The Cavafy Effect: Homages, Allusions, Readings, por Fabián O. Iriarte

Fabián O. Iriarte holds a Licenciatura en Letras from the Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata (1987) and a Doctoral Degree in the Humanities from the University of Texas at Dallas (1999). He currently teaches English and US Literature and Comparative Literature at the UNMdP and is a member of the Problemas de la Literatura Comparada research group. Some of his essays on translation have appeared in Traducción como cultura (1997) and La cultura de los géneros (2001). He has directed seminars on translation and gay & lesbian poetry. His translations of Jorie Graham’s and Adrienne Rich’s poetry are featured in the anthology Los pájaros, por la nieve (Santiago de Chile: RIL, 2008); he also co-edited and co-translated with Lisa R. Bradford Usos de la imaginación: Poesía de l@s latin@s en EEUU (Mar del Plata: Eudem, 2008).

W. H. Auden declared, in his Introduction to the 1961 edition of The Complete Poems of C. P. Cavafy, that the Alexandrian poet's work remained an influence on his writing since the time he had been introduced to it, thirty years earlier: "I can think of poems which, if Cavafy were unknown to me, I should have written quite differently or perhaps not written at all." Cavafy seems to have had a similar effect on a host of American and British writers (some of whom identified themselves as either "homosexual" or "gay"). His poetry has been disseminated and multiplied in numerous texts by poets acknowledging their debt in several ways. Roughly classified, their poems may be seen as "homage poems" (like Peter Bradley's "On a Snapshot of Cavafy's House", 1990), "allusive poems" (like William Plomer's "A Casual Encounter", 1973), and "poems of reading experience" (like Timothy Liu's "Reading Cavafy", 1998). An analysis of these texts will reveal the productive effects of Cavafian poetry in translation in the English-speaking world and the way his poetry found new life in poetic homages, re-stagings of typical Cavafian scenes, and revisitations.

Addressing Gender-based Ideologies, por Andrea Insaurralde

Lic. Andrea Insaurralde. Profesora en Inglés e Inglés Técnico – Instituto Nacional Superior del Profesorado Técnico. Licenciada en Lengua Inglesa – Universidad de Belgrano. She has specialized in the teaching of Language and teaches at Universidad CAECE and Instituto Superior CEM. She is also teaching Grammar I at Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. She has been a teacher at several secondary schools and Teacher Training Colleges in Buenos Aires, Santa Cruz and Corrientes.

The study of language and gender has always been grounded in eliminating disadvantage. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, in the USA, women began to examine social practices that supported gender discrimination. This led to the study of language and gender with the aim of banishing societal inequities based upon gender. The aim of this class is to raise awareness of the constitutive nature of discourse, that is to say, how our language use shapes our understanding of the social world, our relationships to each other and our social identities, and how gender-differentiated language use can reflect and help perpetuate the subordinate status of women in society. By recognizing the constitutive nature of language discriminatory practices can be challenged and transformed through our language choices.

Since the components of our social identity – social class, ethnicity, gender, age and so on – have a crucial bearing on our experience of and relationship to social processes, one step towards redressing social inequities is the use of nonsexist language. In light of this fact, the notion of “sexist language” will be addressed, together with the question of possible gender differences in the area of language usage. The former will include the discussion of naming conventions, lexical choice and the use of generic “he”, and the latter, two different approaches to the study of language and gender: the dominance approach and the dual-culture approach.

Awkward Phrasing in Advanced EFL Writing, por Susana B. Tuero y Marina Selesán

Tuero, Susana is a full-time professor at the Departmento de Lenguas Modernas, and at the Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias, Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. She holds a Master’s Degree in TESOL, and a Ph. D in English -Applied Linguistics from Michigan State University, USA. Her areas of interest are testing, vocabulary, and writing in EFL.

Research findings in the late 1970s, changed our perception of the writing process. The product-based approach that viewed writing as a linear process was abandoned as writing was considered a cognitive-based process that was recursive in nature. In this paradigm, writing is perceived as a process in which the writers moves back and forth throughout a series of stages: thinking about the topic, organizing ideas, writing, revising, and re-writing.
Even though it is claimed that it is absolutely necessary to revise, inexperienced writers are very reluctant to revise their own writing. They find it hard to understand that revision is an essential part of good writing. Professional writers go through several drafts to achieve the results they want. Good writers are in fact re-writers.
In EFL writing classes, feedback on the various drafts is what helps students move through the process, and improve their writing skills. A review of the literature reveals three major areas of feedback as revision: the teacher, other learners, and the student him/herself (Keh, 1989). Researchers and composition instructors agree that teacher feedback is highly effective in the process of constructing a text.
Most writing teachers use symbols and abbreviations to indicate the sections in the student’s text that call for improvement; for example, ‘gram.’ written on the margin suggests that a syntactic structure must be corrected/improved; ‘not relev,’ helps students understand that the detail(s) provided may not be connected to what is being discussed; and ‘sp’ is used to indicate that there is a spelling error. One comment that student writers find particularly puzzling, and do not know what they should do, is the notation awkward. The problem of awkward phrasing is not easy to define, its characteristics are difficult to define, and its solution hard to achieve.
The purpose of this presentation is to discuss the common features of awkward prose, to present a working definition, and to suggest steps that writing teachers can follow to help their students eliminate awkward phrasing from their writing. A set of awkward sentences will be presented to the audience and possible solutions discussed.

Un blog para los alumnos de Profesorado y Traductorado de Inglés de la UNLP, por Silvia C. Enríquez

Silvia Enriquez: Profesora de Inglés graduada en la Universidad Nacional de La Plata en 1981. También aprobó 25 materias de la carrera de Letras en la misma Universidad.
Desde 1990 trabaja en la Cátedra de Lengua Inglesa III, Profesorado y Traductorado de Inglés de la Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación, UNLP. Actualmente se desempeña como Jefa de Trabajos Prácticos.

Los avances tecnológicos hacen posibles nuevos modos de comunicación con los alumnos, a la vez que facilitan el acceso a modalidades de trabajo que no existían hasta hace unos pocos años. Debido a las posibilidades que ofrece el uso de la web 2.0, la cátedra de Lengua Inglesa III del Profesorado y Traductorado de Inglés de la UNLP reemplazó en el transcurso de este año parte de las horas de consulta ofrecidas semanalmente por el uso de un blog a través del cual los alumnos pueden debatir temas propuestos por la cátedra. Esto les permite ejercitar su capacidad crítica y las destrezas necesarias para escribir los textos argumentativos que constituyen parte de los trabajos prácticos de la materia. En el presente trabajo se comentan los resultados de la experiencia, tanto desde el punto de vista de los docentes como de los alumnos. El resultado en general es positivo, ya que ha permitido que los estudiantes comprendan mejor las características y la función de un texto argumentativo fuera del ámbito de clase.

The Sharp Shock of Digging Up “Real” English, por Chris Kunz

Chris Kunz: ELT Professional in Argentina, Australia and UK for 17 years. Currently living and working in England. Senior Director of Studies at Kensanglia Schools of English, Buenos Aires. Has been lecturing on ELT Methodology, Advanced Language for teachers and English Phonetics and Phonology in Argentina and overseas since 1997.Has been involved with the Anglia Examination Syndicate Testing Services since 1996. Is the Academic Representative for South Amerca & Mainland Spain. Holds the Cambridge/RSA Cert. / Dip. ELTA.
Main interests: "Evolution and Change in Spoken English", "Diversities of English Accents" and "English Language Teaching Resources".Now divides his time between Chichester College, England, as EFL Lecturer, and Anglia Examination Syndicate. Facilitator/ Interlocutor in UK with several exam boards for Skills for Life Examinations. Has delivered the Phonology Modules of LSC Skills for Life Quality Initiative Professional Development Programme in UK.

Language will always be changing, according to world-class linguist David Crystal. This is something we cannot stop, no matter how hard we try. The key to success though, to my mind at least, is being aware of what these changes involve, analysing them and eventually passing judgement on what they represent.
As we speak, falling standards in terms of grammar, punctuation, lexis and pronunciation are everyday international talking points among English language lovers. These so-called “falling” standards have come to stay and become part of our everyday repertoire.
Join Chris in this interactive presentation if you fancy a stroll through the fascinating and thought-provoking examples of what native speakers of English actually say or write these days.

Polyphonic Texts: Hanif Kureishi's The Buddha of Suburbia and Zadie Smith's White Teeth, por Karen Cresci

Karen Lorraine Cresci graduated from UNMdP in 2006 and is a member of the research group "Problemas de la Literatura Comparada," directed by Dr. Lisa Bradford. Since 2005 she has been a fellow of the UNMdP and is doing research on translation studies and multicultural literature. She has contributed translations of Diana García’s poetry to an anthology of U.S. poetry in Spanish, Usos de la imaginación: poetas latin@s en EE.UU. (EUDEM, Argentina), that will be appearing in 2008.

Hanif Kureishi and Zadie Smith have been widely praised for their skillful representations of the multiplicity of voices that characterizes post-imperial England. Transposing these multiple voices poses a formidable challenge to literary translators. Since the way a character speaks is key in characterization, translators must strive to render the nuances of the speech of each character in the target language. In this talk, we will explore some of the difficulties that the translation of polyphonic texts entails. The novels The Buddha of Suburbia by Hanif Kureishi and White Teeth by Zadie Smith, and their Spanish translations will be analyzed.

ESP en Ingeniería, por Carolina Di Benedetto y Eva Brunstein Blum

Carolina Di Benedetto. Profesora de Inglés, UNMDP, 1996. She has worked at Facultad de Ingeniería, UNMdP in Inglés Técnico I and II since 1994 and Inglés Profesional I and II as Profesor Adjunto since 2002. She has also worked at JTP at Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Sociales, UNMdP. She has participated in Jornadas and Congresses as an author and exhibitor of papers related to ESP. She has worked in Tertiary level teaching Technical English in areas such as Programming and Industry Safety and Health.

Eva Brunstein Blum holds a degree as an English Teacher for Secondary School (UNMDP, 1989) and as a University English Teacher (UNMDP, 1991). She has taught English for Specific Purposes at Tertiary level in the areas of Programming and Marketing. She has attended several Congresses and Jornadas as an author of papers on ESP. At present she works as Profesor Adjunto of Inglés Técnico l and Inglés Técnico ll at Engineering Technical College (UNMDP), and as JTP at Inglés Profesional l and Inglés Profesional ll at the same college.

El idioma inglés se constituye como una herramienta fundamental en la formación de los estudiantes de ingeniería, tanto en la formación académica como para el futuro profesional. El idioma inglés se vuelve así un medio indispensable para acceder al conocimiento, por lo que se hace imprescindible el manejo la lectura. La comprensión global de un texto no es suficiente en este contexto ya que los saberes de los distintos campos de las ingenierías demandan más exactitud que un mero entendimiento de la idea general de los contenidos del texto. La precisión en la lectura del inglés requiere una metodología especial que la promueva y la desarrolle, tomando como pilar la adquisición de un vocabulario básico y una técnica de traducción literal, sin olvidar el objetivo final que es la comprensión. Esto se acompaña con un sistema de evaluación que estimula la apropiación de los conocimientos necesarios para llegar a tal fin. Ejemplificaremos y compartiremos nuestra experiencia en las cátedras de Inglés Técnico de la Facultad de Ingeniería, UNMDP y mostraremos el enfoque utilizado para que nuestros alumnos logren la mencionada precisión en la comprensión, así como el sistema de evaluación implementado.

On register in the second language class, por Zelmira Álvarez

Zelmira Alvarez teaches English Grammar I and II and “Teorías del Sujeto y del Aprendizaje” at UNMDP. She is a member of the Education and Cultural Studies Research Group (GIEEC) directed by Luis Porta and of the Discourse Analysis Research Group directed by Martín Menéndez. She has participated in several research projects on good teaching practices in teacher education, narrative and biographical studies. Her main interests in research lie in the field of discourse analysis applied to the understanding of educational and classroom phenomena.

This presentation intends to carry out a critical and instrumental analysis of the concept of register in reference to second language classroom discourse. Register is understood as the variety of language used to suit the situation where the interaction takes place. This key concept of functional linguistics contributes to a better understanding of the relationship between language and context, which can be of great help in the design and implementation of second language teaching courses. The functional variety of language is related to the possibilities that speakers/writers have to select the language variety they consider most appropriate for the type of situation where they are immersed. Consistency in register in a second language is not knowledge or skill that simply results from exposure to different types of register. Rather, it is something that must be especially fostered in the second language class through reflection (and practice) on the linguistic and discursive resources necessary to carry out different communicative tasks. It involves a construction that rests on awareness about the options available in the system and the contextual conditions that make that selection possible. The presentation includes the analysis of some sample corpora from teacher and students´ interactions in second language classes of different levels to exemplify the attention paid to questions of register in classroom work.

La enseñanza del inglés en comunidades socialmente desfavorecidas. Aprender a mirar distinto, por Elisabet Caielli y Laura M. Spina

Betina Caielli: Docente Area Formación Docente, Profesorado de Inglés. UNMDP.
Docente Municipal de Inglés.

Laura Spina: Coordinadora Proyectos Especiales. Secretaría de Educación - MGPDocente Municipal de Inglés.

Talleres de inglés para adultos mayores en la UNLP, por Silvia C. Enríquez

Silvia Enriquez: Profesora de Inglés graduada en la Universidad Nacional de La Plata en 1981. También aprobó 25 materias de la carrera de Letras en la misma Universidad.
Desde 1990 trabaja en la Cátedra de Lengua Inglesa III, Profesorado y Traductorado de Inglés de la Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación, UNLP. Actualmente se desempeña como Jefa de Trabajos Prácticos.

La sección de Cursos Especiales de la Escuela de Lenguas, dependiente de la Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata, ofrece talleres de inglés para adultos mayores de 45 años. Debido a la carencia de bibliografía sobre la enseñanza a estos alumnos, este trabajo fue elaborado a partir de las observaciones hechas en los últimos años acerca de sus características, a fin de determinar una metodología de trabajo específica que contemple sus necesidades.

Does command of L1 override comprehension in ESP reading courses?, por Dr. Susana B. Tuero y Prof. Viviana Innocentini

Tuero, Susana is a full-time professor at the Departmento de Lenguas Modernas, and at the Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias, Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. She holds a Master’s Degree in TESOL, and a Ph. D in English -Applied Linguistics from Michigan State University, USA. Her areas of interest are testing, vocabulary, and writing in EFL.

Vivana Innocentini is a language assistant at the Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias, Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. She is also in charge of different English languages courses at KWS. Her areas of interest are ESP, vocabulary development, and acquisition of the sound system.

English comprehension is one of the main problems students are faced with, when majoring in different fields (from Social Studies to Science or Biological Studies) at Argentinean universities. To meet such requirements, many universities offer undergraduates English for Specific Purposes (ESP) courses which vary both in length and objectives, depending on several factors such as resources and needs. In the context of Agricultural Sciences and Food Technology at Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias in Balcarce, learners are expected to read and understand a research article in English as a foreign language.
Results from previous research findings have shown that a positive correlation exists between the teaching of reading strategies and a successful performance on second language reading tasks. Fernandez Toledo (2005) claimed that overt instruction on the use of reading strategies has a positive impact on students’ performance when dealing with foreign language reading.
Such a view has been widely supported by our daily practices as ESP teachers. Even though students seem to improve their reading skills, quite a few have difficulties in putting into words what they have understood / read from a given text. This might be well explained in terms of students’ poor command of the second language. However, there are some reasons to believe that students’ command of their L1 could play an important role in determining either failure or success in L1 written texts a after completing an L2 reading task. Therefore, as Aneta Pavlenko and Scott Jarvis (2001) have stated, there is a need to approach transfer in SLA from a bidirectional perspective as it can influence an individual’s use of the L1 and L2.
The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of both prior L1 and L2 command on L1 written production. This poster presentation will describe the design of the study, and a preliminary analysis of the data that attempts to explain whether errors primarily result from difficulties in L1 or from deficiencies in L2 command.

How much attention do EFL student writers pay to teacher feedback?, por Prof. María Pía Gómez Laich

María Pía Gomez Laich holds a Teaching Degree in English from UNMdP. Before graduating, she was awarded a Research Fellowship for Advanced Students. The research project she worked on as part of the fellowship explored vocabulary teaching methods in EFL classes. She currently holds a Research Fellowship for Beginning Graduate Students and is member of the research group “Cuestiones del Lenguaje.”

As multiple-draft approaches to writing instruction have permeated many ESL/ EFL classrooms over the past two decades, feeddback has become a central aspect of ESL/ EFL writing programs all over the world. The influence of teacher commentary on student writing is now a topic of crucial importance for second language (L2) writing teachers and researchers, and it has been widely investigated over the past decade (Ferris, 2003). Initial L1 and L2 research concerning the effects of written teacher commentary on student writing assignments revealed that no matter how written teacher feedback was delivered, it appeared to be ineffective in helping students to gain control over composing skills. Worse still, students seemed to either resent or ignore written teacher commentary (Knoblauch and Brannon, 1981; Hillocks, 1986; Leki, 1990, 1991; Truscott, 1996). However, it is of paramount importance to remember that these first studies were conducted in the 1970s and early 1980s and obtained their data from classes and teachers who did not follow the response-and-revision dynamic. Students wrote only one draft of a paper, gave it to the teacher for correction and evaluation, and did not engage in draft revision. However, this discouraging picture changed when research done on the effect of teacher feedback in multiple draft settings indicated that L1 and L2 writers were inclined to pay attention to their teachers feedback. On the basis of these last claims, the purpose of this study was to analyse whether EFL writers at the English Teacher Training Program at Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata (UNMdP) attend to teacher feedback and utilize it in their revisions. The purpose of this presentation will be to share with the audience the results of this research project. An analysis of the data collected will be presented and conclusions of the research will be discussed.

The Writing Process: Common Fallacies in Writing, por Claudia Cañedo

Claudia Cañedo:
Profesora en Lengua y literatura Inglesa Universidad Nacional de San Juan. Licenciada en Filología Inglesa. Universidad Central de Barcelona. Postgraduate courses:
Didáctica de la Lengua. Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona
Lectocomprensión en Lengua Extranjera. Universidad Nacional de Buenos Aires
Master in TEFL (Teaching of English as a Foreign Language). Universidad de Granada
She has delivered several workshops and lectures on English Language Teaching.

This presentation gives an insight into the complexity of writing and analyzes the main drawbacks that the writing skill encompasses. On the one hand, the learner has to overcome many difficulties along the several stages he has to undergo. For reasons of time, the student does most of his writing in isolation with little help from peers and/or the teacher. This makes the task for both teacher and learner even harder. The teacher also carries out the marking of the end-product in isolation without having actually taken part in the writing process.
For marking students’ papers teachers may choose different approaches. Some texts demand a former concentration on form even when the teacher is more likely to use a content- based approached. Although the focus on content has been carefully applied, the teacher might still feel that there is some awkwardness pervading the text which has not been straightened up after the marking.
A closer scrutiny might bring to light that some texts seem to exhibit weaknesses which lie at the thought level. In other words, the use of wrong assumptions or fallacies in writing shadows the quality and credibility of written texts.
The presentation shows the most current fallacies used in written texts. Instances have been drawn from EFL students’ pieces of writing with view to increase recognition of fallacies and reduce their use. It is expected that learners gain knowledge on how to improve their texts and strengthen the value of their arguments. Teachers might also benefit from understanding that content and form are supported by a structure of thoughts which needs to be unambiguously built- up.

He, She, and Ze? Oppression and Empowerment Through Language, por Jennifer Timm and Matthew Sanchez

Jennifer Timm and Matt Sanchez have been in Argentina for 8 months with an English Teacher Assistantship grant from the Fulbright Commission. They graduated from Wesleyan University (Connecticut, USA) and Ohio University (OH, USA) in 2007 with a degree in Latin American Studies and Advertising respectively.

Language does not merely reflect the way we think: it also shapes our thinking. -UNESCO Report on Gender-Neutral Language
Just how powerful is language? In this talk, we will explore the role of language as a tool for fighting for human rights and social progress. We will define political correctness and look at how it has evolved in society. We will consider how language has both oppressed and empowered various groups within society, focusing our discussion on race, gender, and sexuality. We will look at a brief history of each group and consider how language has changed to accommodate new social rights and roles.

Language as a Means…But How? por Alejandra Ottolina

Alejandra Ottolina, Director of Studies at Santa Monica School of Languages is an experienced teacher and teacher trainer, accredited for COTE, DOTE and ICELT – University of Cambridge, who has lectured in Argentina as well as in neighbouring countries. She has taught all levels in both the private and public sectors and currently supervises the English department of more than thirty institutions.
Co-author of Road to Success. In 2004 Alejandra joined the Macmillan team as a course consultant for WINNERS and author of the Teacher’s Books and BONUS for Winners and the CLIL section of Switch On among others.
INSP Lenguas Vivas

In order to decide whether a CLIL approach is suitable for our teaching reality or not, we should first of all define CLIL and analyze the implications that it may have both for us, teachers, and for our learners. We all know that if our objective is communicative competence, we should respect certain classroom principles such as meaningful learning, production – instead of mere understanding, a safe environment for students to feel confident in and therefore use the target language, etc. The main question is then: How? Some of us only have two contact hours a week…
Next, we ought to focus on the wide scope of advantages that CLIL offers us and which range from student motivation to teacher self-development. Still, the main question remains the same. Is it possible to put all this into practice in our context? If so, how?
Methodology has historically adjusted itself to certain times, needs and environments, allowing us to speak about eclectic approaches, not as an easy way to justify mistakes but as a real alternative, as the only chance to take the best or the most suitable from each method. Perhaps we should once again be selective, taking from CLIL what will best help my students, what will best match my personality and teaching style, what will make me feel an educator rather than just a teacher. This has to do with communicative strategies, with content and with curricular integration as well as with teacher’s work and development.
Having analyzed CLIL from a realistic and practical point of view, it is true that we still have the HOW question… Join us and we will find the answer! We will go through the different variables that will affect our teaching and will discuss clear examples.

Teaching and learning English as an International language: An exploratory task with “Discurso Oral 2” Students

por Pedro Luchini, Mercedes Gayone, Fernanda Fischbach y Francisco Cejas.

Pedro Luis Luchini: ELT graduated from Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata (UNMDP). Holds an MA in ELT and Applied Linguistics, King’s College, University of London. He is currently teaching English Phonetics and Phonology and Language at the Teacher Training Program, UNMDP. 1997: Ex-Fulbright scholar, Spanish instructor at College of DuPage, Illinois, US. 2003: Taught EFL at Shanghai Normal University, China. 2007: Faculty Enrichment Program Scholarship, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada.

Mercedes Gayone, Fernanda Fischbach, Franciso Joaquín Cejas: Discurso Oral II students.

Nowadays, English is no longer spoken only by its native speakers (ENSs) and by those who learn English in order to communicate with ENSs. It is also used in interactions among non-native speakers (NNESs) internationally. This last use of English is often referred to as 'English as an International Language' or EIL, and it is this kind of English which this presentation will centre around as it is the largest group of English speakers, amounting to around 1.5 billion worldwide (Kachru, 1992; Crystal, 1997).
The purpose of this presentation is to show the results of an exploratory task carried out by Discurso Orall II students in 2008. As part of this exploratory task, these learners, guided by their teacher and the literature in this field, set out to explore those phonological deviations that are damaging for mutual global intelligibility in international contexts where NNESs, whose first languages are different, try to converge on one another’s pronunciations using their own local accents. Speech data were collected from fourteen students enrolled in Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. These students were from China, Vietnam, South Korea, Jordan, Perú, Ukraine and Bangladesh. These subjects were asked to record a communicative task in pairs for which they were pushed to talk using their own English regional accents. Later, the interviewer conducted a post-task debriefing session with each pair in which they analysed those instances where communication had been impaired. Both the tasks and the debriefing sessions were tape-recorded. DOII students transcribed these recordings and, using the Lingua Franca Core (Jenkins, 2000) as a theoretical framework, analysed and interpreted this information. The findings obtained divulged that segmental deviations, especially when combined with misplacement of nuclear stress, turned out to be the most detrimental factor for the attainment of mutual intelligibility. On the grounds of these findings and upon the completion of this hands-on teaching experience with DOII students some recommendations for the teaching of English as an international language will be given.

The Use of Biographical Narratives to Explore Good Teaching Practices, por Zelmira Alvarez, Mª Cristina Sarasa y Luis Porta

Zelmira Álvarez, Mª Cristina Sarasa, and Luis Porta, from the faculty at the School of Humanities in Mar del Plata State University are members of the Education and Cultural Studies Research Group (GIEEC), created in 2005. The presenters have been involved in the following research projects. “Good Teaching Practices and Teacher Education: Contributions towards a New Pedagogical Agenda” (2003-2005); “Teacher Education II: Narrative in Teaching” (2005-2007); and “Teacher Education III: memorable teachers’ professional (auto) biographies” (2008-2009).

This presentation summarizes the findings of three research projects on teacher education. The first explored “Good Teaching Practices and Teacher Education” (2003-2005). It studied good teaching in the EFL Teacher Education Program at the School of Humanities, UNMDP. It identified good practices through a semi-open questionnaire administered to a selected sample of good senior students. This presentation analyzes students’ conceptions on good teaching that obtained. The second project was called “Teacher Education II: Narrative in Teaching” (2005-2007). It continued focusing on the role of narrative in teaching and educational research. Most frequently recorded instructors were interviewed by means of a semi-flexible script emphasizing their narrative perspectives. Conceptions on good teaching, ideal curriculum and good teaching models emerged in the course of these interviews and were used to theoretically resignify private teaching experiences, generating categories involving conversation in teaching, the site of narratives, and the relevance of teachers’ intuition and beliefs. The third ongoing project “Teacher Education III: memorable teachers’ professional (auto) biographies” (2008-2009) follows biographical narrative lines. The biographies of university teachers from the five teacher Education Programs at the School of Humanities, UNMDP, are studied, selecting those instructors who have been identified as memorable teachers through a questionnaire administered to senior students. Categories analyzed centre on the meaning teachers give to their personal and professional development, the value they assign to their life itineraries, and the views they construct about their teacher education process through their “storied” accounts. The interpretation of data aims at generating categories that illuminate teachers’ professional development, which in turn contributes to the exploration of university didactics. The results will be linked to the conceptualization of new problematics and alternatives in reference to teaching in higher education.

Studying sets of semantically related of semantically unrelated items. What helps word meaning retention

por Dr. Susana Tuero, Prof. María Pía Gómez Laich, Carolina Suarez.

Tuero, Susana is a full-time professor at the Departmento de Lenguas Modernas, and at the Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias, Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. She holds a Master’s Degree in TESOL, and a Ph. D in English -Applied Linguistics from Michigan State University, USA. Her areas of interest are testing, vocabulary, and writing in EFL.
María Pía Gomez Laich holds a Teaching Degree in English from UNMdP. Before graduating, she was awarded a Research Fellowship for Advanced Students. The research project she worked on as part of the fellowship explored vocabulary teaching methods in EFL classes. She currently holds a Research Fellowship for Beginning Graduate Students and is member of the research group “Cuestiones del Lenguaje.”

Paula Carolina Suarez is an advanced student at the ELT teaching program at UNMDP. She has been a student aid in Process of Writing I and II at UNMDP and she currently holds a rented apprenticeship in the same courses. Within these courses, she has been researching in the fields of vocabulary learning and teaching for the past three years.

Federico Pinilla, Sofía Romanelli:

Propuesta de actividades para trabajar la pronunciación de los sonidos consonánticos del español rioplatense (ERP) con hablantes de inglés americano general (IAG) utilizando material auténtico.

Sofia Romanelli: Adscripta graduada en las materias Fonética Inglesa I y II y docente del Laboratorio de Idiomas

Federico Pinilla: Prof. universitario de inglés graduado en la UNMdP

La siguiente propuesta tiene como objetivo la presentación de actividades orientadas específicamente a la enseñanza y practica de la pronunciación de los fonemas consonánticos del ERP para hablantes de IAG empleando material auténtico. Considerando la relevancia del componente fonológico en el desarrollo de las habilidades lingüísticas de comprensión auditiva y expresión oral, la siguiente propuesta pretende entrenar al alumno para que mejore su comprensión y producción de la lengua hablada. A tal propósito, se propone un programa con los siguientes componentes: una sección teórica, con breves descripciones y diagramas interactivos sobre la articulación de los sonidos del ERP y el IAG; una sección práctica, estructurada en tres tipos de actividades siguiendo el modelo de Joan Morley (1991): a) de práctica imitativa focalizada en la producción controlada de una selección de fonemas; b) de práctica ensayada orientada a la estabilización de patrones de pronunciación modificados; y c) de práctica espontánea con el propósito de integrar patrones de pronunciación modificados en la producción creativa; una sección de instrucción en estrategias metacognitivas, con actividades para desarrollar la autonomía del estudiante equipándolo con herramientas y estrategias donde se enfatiza el uso de auto-monitoreo y auto-corrección; y finalmente, una sección de auto-evaluación. Cabe destacar que el programa de actividades propuesto utiliza materiales auténticos como propagandas y series televisivas, canciones, extractos de películas y sitios web entre otros. En resumen, esta propuesta ayuda a que el alumno tome conciencia de la articulación de los sonidos consonánticos del ERP y de su propia producción, lo guía desde una práctica controlada, a una práctica guiada, hasta llegar a una práctica impromptu, y lo entrena, además, en el uso de estrategias de aprendizaje para mejorar su pronunciación de los sonidos del ERP.

Discusión en torno a la Teoría de Polisistemas. Para entender la trilogía de Peter Jackson, por María Inés Arrizabalaga

María Ines Arrizabalaga. Traductora de Ingles y Licenciada en Letras. Posee una beca de CONICET para su disertación doctoral en Traductología (UNC). Cuenta con varios años de experiencia en la enseñanza de traductorados del Mar del Plata Community Collage y, recientemente, del Instituto de Conocimientos y Estudios Disciplinarios. Es miembro del grupo “Problemas de la Literatura Comparada” dirigido por la Dra. Lisa Rose Bradford (UNMdP). En el año 2006, el CIT (Centro de Investigaciones en Traducción, UNC) aceptó la radicación de dos proyectos de investigación, uno de ellos en cooperación con el Centro de Semiótica de Arhus Universitet (Dinamarca) y el otro, con la Escuela de Lenguas Modernas y Estudios de Traducción de Tampereen Yliopisto (Finlandia). Es autora de J.R.R. Tolkien y “El Señor de los Anillos” Problemas Semióticos de Traducción (2005) y de numerosas comunicaciones en teoria de la traducción.

La Teoría de Polisistemas explica la producción, circulación y consumo de traducciones en el contexto de llegada. A esta teoría se han anexado dos grupos de categorías, el de las normas y el de la transferencia. En este grupo se hallan comprendidos los cambios obligatorios, de carácter lingüístico, y no obligatorios, de naturaleza no lingüística, dependientes de factores culturales, como los repertorios (Toury, 1995; Shuttleworth & Cowie, 2004 [1997]: 153). Esta definición de ‘obligatoriedad’ y ‘no obligatoriedad’ se muestra clara en relación con la constitución de normas vinculadas a la transferencia de un sistema literario a otro pero requiere ajustes en el pasaje de la literatura al cine. Al ser llevada a la pantalla grande por Peter Jackson, la ‘tesis lingüística’ en la trilogía de J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, ha sido excluida. Este cambio puede considerarse obligatorio, pero puede también pensarse que la exclusión se ha debido a las restricciones que operan sobre el guión por parte de un repertorio estigmatizado por Star Wars de George Lucas. Una descripción de los tópicos en las trilogías de Lucas y el relevamiento de los archivos de New Line Cinema y de la Tolkien Society permiten entender la baja aceptabilidad que tendría la inclusión de la tesis lingüística en el producto de Jackson. Asimismo, para suplementar las categorías de análisis relativas a la transferencia se ha recurrido al modelo fílmico-narratológico de André Gaudreault & François Jost (1995 [1990]), especialmente a los conceptos de narrativización, diegetización y figurativización. Se busca explicar que los cambios en el pasaje de formatos literario a fílmico deben entenderse en función de las operaciones ficcionalizantes propias del cine. Y así, puede hablarse de cambios por – o para – la narrativización, la diegetización y la figurativización de una obra en otra.

On the Role of Phonetics in an ESP Course: an experience presented by students, por Susana Chiatti, Claudio Alé y Gustavo Alvarez

Susana L. Chiatti is the holder of the chairs of English Phonetics and Phonology I and II at the Teacher Training College of the Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. She is also a researcher and has written articles for specialized journals. She is a member of the Education and Cultural Studies Research Group (GIEEC) created in 2005.

Communication has always been a major problem for mariners. Ships need to be able to contact each other and yet the nature of shipping has always made this difficult. For centuries the human voice was the only method available. To overcome this difficulty signal flags and lights have been used and today the introduction of radio has solved many of the earlier difficulties.

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) began working on this problem and following an initiative taken by the United Kingdom Institute of Navigation, adopted in November 1977, a Standard Marine Navigational Vocabulary which, it is hoped, will help overcome the age-old barrier of language.

The vocabulary consists of a number of simplified, standard and precise phrases in English based on phonetics which enable mariners of different nationalities to communicate with each other more easily than in the past.

The purpose of this talk is to present an in progress- phonetics course that may be useful for ESP teachers showing activities used in Mar del Plata at Escuela Nacional de Pesca "Comandante Luis Piedra Buena ".
This course was designed to provide a stepping - stone to enable seamen who are studying for professional qualifications at this school handle with accurate pronunciation the vocabulary they will need in their particular area of study: on board ship and throughout the world where the medium of English is used.

As Others See Them: 9-11 in Shorts, por Juan Ariel Gómez

Juan Ariel Gómez teaches English and American Literature at Idioma Inglés: Nivel Avanzado, Comunicación Integral and Literatura Inglesa at the Profesorado de Inglés, UNMdP. Since 1997 he has been a member of Professor Bradford’s research team “Problems in Comparative Literature.” In 2007 he finished his MA in Comparative Literature from State University of New York, Stony Brook with the support of a Fulbright scholarship.

What representational possibilities do artistic languages afford when attempting to narrate a given event? What variables should the critical reader center on as a means of assessing the operations or procedures implemented in cultural texts? How much can the artistic craft align or adjust to the intrinsic political or ideological undercurrents involved in representing such events? The previous questions will be examined, and possibly, some of them, tentatively answered, when reading two short films seeking to represent and reconstruct 9-11 yet from the point of view of what might be considered an-other gaze “regarding the pain of others,” to borrow Susan Sontag’s words.

Bilingual Poetry Reading from Usos de la imaginación: Poesía de l@s latin@s en EE.UU. Lisa Rose Bradford, Fabián Iriarte, Karen Cresci y Mayra Ortiz

Lisa Rose Bradford teaches Literature at the UNMdP and Translation Studies at the UNC. Since completing her doctorate at UC Berkeley, she has edited three compendiums on translation and cultural studies. Her poems and translations have appeared in various magazines such as Poetry Now, Thorny Locust, Faultline, Calque, eXchanges and Hablar de poesía. Two of her anthologies of U.S. poetry in Spanish will be appearing in 2008: Los pájaros, por la nieve (RIL, Chile) and Usos de la imaginación: poetas latin@s en EE.UU (EUDEM, Argentina).

Fabián O. Iriarte holds a Licenciatura en Letras from the Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata (1987) and a Doctoral Degree in the Humanities from the University of Texas at Dallas (1999). He currently teaches English and US Literature and Comparative Literature at the UNMdP and is a member of the Problemas de la Literatura Comparada research group. Some of his essays on translation have appeared in Traducción como cultura (1997) and La cultura de los géneros (2001). He has directed seminars on translation and gay & lesbian poetry. His translations of Jorie Graham’s and Adrienne Rich’s poetry are featured in the anthology Los pájaros, por la nieve (Santiago de Chile: RIL, 2008); he also co-edited and co-translated with Lisa R. Bradford Usos de la imaginación: Poesía de l@s latin@s en EEUU (Mar del Plata: Eudem, 2008).

Karen Lorraine Cresci graduated from UNMdP in 2006 and is a member of the research group "Problemas de la Literatura Comparada," directed by Dr. Lisa Bradford. Since 2005 she has been a fellow of the UNMdP and is doing research on translation studies and multicultural literature. She has contributed translations of Diana García’s poetry to an anthology of U.S. poetry in Spanish, Usos de la imaginación: poetas latin@s en EE.UU. (EUDEM, Argentina), that will be appearing in 2008.

Mayra Ortiz: Profesora en Letras egresada de la Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Allí desarrolla tareas de investigación en el marco del G.LI.S.O. (Grupo Literatura Siglo de Oro) desde 2000. Fue adscripta en las cátedras Nivel de Inglés y Literatura Española I. A partir de 2006 es becaria de Perfeccionamiento con una investigación sobre teatro del siglo XVII y con funciones docentes en las cátedras Literatura Española I, Seminario de Literatura Española y Teoría y Crítica del Teatro. Se encuentra en instancias finales de la Maestría en Letras Hispánicas.

Usos de la imaginación: Poesía de l@s latin@s en EE.UU.

Gary Soto, en su poema “Pompeya y los usos de nuestra imaginación”, describe un episodio de ingenua subversión mental. Relatando su esfuerzo para imaginar la histórica erupción volcánica para cumplir con una consigna de tarea escolar, se encuentra asociando la trágica escena con un tamal chorreado de mole, y el heroísmo de los pompeyanos con algunas estrellas de Hollywood. El humor de este caos conceptual se arraiga en la experiencia bicultural del autor e ilustra el modo de representación que los “latinos” en Estados Unidos suelen emplear en su poesía, algunas veces como crítica social y otras como alegre anarquía. Además, estos poetas tienden a exacerbar lo más fascinante del lenguaje, que no es necesariamente la clara comunicación diaria que nos provee, sino la manera en que la mente humana puede reconfigurar las palabras para crear significados nuevos y, a veces, equivocados. Asombra cómo usamos la imaginación para provocar otras percepciones del mundo a través del lenguaje, y en el caso de estos poetas, que tienen dos sistemas lingüísticos a su disposición, el desconcierto se duplica y produce versos de alta riqueza sonora e imaginativa.
Esta charla/lectura dará a conocer a estos poetas y mostrará los logros y obstáculos respecto de la transmisión de esta lírica latina al trasladarse al contexto argentino a través de su traducción.