Reference: Activity 2


What did the child do with the bottle?

We have laid out for you in the table below the way Pari and Fereshteh and two native speakers of Persian referred to the same event in the Narrative Task.

Native Speaker 1

væ in dokhtær bæcheh ye(k) duneh botri-e mæshrub fekr mikonæm basheh, bær-midareh væ tu-ye kif-e khanum-e pir mizareh keh mibineh unja.

Native Speaker 2

in dokhtær bæcheh ye duneh æz in botri-haye nushidani ro bær-midareh, ba'd væghti keh inha hævas-eshun nist mizareh tu kif-e khanum-e.

Pari

dokhtær-e khuchulu <laugh> ye botr, botri? botri shærab  gerefte uum uum cheh khub væ, ah che ah sheytun! Um botri botri-ye shærab tu-ye kif-e pir-e zæn um aa, gozasht?!  næ mizareh, <pokh>, mizareh.

Fereshteh

hum, aa, ..(to grab:whisper) um,….um <laugh> nini, um….ah..nini kheili ,aa, sheytun-e, sheytunæk, or sheytunæsh, æmma botry...hum…aa…nemidunæm bebækshid…aa…ah <laugh>..um, nini, um, took nemidunæm, bedi, bedi,bedi, um, nini..kif…aa..bede, nini <laugh> (grabbed: whisper)….um, um, (nækon, nækon:whisper) um, dokhtær be nini goft nega nækon, lotfæn, in kif-e maman bozorg, aa, vaysa lotfæn,vaysa, beshin beshin.

  1. Compare the learner versions to the way Native Speaker 1 and 2 describe this event. Pay particular attention to the language they use when narrating what the child did with the bottle. What terms do they use to refer to this event’s actions, characters, objects, and locations? How do they signal connections among these? What differences do you notice between the native-speaker and the learner versions of this narrative, and what are some possible reasons for those differences?

 

Pari

Fereshteh

NS 1

NS 2

Child

dokhtær bæcheh

dokhtær bæcheh

Bottle

ye(k) duneh botri-e mæshrub

ye duneh æz in botri-haye nushidani

Taking

bær-midareh

bær-midareh

Bottle

into

tu-ye

tu

Purse/bag

kif-e khanum-e pir

kif-e khanum-e

Put

mizareh

mizareh

  1. Compare the learners’ oral version and written version of this narrative. What differences do you notice between these two versions, and possible reasons for these?

    Pari - Narrative Video - Written Narrative

    Fereshteh - Narrative Video
    - Written Narrative

 

Please type your answers to the questions in the box below.

When you have finished typing your answer, click to compare your response with the Learner Language staff response.

1. Compare the learner versions to the way Native Speaker 1 and 2 describe this event.

 

Pari

Fereshteh

NS 1

NS 2

Child

dokhtær-e kuchulu

nini

dokhtær bæcheh

dokhtær bæcheh

Bottle

ye botr, botri? botri shærab

botri

ye(k) duneh botri-e mæshrub

ye duneh az in botri-haye nushidani

Taking

gerefte

to grab, took nemidunæm, bedi

bær-midareh

bær-midareh

Bottle

botri-ye shærab

into

tu-ye

tu-ye

tu

Purse/bag

kif-e pir-e zæn

kif-e maman bozorg

kif-e khanum-e pir

kif-e khanum-e

Put

gozasht/mizareh

mizareh

mizareh

Overall, the native speakers’ responses are more precise with longer but fewer sentences, while the learners have more false starts and hesitations. Native Speaker 1 (NS1) adds extra lexical items to the sentence, e.g. “fekr mikonæm” and “ke mibini unja”. This is of course one characteristic of spoken language that is absent in written texts: in spontaneous speech, one speaks out one’s thought without always being concerned with formal grammar. Another difference between the native speakers’ utterances and those of the learners’ is that Native Speaker 2 (NS2) gives more background information, as in “ba’d væghti keh inha hævaseshun nist” (then, when they are not aware).
Interestingly, there was only one reference to location by the participants; NS1used “unja” (over there) as a deictic word which can be decoded in relation to where the speaker is. No one, neither the native speakers nor the learners, mentioned the word ‘shelf'.

While both native speakers used the compound noun “dokhtær bæcheh” for the child, Pari used a noun + adjective “dokhtær-e kuchulu” and Fereshteh used a single noun “nini”. Also, for the word “bottle”, the native speakers and Pari used an adjective to clarify what kind of a bottle it was: NS1: “one bottle of alcoholic drink”, NS2: “ one of these bottles of drinks”, and Pari: “one bottle of wine”. However, Fereshteh only said “bottle,” a possible “simplification strategy”.

For the action of “taking the bottle”, both native speakers used the verb “bar-dashtan” which means “to pick up/to grab/ to take out”. Pari used a less appropriate verb “gereftan”, which means “to receive/ to take/ to grab”; this verb should only be used when one takes/grabs/receives something from someone else. Fereshteh had a very hard time expressing the actions in this set of pictures. She whispered: “to grab, took nemidunæm (I don’t know), bedi (you give)”. This could be “appealing for assistance” or private speech (in sociocultural terms). When Fereshteh couldn’t find a word she liked for this action, she created a dramatization from the child’s mother’s perspective: “ don’t do it, don’t do it, please, this is grandma’s bag, stop please, … sit down.”

Pari and both native speakers indicated where the child put the bottle, using “tu/tu-ye” (into) that is necessary to complete the meaning of the action “putting”. All four speakers specified the possessor of the bag (Pari: “old woman’s bag”; Fereshteh: “grandma’s bag”; NS1: “old lady’s bag”; and NS2: “old lady’s bag”).

To sum up, it seems that Pari was more successful than Fereshteh in describing actions, but both learners convey their intended referential meanings one way or another, using different communicational strategies in spite of limited linguistic resources.

2. Compare the learners’ oral version and written version of this narrative.

Pari’s written Narrative is almost the same as her oral Narrative with slightly different changes in parts of speech. For instance, in the oral Narrative, Pari says “the old woman and the other woman” when she is mentioning them for the second time; but in her written Narrative, Pari, uses a third person plural pronoun “anha” (they). Pari spells the Persian “gh” correctly while she pronounces it as “k” in her oral Narrative.

In both her oral and written Narratives, Fereshteh uses the same approach of dramatizing a conversation from the grandma’s and the girl’s perspective but in the written version she tries to be more clear by putting the meaning or spelling of words that she does not know in parentheses using English or writing Persian with the English alphabet. It is worth mentioning that in her written Narrative, she succeeds in referring to the action where the child put the bottle in the old lady’s bag, by switching to English. She writes in Persian “and then this baby, is/has grandma’s bag and put [in English] this bottle in this bag. This baby is very naughty.”

Overall, both learners’ written versions of the bottle transfer are clearer and more accurate than their oral versions. This is suggestive of the nature of spoken and written languages.

 

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