Culture

Essential Question

• How does culture matter in academic language

acquisition?

Cultural Discourse Patterns

• Robert Kaplan• James Gee

(African American pattern)

Discourse Patterns: Asian

What do you see?

Discourse Patterns: Latin/Romance

Discourse Patterns: Russian

Discourse Patterns: Arab/Semitic

African American Pattern

Discourse Patterns: British and American

Language, Perception and Neural-pathways

Language “Studies have found effects on how people perceive:EventsPhysical realitySequence EmotionsMental statesRisk takingAnd How we make choicesLara Boroditsky from the Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science

So What?

Embodied Cognition

• In philosophy, embodied cognition holds that an agent's cognition is strongly influenced by aspects of an agent's body beyond the brain itself.

Examples

• We use hand gestures while on the phone.• Test subjects leaned backward slightly while

recalling past evens and forwards for thoughts of the future.

• Test subjects take longer to recall a dentist experience while standing tall than while laying down on a couch.

• Gut feelings