http://hdl.handle.net/1903/2254 Fri, 24 May 2013 11:21:33 GMT 2013-05-24T11:21:33Z http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13850 Title: Pre-task planning time and working memory as predictors of accuracy, fluency, and complexity Authors: Nielson, Katharine Brown Abstract: Working memory, which accounts for the ability to process information in the face of interference, is critical to second language acquisition (SLA) and use. The interaction of working memory capacity (WMC) with specific pedagogical interventions is a logical place for empirical SLA research, both to examine the cognitive processes underpinning second language performance and to identify instructional treatments that may differentiate learners based on their WMC. A good candidate for such an examination is planning time, a pedagogical intervention that has been the subject of extensive empirical research, which has, thus far, been largely unrelated to WMC. The study undertaken here considers WMC along with two different types of pre-task planning time (guided and unguided) as predictors of the accuracy, fluency, and complexity of learners' discourse. Ninety-two intermediate ESL students from seven classes at a community college participated in this study by completing two different working memory span tasks as well as two different "there-and-then" oral story-telling tasks. The treatment condition of the story-telling tasks was manipulated so that learners' performance could be considered in terms of provision of pre-task planning (± planning), type of planning (guided vs. unguided), and order of planning (planning first or planning second). The results demonstrate that the relationship among type of planning time, order of planning time, and WMC is complex. Task order had a clear effect on learners' production, regardless of the provision of planning time. When learners began the series of story-telling tasks under the + planning condition, their output on the subsequent, unplanned task varied according to whether they had first received guided or unguided planning time. In addition, guided planning time and unguided planning time also have very different effects on learners' production, with guided planning time promoting a focus on accuracy at the expense of complexity and unguided planning time fostering fluency. Finally, this study indicates that task conditions can affect learners with high and low WMC in different ways. Learners with high WMC are more likely to comply with complex story-telling instructions, improving their focus on grammatical form at the expense of fluency, whereas learners with low WMC are more likely to improve their fluency as a result of task repetition, regardless of the task conditions. Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13850 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13833 Title: Valiente clase media. Literatura, dinero y bienes en América Latina. Authors: Enrigue, Alvaro Abstract: This dissertation follows the thread of commerse, class and money from a transatlantic perspective between the 17th and 18th centuries, in order to reread, under this particular focus, the transition between 19th century Modernismo and its decline at the rise of the novel of the Mexican Revolution in the early 20th century. There is a tight correlation between the construction of a Latin American literary social imaginary and the mythologies of wealth and spending. The Mexican baroque poet Juana Inés de la Cruz represents erotic relationships using the language of banking; the Jesuit historians of the Latin American 18th century, as well as the next generation of founding fathers of the region, seeded the idea of dismantling the Spanish Empire in the necessity of commercial freedom and proper exploitation of the land's wealth. In times of the early Latin American Republics, authors as distant from each other as Manuel Antonio Carreño -a 19th Century Venezuelan who wrote the essential Latin American Manual of Good Manners- or the Mexican poet Manuel Gutiérrez Nájera, dedicated their works to illustrating the ways of the new, proud middle classes. Rubén Darío, the Nicaraguan modernist, represented himself in one of his most honest autobiographical poems as a debauched member of that same middle class -a topic that later recurs in the novels about the Mexican Revolution that are set in Mexico City. They all talk about money and class in search of a definition of their peculiarity as Latin Americans; they all show their administrative skills -or their lack of them- as an essential tool for constructing the written page, and with it, the future of their nations. These texts, when read together as a historically coherent "secondary corpus," produce a clear idea of the configuration of the Latin American literary taste as phenomenon deeply rooted in a commercial impulse, and the discourses they developed ultimately produced an "aesthetics of aspiration": the peculiar literary taste which pivoted the poetic explosion of Latin American Modernismo. Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13833 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13800 Title: Proyecto Web Brasil Papeles sueltos. Textualidades digitales y traducción Authors: Tomasini, Silvina Julia Abstract: Since the creation of writing, literature has been circulating in different formats, such as the scroll and codex. Nowadays, digital textualities are changing the way we read and write, and also the way texts circulate in the writing culture. For Brazilian contemporary literature, the use of Internet has become almost central for the circulation and divulgation of this vigorous and heterogeneous production. My Web project, Brasil papeles sueltos, aims to divulgate Brazilian literature in translation into Spanish in order to allow Spanish-speakers to have access to this production. The page presents literary translations and contemporary debates on literature. As digital text allows us to experiment with different ways of creating texts -using its inner characteristics, such as hyperlinks- these new textualities are a potential tool to experiment and consider new ideas about translation. Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13800 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13587 Title: Art as Archive in Archives du nord Authors: Phair, Elise Abstract: Archives du nord est l'histoire d'une humanité où la présence de l'auteur est évidente non dans la forme traditionnelle d'un personnage, mais dans les opinions et l'imagination insérées dans ses réflexions sur l'art et son analyse de l'art comme témoignage de l'Histoire et de la pensée humaine. Ce mémoire explore le discours sur l'art dans Archives du nord et montre en quoi il est un témoignage historique selon Yourcenar, ses perspectives sur l'Histoire de la pensée, et comment art reflet sa propre identité, liée aux cultures française, flamande, et européenne en général. Ces réflexions sont fondées sur des peintures, des sculptures, et dans quelques cas, des photographies. Yourcenar donne à l'art une place importante dans les archives qui forment la base de son oeuvre, car les tableaux et les portraits sont des témoignages visuels de l'identité individuelle et universelle, propre à ses personnages et générale à tout le monde à la fois. Archives du nord is a story of humanity where the author's presence is felt through the opinions and use of imagination included in her reflexions on art and her analysis of art as a testimony of human thought, rather than in the form of a traditional character. This thesis explores the discours on art in Archives du nord and reveals how Yourcenar considers it historical evidence, her perspectives on human thought, and how art reflects her own identity as it is linked to French, Flemish, and European culture in general. These reflexions are based on paintings, sculpture, and in some cases, photographs. Yourcenar gives art an important position among the archives that provide the basis of her work, for paintings and portraits are visual testimonies to both individual and universal identity, relating to her characters and to humanity in general. Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13587 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z