Language and literature departments are being asked to reflect more on the best way to maintain the intellectual integrity of their programs in view of departmental reforms imposed on them by budgetary restraints. Discusses the mediating role played by translation in this kind of situation. (Author/VWL)

Discusses the role of screen translation in minority language broadcasting. The article is a response to a roundtable discussion on minority language broadcasting and language maintenance. (Author/VWL)

Addresses the linguistic effects of an increased "Englishization" of Sweden. Focuses on English loanwords, the dominating role of English as a source language for translations, and losses of domains of usage to English. Reports results from an investigation of the use of Swedish within different European bodies. (Author/VWL)

The purpose of this study was to address the effectiveness of a Spanish-English dual-language test booklet in 8th-grade mathematics. This study used analyses of test data (n = 402) as well as information gathered through focus groups (n = 68) and cognitive interviews (n = 18) to assess the accuracy and utility of the dual-language format as a…

A test item exhibits differential item functioning (DIF) if students with the same ability find it differentially difficult. When the item is administered in French and English, differences in language difficulty and meaning are the most likely explanations. However, curriculum differences may also contribute to DIF. The responses of Ontario…

A Spanish version of the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MCSDS) was developed by applying a method derived from the cross-cultural and psychometric literature. The method included five sequenced studies: (a) translation and back-translation, (b) comprehension assessment, (c) psychometric equivalence study of two mixed-language versions,…

The goal of this study was to test the internal reliability of a Spanish translation of the CDI, (i.e., CDI-LA), a potentially useful screening instrument for Hispanic youngsters in their native language at a primary-care level. Self-reported symptoms of depression were assessed with the CDI-LA in a school sample of 205 Hispanic students. Girls…

This paper examines the choice to translate plays from "Hochdeutsch" (the standard form of the German language) into local dialect in German-speaking Switzerland. It first looks at the creative process of translating for the amateur stage and then at the reasons behind the choice to translate. It argues that this choice reflects a desire…

An error corpus of deviant SVO structure was collected from the translation projects of students majoring in translation. Syntactic, semantic, pragmatic and discoursal criteria were used to judge the deviations. Percentages of interlingual and intralingual errors, the syntactic contexts in which subjects were misplaced, the strategies used to…

Language teaching approaches and methods have cast light on the language teaching theory and practice. There are still many controversies about their usefulness and appropriateness. This paper tries to analyze their effectiveness and weakness of several most influential teaching approaches and methods: Grammar-translation Method, Direct Method,…

The study examines the impact of topic familiarity and passage sight vocabulary on lexical inferencing and retention. Independent variables include (a) a topic familiarity questionnaire, and (b) a passage sight vocabulary test. A repeated-measures design was used with a cross-sectional sample of 35 adult L2 learners of Spanish. Ss read narratives…

This study illustrates the regularity with which the children of mostly Mexican immigrants in Chicago interpret languages and cultural practices for their families. It also tests the hypothesis, generated from qualitative research, that such "language brokering" is related to academic outcomes. Using data collected from a subset of…

The following is a translation of the introduction to "Medabrim Chazon" (Jerusalem: Keter, 2006), the Hebrew translation of "Visions of Jewish Education," edited by Seymour Fox, Israel Scheffler, and Daniel Marom (Cambridge, 2003). "Visions of Jewish Education" is an effort by leading scholars to improve the quality…

The psychometric properties and factor structure of a Welsh translation of the school short form of the Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory (SEI-SSF), which is widely used as a measure of children's global self-esteem, was investigated among a sample of 681 pupils attending Welsh-medium primary schools in Wales. It has generally been assumed that…

This report shows a classification of differential item functioning (DIF) sources that have an effect on the adaptation of tests. This classification is based on linguistic and cultural criteria. Four general DIF sources are distinguished: cultural relevance, translation problems, morph syntactical differences, and semantic differences. The…