Words contain multitudes. This multiplicity of meanings raises two key questions, both of which this thesis attempts to address. First, are word meanings categorical or continuous? The results of Chapters 2-4 support a hybrid model, in which word meanings occupy a continuous state-space (Elman, 2009), which is further discretized along the…

In linguistics, onomastics is the science that studies the history and origin of toponyms, along with their structural aspects. This study aimed to determine the origin of toponyms by comparing their linguistic and ethnocultural, as well as mythical, information. A qualitative research design guided this study. A few toponyms were identified…

A literary dictionary assignment provides honors students with an understanding of the ways knowledge shifts and changes over time as well as an opportunity to create knowledge rather than just recall correct answers.

The purpose of this research is to explore three English synonyms, namely critical, serious, and crucial, with a particular focus on meanings, degrees of formality, collocations, and semantic preferences. Two dictionaries, namely the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary and the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary online, as well as the Corpus…

Student feedback is crucial for evaluating the performance of teachers and the quality of teaching. Free-form text comments obtained from open-ended questions are seldom analyzed comprehensively since it is difficult to interpret and score compared to standardized rating scales. To solve this problem, the present study employed aspect-level…

The interpretation of numerals has been traditionally debated across disciplines including, but not limited to, Linguistics, Developmental Psychology, and Philosophy. A big portion of the debate concentrates on the ontology of numerals, i.e., their basic meaning, and the mechanisms by which (non) exact interpretations (e.g., at least) are derived.…

Proverbs are maxims that reflect the values, beliefs, and cultural heritage of a society. This study attempted to conduct ethnocultural analysis of two concepts, marriage and family, in the Chinese Paremiology. The topics of 'marriage' and 'family' are extensively covered in Chinese proverbs; hence this study aimed to find out how Chinese proverbs…

Through consultations with the online version of the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (LDOCE) and the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), this study focuses on distinguishing between the two synonymous verbs "restrict" and "constrain," both part of Coxhead's (2000) Academic Word List, in terms of formality…

Previous studies report that exposure to the Maori language on a regular basis allows New Zealand adults who cannot speak Maori to build a proto-lexicon of Maori -- an implicit memory of word forms without detailed knowledge of meaning. How might this knowledge feed into explicit language learning? Is it possible to "awaken" the…

This study aims to investigate the distribution across genres and the collocation of three synonymous verbs "cease," "halt," and "stop." Data were drawn from the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA). The results from the distribution across genres shed light on the degree of formality of each verb. The verb…

A significant distinguishing characteristic of the International Classroom Lexicon Project was the documentation of classroom pedagogical practices of mathematics teachers in the original languages of ten communities. These lexicons provide us with an opportunity to compare identified teacher practices within these communities. In this paper, we…

The web is the largest world-wide communication system of computers. The web has local, academic, commercial and government sites. As the types of websites increases in numbers, the cost and accuracy of manual classification became cumbersome and cannot satisfy the increasing internet service demands, thereby automated classification became…

In response to tumultuous gender relations in South Korea, many feminist and anti-feminist communities have increased their online presence since the 2010s. At the extreme end of this spectrum is the radical cyberfeminist community Womad. In this paper, we examine Womad's online dictionary, which prescribes specific language to be used on their…

This study aimed to develop a web-based Pedagogia Dictionary application, which is a special dictionary in the field of education and learning. This research was conducted using the D & D (Design and Development) approach or development research that produces a product. This study adopted the stages of the Ellis & Levy (2010) development…

The era of globalization and information and knowledge in which we find ourselves requires Higher Education to develop English-speaking proficiency in its students to adequately respond to academic and occupational challenges, taking advantage of the virtues of the variety of resources offered by technology. YouGlish is an online oral dictionary…