deaf people. Sign language includes different components of visual actions made by the signer using the hands, the face, and the torso, to convey his/her meaning. To use different aspects of signs, we combine the different groups of features which have been extracted from the image frames recorded directly by a stationary camera. We combine the features in two levels by employing three techniques. At the feature level, an early feature combination can be performed by concatenating and weighting different feature groups, or by concatenating feature groups over time and using LDA to choose the most discriminant elements. At the model level, a late fusion of differently trained models can be carried out by a log-linear model combination. In this paper, we investigate these three combination techniques in an automatic sign language recognition system and show that the recognition rate can be significantly improved.
Keywords: American sign language, appearance-based features, Feature combination, Sign language recognition
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 13981466 Language Policy as an Instrument for Nation Building and Minority Representation: Supporting Cases from South Asia
Authors: Kevin You
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Nation-building has been a key consideration in ethno-linguistically diverse post-colonial ‘artificial states’, where ethnic tensions, religious differences and the risk of persecution of minorities are common. Language policy can help with nation-building, but it can also hinder the process. An important challenge is in recognising which language policy to adopt. This article proposes that the designation of a widely used lingua franca as a national language (in an official capacity or otherwise) - in a culturally, ethnically and linguistically diverse post-colonial state - assists its nation-building efforts in the long run. To demonstrate, this paper looks at the cases of Sri Lanka, Indonesia and India: three young nations which together emerged out of the Second World War with comparable colonial experiences, but subsequently adopted different language policies to different effects. Insights presented underscore the significance of inclusive language policy in sustainable nation-building in states with comparable post-colonial experiences.
Keywords: Language policy, South Asia, nation building, Artificial states.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 8451465 Mistranslation in Cross Cultural Communication: A Discourse Analysis on Former President Bush’s Speech in 2001
Authors: Lowai Abed
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The differences in languages play a big role in cross-cultural communication. If meanings are not translated accurately, the risk can be crucial not only on an interpersonal level, but also on the international and political levels. The use of metaphorical language by politicians can cause great confusion, often leading to statements being misconstrued. In these situations, it is the translators who struggle to put forward the intended meaning with clarity and this makes translation an important field to study and analyze when it comes to cross-cultural communication. Owing to the growing importance of language and the power of translation in politics, this research analyzes part of President Bush’s speech in 2001 in which he used the word “Crusade” which caused his statement to be misconstrued. The research uses a discourse analysis of cross-cultural communication literature which provides answers supported by historical, linguistic, and communicative perspectives. The first finding indicates that the word ‘crusade’ carries different meaning and significance in the narratives of the Western world when compared to the Middle East. The second one is that, linguistically, maintaining cultural meanings through translation is quite difficult and challenging. Third, when it comes to the cross-cultural communication perspective, the common and frequent usage of literal translation is a sign of poor strategies being followed in translation training. Based on the example of Bush’s speech, this paper hopes to highlight the weak practices in translation in cross-cultural communication which are still commonly used across the world. Translation studies have to take issues such as this seriously and attempt to find a solution. In every language, there are words and phrases that have cultural, historical and social meanings that are woven into the language. Literal translation is not the solution for this problem because that strategy is unable to convey these meanings in the target language.
Keywords: Crusade, metaphor, mistranslation, war in terror.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 8441464 Structural Parsing of Natural Language Text in Tamil Using Phrase Structure Hybrid Language Model
Authors: Selvam M, Natarajan. A M, Thangarajan R
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Parsing is important in Linguistics and Natural Language Processing to understand the syntax and semantics of a natural language grammar. Parsing natural language text is challenging because of the problems like ambiguity and inefficiency. Also the interpretation of natural language text depends on context based techniques. A probabilistic component is essential to resolve ambiguity in both syntax and semantics thereby increasing accuracy and efficiency of the parser. Tamil language has some inherent features which are more challenging. In order to obtain the solutions, lexicalized and statistical approach is to be applied in the parsing with the aid of a language model. Statistical models mainly focus on semantics of the language which are suitable for large vocabulary tasks where as structural methods focus on syntax which models small vocabulary tasks. A statistical language model based on Trigram for Tamil language with medium vocabulary of 5000 words has been built. Though statistical parsing gives better performance through tri-gram probabilities and large vocabulary size, it has some disadvantages like focus on semantics rather than syntax, lack of support in free ordering of words and long term relationship. To overcome the disadvantages a structural component is to be incorporated in statistical language models which leads to the implementation of hybrid language models. This paper has attempted to build phrase structured hybrid language model which resolves above mentioned disadvantages. In the development of hybrid language model, new part of speech tag set for Tamil language has been developed with more than 500 tags which have the wider coverage. A phrase structured Treebank has been developed with 326 Tamil sentences which covers more than 5000 words. A hybrid language model has been trained with the phrase structured Treebank using immediate head parsing technique. Lexicalized and statistical parser which employs this hybrid language model and immediate head parsing technique gives better results than pure grammar and trigram based model.Keywords: Hybrid Language Model, Immediate Head Parsing, Lexicalized and Statistical Parsing, Natural Language Processing, Parts of Speech, Probabilistic Context Free Grammar, Tamil Language, Tree Bank.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 36431463 An Empirical Analysis of HRM in Different Pharmaceutical Departments of Different Pharmaceutical Industries in Pakistan
Authors: Faisal Ali, Mansoor Shuakat, Lirong Cui, Helena Uhde, Rabia Riasat, Janeth J. Marwa
Abstract:
HR is a department that enhances the power of employee performance in regard with their services, and to make the organization strategic objectives. The main concern of HR department is to organize people, focus on policies and their system. The empirical study shows the relationship between HRM (Human Resource Management practices) and their Job Satisfaction. The Hypothesis is testing on a sample of overall 320 employees of 5 different Pharmaceutical departments of different organizations in Pakistan. The important thing as Relationship of Job satisfaction with HR Practices, Impact on Job Satisfaction with HR Practices, Participation of Staff of Different Departments, HR Practices effects the Job satisfaction, Recruitment or Hiring and Selection effects the Job satisfaction, Training and Development, Performance and Appraisals, Compensation affects the Job satisfaction , and Industrial Relationships affects the Job satisfaction. After finishing all data analysis, the conclusion is that lots of Job related activities raise the confidence of Job satisfaction of employees with their salary and other benefits.Keywords: HRM, HR practices, job satisfaction, TQM.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 18401462 The Effects of the Inference Process in Reading Texts in Arabic
Authors: May George
Abstract:
Inference plays an important role in the learning process and it can lead to a rapid acquisition of a second language. When learning a non-native language i.e., a critical language like Arabic, the students depend on the teacher’s support most of the time to learn new concepts. The students focus on memorizing the new vocabulary and stress on learning all the grammatical rules. Hence, the students became mechanical and cannot produce the language easily. As a result, they are unable to predicate the meaning of words in the context by relying heavily on the teacher, in that they cannot link their prior knowledge or even identify the meaning of the words without the support of the teacher. This study explores how the teacher guides students learning during the inference process and what are the processes of learning that can direct student’s inference.Keywords: Inference, Reading, Arabic, and Language Acquisition.
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