VII. Learner"s Diary Lecture № 1: Inroduction Lecture: Organization, Text Theory Applications, Literature

1-st Session: 17.10.2006

Summary of the session *-*

Quizzes *-*

GO TO THE NEXT LECTURE: Lecture 2 *-*

Summary of the lecture:

• This is the first lecture. It is about the technicalities about the class, the reguirements and the portfolios. It focuses on the Text Theory.

• Organization:

  • participants, methods and media, tutorial, web portfolio, creating a portfolio web site, several ways to make a web site;

• what is a website/a hypertext/a text; properties of a text;

• Text theory applications:

  • examples of texts and documents;

  • dictionaries;

  • why bother with text theory;

• Literature

Back to the beginning

Quizzes:

1-st quiz:

Why is portfolio important:

Portfolio provides feedback for the lecturer. It has two main functions: first, it may be used as assessment of learning outcomes (by teachers, by peers, by employers, self-assessment); second, it can serve as a basis for preparation for further learning stages or for tests and examinations. Besides, it is a form of applied linguistics.

What should a portfolio contain, and how are these components defined:

Generally speaking, a portfolio can contain different components depending on the designer"s purposes and aims. For example, a portfolio can contain the following elements: table of contents (for easier navigation through the portfolio), introduction (giving a brief summary of the contents), chronological organization course topics (goals, examples, exercises, reports, quizzes, homeworks, tests, results, exams), overview and evaluation, glossary (of technical terms), bibliography (of recommended and used literature and websites).

Why should the portfolio be on a website:

It is easier for the teacher, peers, etc. to see it, look through it and assess and evaluate it.

How do you make a website:

One can both run their own web server or use a university or another web service provider. A third option is to create a weblog (blog).

Back to the beginning

2-nd quiz:

What is a website:

A website is a hypertext document available for everybody with embedded document objects and linked document objects. Therefore, it is a kind of text.

What is a hypertext? Give examples:

It is any text in the web. A hypertext document is a text either with conventional hierarchical parts (a tree-like structure) or as a complex network of parts. This text consists of embedded list(s) of elements, words, spaces, characters. It is a text connected with other texts electronically. Examples of hypertext: any document on the World Wide Web (electronic dictionary, blog, e-commerce site, google, yahoo) or a help document for a computer application.

What is a text, what are its main properties:

Examples of texts: books (novels, fairytales, dictionaries, essays, etc.), periodicals (newspapers, scientific journals, etc.), the web. Texts consist of words, organized in paragraphs and comprising spaces and characters. A text has the following properties: appearance (media), meaning (semantics, pragmatics) and structure (formulation).

How do these properties relate 1. to the mind and 2. to the world:

1. The speakers/writers have the text structure (or the formulation) in their minds i.e. they know what they want to say, they have it in the world of mind. In the act of communication (speaking or writing) they deliver the meaning (sense) to the outer or shared world through some media with a certain appearance (style) i.e.we have relations of semantic interpretation and media interpretation. The listener/reader, on the other side, has to reconstruct the information in his/her world of mind. 2. In the shared world we have,on the one hand, the speaker/writer and, on the other hand, the listener/reader as well as relations of reception and production between the meaning and appearance. The listener/reader attempts to grasp and understand the meaning delivered by the speaker/writer by means of the media.

Back to the beginning

3-rd quiz:

What is a dictionary:

Dictionaries are texts, documents. Like all texts they possess the following three properties: structure, meaning, form. In respect of structure, dictionaries comprise four types of structure: meta-, meso-, macro- and microstructure; they have data and metadata (or data about the dictionary). The meaning or the content of a dictionary is words organised in different principles. A dictionary may have different appearances: it may either be a book or be in electronic form.

What is the difference between a semasiological dictionary and an onomasiological dictionary:

“Onomasiological” and “semasiological” relate to different kinds of dictionaries. A semasiological dictionary is an ordinary alphabetically ordered dictionary where words are given definition, phonetic transcriptions, POS information, examples. Its macrostructure is realized in a list of alphabetically ordered entries. Such kind of a dictionary is called also reader’s dictionary (because readers need it to find the definitions to the new unfamiliar words they encounter) or decoding dictionary (because readers decode the meaning of unknown words). Glossary is more like a semasiological dictionary. An onomasiological dictionary is typically the thesaurus. It supplies the synonyms and antonyms of a given world. There are no explanations of the worlds. It has tree structure. Onomasiological dictionary is called also writer’s dictionary (because it is very useful for people who write and need to find the correct word out of many synonyms or antonyms) or encoding dictionary (because the meaning is not given – it is presupposed to be known by the user of the dictionary; actually the user differentiates between words with slightly the same meaning and needs to choose the better one; he or she only needs to be reminded of the existing words which are difficult to be retrieved all at a time ).

Example of an entry in a semasiological dictionary:

eddy ["edi] n acircular movement of water, wind, dust, smoke, etc.: The little paper boat was caught in an eddy and spun round and round in the water.

Example of an entry in an onomasiological dictionary:

(312) Motion in a continued circle.

Rotation, revolution, gyration, roll, circumrotation, circumgyration, volutation, circination, pirouette, circumvolution, convolution, verticity, whirl, eddy, vortex, whirlpool, gurge, surge, a dizzy round.

What other kinds of dictionaries are there: see the homework for the next time. *-*

What is text theory:

Text theory is concerned with texts, their properties and the relations between these properties: the formulation and the structure of texts, semantics and meaning of texts, appearance of texts, reception and production of texts. The model of the text theory is a triangular and on each apex of it we have the structure, meaning and appearance.

What is text linguistics:

Text linguistics has to do with all about appearance, structure and meaning of texts (particularly with texts and not with grammar, words, sounds,etc.)

What is applied text linguistics:

Applied text linguistics is text linguistics or text theory applied virtually. For example: in text processors like MS-word or OpenOffice Writer, in translations of texts for software user interfaces, in Google and Yahoo, in other electronic media publishers and companies.

Back to the beginning

GO TO THE NEXT LECTURE: Lecture 2 *-*