Valentin Werner

The present perfect in Nigerian English

This article offers an analysis of present perfect (PP) use in Nigerian English (NigE), based on the Nigerian component of the International Corpus of English (ICE). First, we analyze variable contexts with the Simple Past (PT; determined by temporally specified contexts) as one of the main competitors of the PP, and thus assess the PP-friendliness of NigE in contrast to other varieties. We further provide an alternative measure of PP-friendliness and test register effects in terms of normalized and relative PP and PT frequencies. Our results indicate an overall reduced PP-friendliness of NigE and show internal variability in terms of PP frequencies in different variable contexts. As regards register effects, NigE does not show less variability of PP frequencies compared to British English (BrE). However, the distribution of the PP across registers in NigE does not follow the British pattern where certain registers are particularly PP-friendly. We discuss potential determining factors of the low frequency of the PP in NigE, and conclude that neither substrate influence nor general learning mechanisms on their own can comprehensively account for it. Instead, we suggest that historical influence from Irish and perhaps (at a later point) American English, in conjunction with general learning mechanisms, may be responsible.

Re-assessing the Present Perfect

The development of the have-perfect is often given as a prime example of a grammaticalization path. The generally accepted account of the development of the English [have + past participle] construction is that it changed from a possessive-resultative construction into a temporal-aspectual construction with perfect-anterior meaning at some time in the Old English period. This study seeks to test the hypothesis that a semantic shift from resultative to perfect-anterior meaning can be observed in early English data. It is based on corpus data from the York-Toronto-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Old English Prose. All instances of [hæbb+ past participle] are categorized according to their meaning, and implications for possible source structures of the have-perfect are discussed. Finally, a look on Present-Day English helps to sound a note of caution on drawing conclusions from singular examples.

Pop Lyrics and Mobile Language Learning: Prospects and Challenges

Pop lyrics represent a rich, but underused resource in language teaching in both institutional and informal contexts. This is striking in view of analyses from the fields of motivational and cognitive psychology, didactics as well as linguistics, which all provide evidence for the inherent potential of pop lyrics. This paper will first take a closer look at arguments in favor of exploiting pop lyrics for learning purposes. Next, it will outline gateway steps and potential difficulties on the way toward using lyrics in a video/lyrics app tailored to the requirements of an informal, gamified and learner-centered setting. In conclusion, the authors suggest that pop lyrics can be used effectively to establish a connection to the world of the learner both within and beyond the language classroom. However, there remain a number of technical and methodological challenges that have to be overcome to create a fully adaptable and flexible framework for using lyrics in mobile-assisted language learning.