Secondary schools in the Netherlands have been offering Chinese Language and Culture as an official exam subject for three years now. Studies on Dutch students SLA of Mandarin are very limited in...Show moreSecondary schools in the Netherlands have been offering Chinese Language and Culture as an official exam subject for three years now. Studies on Dutch students SLA of Mandarin are very limited in number, and established literature often studies participants in their twenties with English as their L1. This study aims to look at improvement shown in tonal production by Dutch teenagers aged 13-17 who follow the relatively new Mandarin course in secondary school, to provide deeper insight into SLA of Mandarin by Dutch teenagers, and into the effectiveness of the course. There were two groups of participants: students with four months of experience in Mandarin, and students from the same school with three and a half years of experience. They were asked to produce a selection of both monosyllabic and disyllabic words. Their tones were visualized using Praat, and compared to both the tonal production of native speakers to identify errors. The production of the two different grades was then compared to one another to identify points of improvement. The results showed that female students showed improvement mainly in pitch contour, and to some extent even acquired tonal coarticulation. The male students showed improvement in pitch height, and very little improvement in pitch contour. For both genders the production of tone 3 appeared most difficult, followed by tone 4, then tone 2. Tone 1 was the easiest to produce.Show less
The Batavian society consisted of people of different nations. It was a society that started from scratch with the building and populating of Batavia in 1619. The process of people arriving in the...Show moreThe Batavian society consisted of people of different nations. It was a society that started from scratch with the building and populating of Batavia in 1619. The process of people arriving in the city and creating a living for themselves made visible the underlying organization: the formation of groups, leadership and the establishing of power. I relate and refer to texts on the topics of racialism, social biology, cultural communication and awareness, and colonial culture that allow insights in the Batavian situation.Show less