Development dyslexia (DD) is a common language disorder, that significantly affects children. Despite having ordinary intelligence, dyslexic people struggle with reading, writing, and comprehension in their native tongue. It is still unclear whether dyslexic kids have difficulties with visuo-spatial working memory. Using meta-analysis, this gap…

This article examines multilingual language use in two groups of children, one group at a state school, and one at a private IB school. The IB school has earlier been assumed to reflect an 'elite' multilingualism. Three research questions are posed: to what extent is the children's language use multilingual, what are their typological profiles,…

While much of the existing literature on code-switching focuses on languages that differ typologically, this dissertation focuses on typologically similar languages. Code-switching between Mandarin and Taiwanese is examined through the perspectives of 1) sociolinguistics, 2) typology, 3) phonetic and phonological production, and 4) speech…

Many papers on international student mobility have analysed different macro factors influencing the decision making of international students. However, only a limited number of studies have considered the role of language distance on international educational choices. This paper aims to fill that gap by identifying the role of language proximity…

Development dyslexia (DD) is a common language disorder, which significantly affects children. Despite having ordinary intelligence, dyslexic people struggle with reading, writing, and comprehension in their native tongue. It is still unclear whether dyslexic kids have difficulties with visuo-spatial working memory. Using meta-analysis, this gap…

The first stage of combinatorial speech is better described as variable than uniform. Talk of variants obscures two different aspects of language (knowledge and use) and two different aspects of language development -- acquisition of the grammar (competence) and deployment of the grammar in speaking and listening (performance). Null subjects and…

The comparison of different languages in terms of specific mathematical ideas can provide insights into the nature of mathematics and into the learning and teaching of mathematics in both languages. This paper uses a typological perspective to contrast the language of comparison of isiXhosa and English, specifically when comparing countable…

This paper seeks to outline and describe the features of Ewe causative verbs and how they encode causative events. It explores the sub-lexical analysis of verbs' meanings since they form the basis of the classification of causal relations that allow us to explore the different imports between (sub-)events and how these events are structured, and…

Due to the typological differences between Korean's aspect system and English's aspect system in terms of progressive construction "-ko iss," learners can no doubt have difficulty acquiring and using the "-ko iss" construction in learner Korean. This dissertation investigates two main points: (i) how is the "-ko iss"…

Suriname represents an interesting case of unidirectional multilingual convergence in a linguistic area. The multilingual ecology of Suriname is hierarchical. The Germanic language Dutch exerts structural and lexical influence 'downwards', but other languages do not do so 'upwards' to the same degree. This study analyses the development of word…

It is often assumed that all languages are fundamentally the same. This assumption has been challenged by research in linguistic typology and language evolution, but questions of language learning and use have largely been left aside. Here we review recent work on Danish that provides new insights into these questions. Unlike closely related…

The "language pyramid" in the post-colonial territories as propounded by Melchers and Shaw in 2003 aptly reflects on the status of different languages in Pakistan. At the top is English, with its heritage as a colonial language. Then is the "national" language Urdu which has nationalist value and is spoken by the majority as a…

Much research has focused on the expression of voluntary motion (Slobin, 2004; Talmy, 2000). The present study contributes to this body of research by comparing how children (three to ten years) and adults narrated short, animated cartoons in English and German (SATELLITE-FRAMED languages) vs. French (VERB-FRAMED). The cartoons showed agents…

Mother tongue-based education has been central to the promotion of early literacy skills in many multilingual contexts of the Global South. However, learners in such environments may face significant linguistic challenges when changing language of instruction during schooling. In particular, the linguistic distance between mother tongue and…

Miniature language learning has been widely used to study the causality of language universals. However, factors that have been shown to affect language acquisition in other paradigms are understudied in miniature language learning, which calls into question results that claim to uncover universal biases. In this dissertation, I ask how the…