Over the last two decades, question of to which linguistic cues learners pay attention when they decode a new language has been subject controversy in field third (L3) acquisition. In this article, we present an artificial learning experiment that investigated how lexical and syntactic similarities between L3 preexisting grammars impact crosslinguistic influence at very beginning acquisition pr...

This paper presents the design and implementation of a programming system that enables third-party developers to add spoken natural language (SNL) interfaces to mobile applications. Existing systems either restrict SNL capabilities to first-party applications or limit developer-defined spoken interactions to keyphrases rather than broad natural language. An examination of expert workflow reveal...

We present a simple tool that enables the computer to read subtitles of movies and TV shows aloud. The tool extracts information from subtitle files, which can be freely downloaded from the Internet, and reads the text aloud through a speech synthesizer. There are three versions of the tool, one for Windows and Linux, another for Mac OS X, and the third is a browser-based HTML5 prototype. The t...

As is well known, the study of L2 acquisition provides essential insights about the language learning process in general. Approaching language learning through the study of L1 acquisition alone yields an incomplete and potentially erroneous view of the language faculty. For example, L2 study critically informs such debates as the "maturation of linguistic principles" proposed for L1 learning. P...

When using a third language to construct a bilingual dictionary, it is necessary to discriminate equivalencies from inappropriate words derived as a result of ambiguity in the third language. We propose a method to treat this by utilizing the structures of dictionaries to measure the nearness of the meanings of words. The resulting dictionary is a word-to-word bilingual dictionary of nouns and ...

In addition to the inevitable hype, Microsoft’s .NET initiative has introduced several interesting technical features such as the move from APIs to namespaces and the integration of different programming languages. The .NET Framework will allow developers to use at least sixteen languages in addition to Microsoft’s mainstream VB and C# etc. Of particular interest to the writers is that Borland ...

It is well-known that interpretation of a text requires understanding of its rhetorical relation hierarchy since discourse units rarely exist in isolation. Such discourse structure is fundamental to document-level applications, such as text understanding, summarization, knowledge extraction and question-answering. In comparison with English, there are only a few studies on Chinese discourse ana...

Learning a new language involves substantial vocabulary acquisition. Learners can accelerate this process by relying on words with native-language overlap, such as cognates. For bilingual third language learners, it is necessary to determine how their two existing languages interact during novel language learning. A scaffolding account predicts transfer from either language for individual words...