This thesis examines the discursive strategies of Geert Wilders, who is a Dutch populist politician. I will review different definitions and suggested characteristics of populism and create an...Show moreThis thesis examines the discursive strategies of Geert Wilders, who is a Dutch populist politician. I will review different definitions and suggested characteristics of populism and create an overarching definition in order to understand what populism is. In this study, I performed a quantitative research to analyze Wilders’ discourse by focusing on important elements in populist speeches. More specifically, this study focuses on the use of references concerning ‘the people’, what elements influence discursive strategies and the focus on different etymologies in order to arrive at a better understanding of the ideas and rhetorical tactics of populist parties. This led to the conclusions that Wilders’ discursive strategies are affected by the topic of a speech, the audience and the date when the speech takes place. Furthermore, I conclude that the etymologies of references concerning ‘the people’ and ‘the opposition’ are of importance to Wilders because of his preference to use Germanic words to refer to ‘the people’ and loanwords to address ‘the opposition’.Show less
This study explores the impact of video gaming on the English vocabulary proficiency of Dutch teenagers from the ages of 11 to 16. Recent academic research argues that the beneficial impact of...Show moreThis study explores the impact of video gaming on the English vocabulary proficiency of Dutch teenagers from the ages of 11 to 16. Recent academic research argues that the beneficial impact of video games lies in the unintentional and natural acquirement of a second language, which is enabled by the element of interactivity in games (Plass & Jones, 2005). According to language acquisitional theory, language is most effectively acquired when the message is provided with context, as this enriches the apprehension of the subject (Krashen, 1989). Furthermore, intrinsic motivation to acquire a language is intertwined with the motivation to engage in play, which in turn leads to more linguistic confidence and eventually successful language acquisition (Melzi & Schick, 2012; Prince, 1996). This research contains a survey-based analysis on the linguistic impact of video games on Dutch teenagers. The survey was answered by 59 Dutch teenagers of the age group and consisted of a translation exercise and a sentence exercise. The answers of both exercises were analyzed on the basis of how often the participants engaged in the activity of video gaming. To avoid faulty analysis, the answers were also compared to the factor of age. The results of this study suggest that teenagers who game more frequently are linguistically more confidant as compared to the participants that did not game frequently and lack this confidence. More importantly, the results suggest that the frequent players are more proficient in English vocabulary than the non-players as they translated more words correctly. Besides this, the players with the highest frequency seemed to engage more often in English communication with other players. This all indicates that not only do video games have a beneficial impact on the vocabulary proficiency of Dutch teenagers, but they also contribute to the linguistic confidence and experience in English communication.Show less
Research in the field of miscommunication in aviation discourse tends to focus on causes of miscommunication. Especially, language proficiency, and phraseology use have been the focus of studies....Show moreResearch in the field of miscommunication in aviation discourse tends to focus on causes of miscommunication. Especially, language proficiency, and phraseology use have been the focus of studies. However, the relationship between these factors of miscommunication is something little is known about. This study, therefore, aimed to determine whether or not language proficiency of a speaker influences their patterns of phraseology use. 150 minutes of communications between air traffic controllers who were native speakers of English, and pilots that were either native or non-native speakers of English were collected, transcribed and coded. Results suggested that language proficiency influences patterns of non-standard phraseology use as well as the frequency of the use of accommodation strategies. It is suggested that the influence of language proficiency on patterns of phraseology use in aviation discourse be researched further so that communications between controller and pilot can be less problematic, and air travel can become safer.Show less
The suicide note is a piece of text that often evokes emotional reactions within the reader, as it contains elements that are heavily personal. These feelings can be so “complex or overpowering”...Show moreThe suicide note is a piece of text that often evokes emotional reactions within the reader, as it contains elements that are heavily personal. These feelings can be so “complex or overpowering” that they “may require reflection and interpretation” (Boden, Gibson, Owen, and Benson, 2016). Boden et al. examined that “researchers will engage in some form of reflexivity, but fewer will examine how their feelings influence their analysis” (p. 1081). Feelings as a component of research is just an example of why qualitative research on the suicide note is important and necessary, as current research on this subject has mostly been quantitative. For instance, current research has shown that linguistic analysis of suicide notes can lead to a broader understanding of the suicidal mind, as “suicidal individuals are more self-focused, express more negative emotion and sometimes use more death-related words” (Tausczik and Pennebaker, 2010). However, the question is whether mere quantitative research is expedient enough to broaden our understanding of suicide, as purely quantitative methods lead to generalised results, which is undesirable (Stack & Rockett, 2018). In my thesis, I will review the relevant literature on how the suicide note as a text type is researched and argue that qualitative components should be incorporated in quantitative research to broaden our understanding of suicide.Show less
Although rap has seen a lot of criticism for its aggressive content, vulgar language, and questionable icons, it has also gained praise for its poetic nature. The praise comes not only from its...Show moreAlthough rap has seen a lot of criticism for its aggressive content, vulgar language, and questionable icons, it has also gained praise for its poetic nature. The praise comes not only from its core audience, but also from scholars and literary connoisseurs. In recent years more and more research has been done in this field and this thesis also has rap lyrics as its main focus. The main themes in rap studies are birthed from and aimed at the negative aspects of rap lyrics, including; racism, sexism, and aggression. However, as one of the people who sees rap as an expression of creativity and wit, I will focus on a more positive end of the broad rap spectrum. Because I experience a lot of political subjects in recent popular rap songs, I decided I wanted to find out whether rap lyrics contain more political themes than other genres. This thesis will take a quantitative approach to the matter at hand by using a large rap lyrics corpus as its main focus. Through corpus linguistics methodology and with the help of corpus analysis software I aim to provide empirical evidence for the political content of rap lyrics. Using a broader lyrical genre to compare the rap genre to I will show that rap is not only assumed to be political because of its origin, but proved to be so.Show less
