Results in BLC Posts
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on March 9, 2010
How the Languages We Speak Shape the Ways We Think by Lera Boroditsky, Assistant Professor, Stanford University, Department of Psychology. How do the languages we speak shape the ways we think? Do speakers of different languages think differently? Does learning new languages change the way you think? Do bilinguals think differently when speaking different languages?…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on March 3, 2010
The Representation of Language in the Earliest Writing Systems by Jerrold Cooper, Professor Emeritus, The Johns Hopkins University, Department of Near Eastern Studies. Why and how did early civilizations develop graphic representations of language? Answers will be sought by examining so-called “pristine” writing systems that arose in the Middle East, China, and Mesoamerica. Although these…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on February 18, 2010
The week after giving his BLC lecture, Professor Andrew Cohen visited Claire Kramsch’s “Language and Power” class and provided the students with an overview of the field of applied linguistics – what it is, what it researches, and where one can study it. His accompanying slide show is attached. Downloads → Download the Applied Linguistics…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on February 5, 2010
Communicating Gramatically: Evaluating a Learner Strategies Website for Spanish Grammar by Andrew D. Cohen, Professor, Program in Second Language Studies, University of Minnesota, presented the first of the BLC’s Spring 2010 Lecture Series, “Communicating Gramatically: Evaluating a Learner Strategies Website for Spanish Grammar,” an introduction to the Spanish Grammar Strategies website. The site is part…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on December 1, 2009
The Fall 2009 issue of the BLC Newsletter includes BLC Fellows reports from Kristin Dickinson (PhD candidate, Department of Comparative Literature), Adam Mendelson (PhD candidate, Language, Literacy, and Culture, Graduate School of Education), and Junghee Park (Lecturer, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures). This issue also marks a design change to a new, smaller,…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on September 15, 2009
Prior research indicates that providing language learners with opportunities to interact with one another through online communication tools can promote positive outcomes such as increased motivation, diversified participation, and improved oral production (Lamy & Hampel, 2007). However, with the exception of Blake’s (2000) suggestion that jigsaw activities are especially effective for promoting negotiation of meaning…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on September 15, 2009
My BLC project was conceived largely as an extension of Jason Vivrette’s fall 2008 project for first-semester Turkish. Through a series of film clips that emphasized the multi-cultural nature of Turkish society, Jason encouraged students to reflect critically on both the concept of Turkishness as well as the experience of learning Turkish in an American…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on May 1, 2009
The Spring 2009 issue of the BLC Newsletter includes a conversation with founding BLC Director Claire Kramsch, Associate Director Mark Kaiser, and lecturer Sirpa Tuomainen, notes from BLC Director Richard Kern and Mark Kaiser, an autobiographical lecturer profile of Sirpa Tuomainen, and an introduction to Found in Translation by Usree Bhattacharya. BLC Fellows reports from…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on December 1, 2008
The Fall 2008 issue of the BLC Newsletter includes Andrew Garrett’s commencement address for the Languages and Literature Departments from May 19, 2008 as well as notes from BLC Director Richard Kern and Associate Director Mark Kaiser, and a follow-up report on the France-Berkeley Exchange by Désirée Pries (Lecturer, French). BLC Fellows reports from Amelia…
Posted by John Wuorenmaa on May 1, 2008
The Spring 2008 issue of the BLC Newsletter includes A Conversation with Elana Shohamy and Lisa Little, notes from BLC Director Richard Kern, Associate Director Mark Kaiser, A French Perspective on American Academic Culture by Nicolas Guichon (University of Lyon 2), Françoise Sorgen-Goldschmidt’s report on recent conferences When MERLOT is not a wine: Technology in…