This paper investigated discourse on the use of the English language in Dutch pop music. An important term in this research was societal treatment. Societal treatment studies deal with the explicit...Show moreThis paper investigated discourse on the use of the English language in Dutch pop music. An important term in this research was societal treatment. Societal treatment studies deal with the explicit manifestations of beliefs, feelings and behavioural intents present in a wide range of communications (Santello 2015). The questions which were researched in this thesis were: What are the language attitudes of the people of the Netherlands towards Dutch and towards English in pop music? Do they have a language preference? Three methods were used to look at the societal treatment of English and Dutch in pop music: content analysis, indirect measurement, and direct measurement (Van Meurs 2010). In the content analysis, Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC) was gathered about the use of Dutch and English in pop music from different forums. All this data was categorized into twenty-three different categories. The indirect measurement consists of a questionnaire which focused on the four tendencies which were found in the content analysis. These four tendencies were the connection to the song, the understanding of the song, the thoughts on the lyrics, and the enjoyment of the song. The goal of this questionnaire was to define if there were differences in the treatment of Dutch and English in these tendencies by letting people evaluate different video clips. In all the video clips Dutch artists were present but half of the video clips were sung in Dutch and the other half was sung in English. The direct measurement was the creation of two discussions online which focused on upcoming new Dutch music genres and the language attitudes of the Dutch towards the Dutch language. Overall, the results show that most of the Dutch have a negative language attitude towards their first language and have a language preference for English in pop music.Show less
English has become increasingly more important in the field of academics due to the rapid development of global internationalisation. In the Netherlands, English has become the primary medium of...Show moreEnglish has become increasingly more important in the field of academics due to the rapid development of global internationalisation. In the Netherlands, English has become the primary medium of instruction in many postgraduate courses. This study was conducted to investigate the use of spoken Dutch within two postgraduate courses with English as primary medium of instruction (EMI classrooms). It’s aim was provide an insight into the situation and aid in understanding the co-existence of Dutch and English. This research investigated three questions: 1) Is Dutch used in the EMI classroom? 2)What is the function of the use of Dutch and 3) How is the use of language perceived by the students? For this project, data were collected through the observation of lectures and interviews with students. The findings showed that Dutch was used by both lecturers and students, in many different situations (for example, mostly outside of the lecturers and in breaks) and served many different functions (for example as an unofficial medium of instruction, or to appeal for assistance when knowledge was lacked in English) This means that even though English is the primary medium of instruction, this does not mean that is not the only language that is being used. The language situation has become similar to a diglossic situation, in which Dutch and English rather comfortably co-exist.Show less
