Information provided by examination of the skills that underlie holistic scores can be used not only as supporting evidence for the validity of inferences associated with performance tests but also as a way to improve the scoring rubrics, descriptors, and benchmarks associated with scoring scales. As fluency is considered a critical, perhaps foundational, component of speaking proficiency, temporal measures of fluency are expected to be strongly related to holistic ratings of speech quality.This study examines the relationships among selected temporal measures of fluency and holistic scores on a semi-direct measure of oral English proficiency. The spoken responses of 150 respondents to one item on the Oral English Proficiency Test (OEPT) were analyzed for selected temporal measures of fluency. The examinees represented three first language backgrounds (Chinese, Hindi, and English) and the range of scores on the OEPT scale. While strong and moderate correlations between OEPT scores and speech rate, speech time ratio, mean length of run, and the number and length of silent pauses were found, fluency variables alone did not distinguish adjacent levels of the OEPT scale. Temporal measures of fluency may reasonably be selected for the development of automated scoring systems for speech; however, identification of an examinee’s level remains dependent on aspects of performance only partially represented by fluency measures.
THIS STUDY investigates the extent to which English is used in shop signs and windows as part of the names of businesses and other premises, and of notes, advertisements, and slogans in the city of Veles, in Macedonia: a country in south-eastern Europe established in 1991, after the disintegration of Communist Yugoslavia. It is situated in the southern part of the Balkan Peninsula, and borders on Serbia, Albania, Greece, and Bulgaria. Macedonian, a Slavonic language, is its official tongue: the native language of around 66.5% of the population, while Albanian is native to approximately 22.9%. Other languages used in Macedonia are Turkish, Serbian, Romani, and Rumanian.
Code-switching to English in non-English commercials has become a popular practice because it is associated with power, prestige, and modernism. For that reason, the purpose of the present study is to investigate the creativity of English use in Macedonian TV advertising as a site for active linguistic contact. Based on four commercials, the study explores how the narrative, musical, and visual aspects of TV commercials enhance the imaginative function of English in the Macedonian advertizing context. Findings suggest that commercials' intermediality allows for parallel and complementary usage of Macedonian and English to complete the message of the commercial. In some cases, Macedonian narration disambiguates the English name of the product, and in other, English song lyrics support the visual representation of the local context. Furthermore, English borrowing is also inter-generic, which means the choice of English is due to its identification with the genre to which the advertisement refers. Finally, English is not simply inserted into commercials to attract attention or address international consumers. Instead, it becomes a resource for lexical and semantic creativity and a tool for molding products' and consumers' identities. In the process of this identity development, English itself is changed to reflect local characteristics.
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