Last updated by kprzemek on 2017-02-19. Originally submitted by grzegorz on 2017-01-31.
List of 1MA theme seminars sorted by teacher's surname
(T = WA timetable code; U = USOS/ECTS code)
(Note to Students: The seminars listed on this page are grouped into time slots in the WA timetable, numbered with Roman numerals as indicated. All the "1MA_I" classes run at the same time, so do all the "1MA_II" seminars etc. Please take this logic into account when electing your courses in USOS.)
dr Anna Basińska (T: 1MA_I -4) (U: 15-SEMT4-11)
prof. UAM dr hab. Małgorzata Fabiszak (T: 1MA_II -2) (U: 15-SEMT6-11)
prof. UAM dr hab. Piotr Gąsiorowski (T: 1MA_I -2) (U: 15-SEMT2-11)
prof. UAM dr hab. Paweł Scheffler (T: 1MA_I -1) (U: 15-SEMT1-11)
prof. zw. dr hab. Przemysław Tajsner (T: 1MA_II -4) (U: 15-SEMT8-11)
prof. UAM dr hab. Elżbieta Wąsik (T: 1MA_II -3) (U: 15-SEMT7-11)
prof. UAM dr hab. Bogusława Whyatt (T: 1MA_II -1) (U: 15-SEMT5-11)
prof. zw. dr hab. Jacek Witkoś (T: 1MA_I -3) (U: 15-SEMT3-11)
Educational technology for effective teaching and learning
(15-SEMT4-11)
dr Anna Basińska
The objective of this theme seminar is to learn about technology that can make teaching and learning more effective as well as to broaden the knowledge and skills in planning lessons with the use of EdTech resources.
Students will learn about:
- on-line technology
- educational apps
- using interactive board
- making recordings, videos,
- making animated presentations
- using social media in education
- using learning platforms with pupils
For a successful completion of the course, students are required to actively participate in all activities, read the assigned materials as well as prepare and present a lesson plan that includes elements of teaching/learning through technology.
All teaching specialization students who are interested in technology in education are welcome to the seminar. Your own laptop will be required.
Bibliography:
Clark R.C., Mayer R.E. (2008), E-learning and the Science of Instruction, Pfeiffer.
How people learn. Brain, Mind, Experience, and School (2004), [ed.] Bransford J.D., Brown A.L., Cocking R.R., National Academy Press, Washington DC.
Kalantzis M., Cope B., New Learning. Elements of a Science of Education, book DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139248532
Prensky M. (2001), Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, On the Horizon, MCB University Press, Vol. 9 No. 5, October.
Did you know that theoretical concepts and analytic tools developed for the study of language can also be used for the analysis of other semiotic systems? The notion of construction, for example, can explain how an intransitive verb can become transitive in certain uses or how an internet meme with Good Greg frames meaning making in specific ways. Another such linguistic theory that may be applied to word formation, conditionals, poetry and advertising posters is Conceptual Integration Theory. In this seminar we will first learn how it sees the conceptual processes involved in meaning making in different modalities, e.g. verbal and visual, and then apply the tools of analysis it offers to small projects of our own. During the course the student will develop their critical reading skills and will learn through small-scale team projects. Credit requirements include: reading the assigned material, active participation in in-class activities/discussions, submission of short reports on Moodle on time, presentation of the team project.
The purpose of this theme seminar is to make the students aware of the role that variability plays in linguistics. Phonetic, morphosyntactic and lexical variants (among others) arise all the time in speech communities and may acquire sociolinguistic significance or be co-opted for communicative functions. They may also remain functionally ‘neutral’, while increasing the level of language-internal diversity. In either case, however, they drive language change and account for the development of novel structures, as well as new language varieties. The study of variation thus leads to a unified view of sociolinguistics, dialectology, and diachronic processes.
No special prerequisites are expected of the students beyond general familiarity with descriptive linguistics, and an interest in understanding language change and diversity. Instead of a fixed reading list, the participants will be invited to read and discuss a selection of textbook chapters and articles representing the “variationist paradigm”. Some knowledge of the history of English and its contemporary varieties may be helpful, since most of the case studies to be discussed in class will be concerned with English. Final credits will depend on the students’ activity and the quality of assigned research tasks.
In this theme seminar, we will investigate quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods approaches for designing research in foreign language learning and teaching. We will discuss the process of reviewing the relevant literature, considerations involved in writing an introduction to a proposal, characteristics of a purpose statement and of hypotheses. We will analyse specific examples from the field of foreign learning and teaching and students will produce their own texts based on the examples. Credits will be given on the basis of two written assignments.
The seminar will be devoted to a discussion of a range of topics concerning the place and role of grammar and language in human brain and cognition. One of such issues is whether language shares any features with other cognitive domains or is rather unique and autonomic in its underpinnings and tenets. Another question is what we can learn about the organization of grammar from neuroscience, in particular from the investigation of the brain with the use of fMRI. Specifically, there is a touchy question of how grammar could be linked with the gray matter of the brain. Further problems are how neurolinguistics and theoretical linguistics are interrelated and how the insights from the former can be implemented for the selection of grammatical models. Still another issue is how grammar interrelates with sentence parsing and production. The way to look at these matters will be from a theoretical perspective known as biolinguistics, which stems from generative tradition and highlights the role of biology and genetics in shaping the human language faculty.
There are no special prerequisites for the course, and it is recommended to anyone interested in linguistics, neurolinguistics, psycholinguistics, , theoretical syntax and the like, though the course will not include formal syntactic analysis as such. During the course, the talks in class will be inspired by selected readings, and the final assessment will be based on the quality of presentations in class, activity and the end-term achievement test.
Selected bibliography
Berwick, R.C. & Chomsky, N. 2013. “The Biolinguistic Program: The Current State of its Evolution and Development”. Biolinguistic Investigations, Di Sciullo & Aguero (eds.), MIT Press.
Boeckx, C. 2010. Language in Cognition. Uncovering Mental Structures and the Rules Behind Them. Malden, MA.Wiley-Blackwell.
Boeckx, C. Martinez-Alvarez, A. & E. Leivada. 2016. “The functional neuroanatomy of serial order in language”. Journal of Neurolinguistics 32, 1-15.
Bornkessel-Schlesewsky, I. & M. Schlesewsky 2009. Processing syntax and morphology: A neurocognitive perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Chomsky, N. 2008. “Of minds and language”. Biolinguistics 1.1 9-27.
Chomsky 2011. “Language and Other Cognitive Systems. What Is Special About Language?” Language Learning and Development, 7: 263–278.
Embick, D. & Poeppel, D. 2015. “Towards a computational(ist) neurobiology of language: correlational, integrated and explanatory neurolinguistics.” Language, Cognition and Neroscience. 30.4. 357-366.
Moro, A. 2008. The boundaries of Babel. The brain and the enigma of impossible languages. Cambridge: CUP.
Jackendoff, R. 2002. Foundations of Language. Brain, Meaning, Grammar, Evolution. Oxford University Press.
Poeppel, D., & Embick, D. 2005. “Defining the relation between linguistics and neuroscience”. In A. Cutler (ed.), Twenty-first century psycholinguistics: Four cornerstones (pp. 103–120). Hillside, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Santi A.& Grodzinsky J. 2012. “Broca’s area and sentence comprehension: A relationship parasitic on dependency, displacement or predictability?” Neuropsychologia 50 (2012) 821– 832.
Identity, culture and ethnicity in the context of language policy and language planning
(15-SEMT7-11)
prof. UAM dr hab. Elżbieta Wąsik
The course is meant for those students who are interested in selected aspects of language acquisition and language use by communicating individuals and groups with reference to both governmental regulations and natural tendencies in the processes of language evolution. In particular, it will expose the issues of personal self-identification of human individuals, such as the sense of their belonging to social groups of various kind, for example, national, ethnic, cultural, racial, etc. Accordingly, special attention will be paid to situations of individual polyglotism and societal multilingualism, which take various forms and find expression in the communicative behavior of humans as originators of interpersonal relations and social agents.
During our pro-seminars, we will address the following specific topics, as, inter alia, language policy and language planning as disciplines of applied linguistics, a functional typology of languages and language varieties in time and space, bridges and interfaces between contact linguistics and language planning, optimality of language use in support of the development of national states, critical discourse analysis of the research on language policy, the impact of postmodern thought on the theories of national and international language planning, language attitudes, stereotypes and prejudices in language contact situations, linguistic human rights, varieties of English and their social status in the countries under the influence of Anglo-Saxon civilization, the role of English as an international and global language, national languages in Europe (on the basis of selected examples), protection of ethnic and national minorities and their languages (on the basis of selected countries in Europe), language policy and language planning in selected states and regions of the world.
To receive credits, students should take active part in seminars. They are obliged to write short responses after each class and present them for group discussions. Moreover, they are expected to select and to submit individually or in groups a presentation of one or two positions related to the topic of the seminar.
Selected bibliography
Anderson, Benedict 1983/1991. Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Revised Edition, London, New York: Verso.
Cooper, Robert L 1989. Language Planning and Social Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Coulmas, Florian ed. 1991. A Language Policy for the European Community: Prospects and Quandaries. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Downes, William. 1984/1998. Language and Society. London, EN: Fontana Paperbacks/Second edition. Cambridge, EN, New York, NY, and Melbourne, VIC: Cambridge University Press.
Hornberger, Nancy H. 1998. “Language policy, language education, language rights: Indigenous, immigrant, and international perspectives”. Language in Society 27: 439-458.
Lock, Andrew, Charles R. Peters eds. 1996/1999. Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution. Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, New York, NY: Oxford University Press / Oxford, UK, and Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers.
Ricento, Thomas ed. 2006. An Introduction to Language Policy and Language Planning. Theory and Method. Malden MA, Oxford, Carlton: Blackwell Publishing.
Spolsky, Bernard 2004. Language Policy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Wodak Ruth, David Corson eds. 1997. Language Policy and Political Issues in Education. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic Press.
Wright, Sue 2000. Community and Communication: The Role of Language in Nation State Building and European Integration. Clevedon [etc.]: Multilingual Matters LTD.
Wright, Sue 2004. Language Policy and Language Planning. From Nationalism to Globalisation. Houndmills, New York: Palgrave.
In this theme seminar we will look at the range of professional translation services which have grown to include much more than traditional text translation. With the development of mass media, the emergence of global markets, increased migration and information technology, the need for international exchange has placed new demands on modern translators. New kinds of translation include localization, transediting, transcreation and post-editing a machine generated translation but also audiovisual translation to improve media accessibility (audio description, respeaking, subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing). Different kinds of translation create different challenges for translators. The traditional tasks including text translation and interpreting as well as the new practices have been investigated and described by Translation Studies but are also of interest to such disciplines as psycholinguistics and cognitive psychology. Investigating how translators process language to produce its translated version requires a multidisciplinary approach. During this seminar we will analyze selected types of professional translation practice and examine the range of methodologies which can be used to study translation. We will also reflect on how Translation Studies can contribute to our understanding of language in the context of intercultural communication.
Credit requirements: Active participation in class discussions following homework assignment including reading of the selected texts or research using on-line information sources. Preparing one in-class reading report and one presentation (either in pairs or individually) of a selected kind of translation and related research questions.
Selected bibliography:
Horváth, Ildikó (ed.). 2016. The Modern Translator and Interpreter. Budapest: Eötvös University Press.
Pym, Anthony. 2013. “Translation Skill-Sets in a Machine-Translation Age”. Meta LVIII (3), 487-503.
Schäffner, Christina. 2012. “Rethinking Transediting”. Meta: Translators' Journal, 57 (4), 866-883.
Whyatt, Bogusława. 2012. Translation as a human skill. From predisposition to expertise. Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UAM.
This course focuses on recent developments in the field of comparative linguistic studies concerning the relationship between structure and meaning in different languages and constitutes a par excellence scholarly enterprise. In the focal point of our interest lies a set of comparative studies on similarities and differences between English and Polish phrase and sentence composition. The course is structured in the following manner; the initial three sessions are devoted to a general introduction to the minimalist framework, whereas other sessions are devoted to such widely discussed areas of comparative English/Polish studies as: anaphoric relations and reconstruction, interrogative constructions, infinitive constructions, nominal phrases of different types, including Numeral Noun Constructions (NNCs) and word order permutations (‘free’ word order phenomena). Previous exposure to generative grammar is a welcome, though not a critical condition for participation. Seminar participants will be given patient and careful instruction, as well as concise reading assignments.
Credit requirements include regular class attendance and a final test.
