Vaičenonienė, Jurgita

This thesis examines how political discourse in Azerbaijan constructs the concept of stability as a central element in state communication. The research focuses on how political language is used to justify authority, marginalize opposition, and frame dissent in relation to national unity and external threats. The study applies a combination of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and corpus-based methods to a selection of political speeches and media texts published between 2018 and 2024. The data consists of 38 texts from both state-controlled and independent media outlets. These were analyzed using AntConc (Antrony 2024) and manually to identify patterns in keyword usage, collocations, and rhetorical strategies. The analysis focuses on how terms such as stability, sovereignty, democracy, and foreign are used in different contexts to promote or contest dominant narratives. The findings show that state-aligned sources frequently link stability with legitimacy and national strength, while using exclusionary language to describe critics and oppositional actors. Independent media, on the other hand, report on repression and censorship, but face structural and legal limitations that restrict their impact. The study shows how political language in Azerbaijan functions as a tool for shaping public perception and maintaining existing power relations. It contributes to the understanding of discourse practices in semi-authoritarian contexts and the role of media in constructing political legitimacy.

This study explores the communication dynamics between native English-speaking customers and non-native Azerbaijani call center agents in California’s appliance repair industry. Using a mixed-method approach, with a primary focus on discourse analysis, the research investigates how non-native agents navigate technical language, grammatical accuracy, and politeness strategies during real service interactions. Drawing on 25 transcribed call recordings, the study analyzes three core dimensions: language complexity, clarity and accuracy, and the use of politeness markers. Findings reveal that while agents demonstrate fundamental communicative competence, challenges arise from limited vocabulary, syntactic errors, and cultural differences in politeness norms. These issues often result in misunderstandings and reduce customer satisfaction. Quantitative data supports qualitative insights, highlighting patterns in agents’ language use. The study underscores the importance of targeted training in both linguistic and pragmatic competence to improve service quality in multilingual settings. Ultimately, the research contributes to the broader understanding of cross-cultural communication and provides actionable recommendations for improving agent performance in globalized customer service environments.

This thesis explores language attitudes and stereotypes towards the Russian language in post-Soviet countries with a focus on Azerbaijan and Lithuania particularly. In a globalized world where language plays a crucial role in shaping societal dynamics, understanding the multilingual perceptions and attitudes towards a language as significant as Russian is important. The aim of this study is to investigate the ways in which these attitudes and stereotypes affect the use, learning, and maintaining the Russian language in Azerbaijan and Lithuania. It also explores the underlying causes and motives of these attitudes and stereotypes and their impact on language policies in both of these countries. The results of this study demonstrate the linguistic perspectives and motives that influence language attitudes and stereotypes about the Russian language. Moreover, the thesis reveals the complicated relationships between language attitudes, history, and present political realities that impact language laws and social dynamics in Lithuania and Azerbaijan. By offering a comprehensive analysis of language attitudes in post-Soviet contexts, this thesis contributes to a deeper understanding of linguistic dynamics and societal complexities in these two countries.

Population ageing is one of the most important trends in today’s world. Still, for many people, ageing is an ambivalent experience. They knew who they were when they were working and raising children, but what about now? Telling stories of their lives can allow older adults to look at their life from a different angle, perceive it within a larger picture, and realise its significance. The aim of this thesis is to study how storytelling helps older adults make meaning of and feel positive about their lives and themselves. The thesis considers six autobiographical pieces by Russian older amateur writers through the prism of the ideas of positive ageing, broadly understood as feeling good about oneself in late adulthood, demonstrating an amicable disposition toward the world, feeling appreciative of the past, content with the present, and optimistic about the future. The research has manifested that telling (writing) their life stories can satisfy people’s need for sharing with others what is important and precious for them, help them better understand and cherish their life experience. The texts by older writers show that one needs to have a positive identity, in the sense of belonging to something that one can value and be proud of, such as one’s past, family, or country, as well as engage in an activity one genuinely enjoys like storytelling.

English is being used more often than ever in a variety of spheres of life, including social media. English language usage has been increasingly common on social media sites, and Azerbaijan is no exception. This thesis investigates how Azerbaijani users use English on Instagram, paying particular attention to their language practices, the motives behind these preferences and code-switching occurrences. The study examines the language used in Instagram captions, different forms of code-switching, and the outcomes of an online questionnaire of 118 social media platform users. In this mixed-methods study design, collection, and analysis of the qualitative part preceded the quantitative part. An online survey for young Instagram users provided quantitative data from 118 respondents in total. For the qualitative part, 200 Instagram captions of 10 Instagram users (each last 20 posts) were observed and analyzed accordingly. The results show that although a considerable percentage of respondents use English on Instagram, it is not the most common language. The study also identified several different types of code-switching. Instagram users prefer English for a variety of purposes, from improving language skills to reaching a worldwide Instagram audience.

One of the issues the world has suffered from over centuries is slavery. Slavery was found in many different forms and all around the world from East to West. With respect to slavery in Africa, there is much there to discuss. In the early fifteenth century, the Portuguese travelers started “the Moorish stronghold” in Centa, in North Africa (Ferguson, 1992: 11). This, as a result, made it easy for Europeans to enter Black Africa. Portuguese traders were interested in gold rather than slaves (Lovejoy, 2000: 36). ). For the second half of the fifteenth century, the number of the Portuguese slave trade mounted to 80,000 along the Mauritanian, Senegambian, and Upper Guinea coast due to buying gold in the region of Senegambian (ibid: 37). With the expansion of slavery in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the number of slaves had increased. This slavery expansion had its effect when the British system colonized Sierra Leone in West Africa (Keefer, 2021: 39). The current study attempts to analyse the ideologies of English writers on African slaves in the late eighteenth century: Thomas Winterbottom’s first volume of Native Africans in the Neighbourhood of Sierra Leone (1803) and John Matthews’s A Voyage to the River Sierra-Leone, on the Coast of Africa (1788).

Fandom is seen as a unique community that has somehow developed a unique language used among themselves. Korean Wave (Hallyu) fandom is one of the fandoms that has been receiving a considerable amount of public and media attention due to its worldwide popularity. Because of that, Hallyu fans from around the world, especially K-pop fans, frequently engage or communicate using certain terms and phrases that individuals outside of the fandom may well not understand, whether through in-person interactions or online communication. Hence, the present study intends to investigate the language use pattern and attitudes of transnational K-pop fans in online text communities on social networking site, Twitter. The study primarily focuses on global fans with diverse backgrounds. Sociolinguistic data obtained from ethnographic observations, with fan tweets being the major source, and qualitative surveys, provide insights into types of fandom language use within the community and the thoughts behind using those terms. The findings revealed three main patterns of fandom language use: Korean subcultural, English with K-pop meanings, and English Korean words. Moreover, this study provided fans’ language attitudes and how fans felt a sense of belonging as a reflection through using fandom language in the community.

This thesis aims to establish the main outline of the ethnolinguistic vitality of the Uyghur diaspora in Munich, which is the centre of Uyghur political activism in Germany and Europe. The Ethnolinguistic Vitality Theory, introduced by Giles et al. (1977), was adopted to address the notion of heritage language maintenance. The objective data was collected from secondary sources and subjective vitality perceptions were collected from 36 first- and second-generation Uyghur speakers with the help of Subjective Vitality Questionnaire introduced by Bourhis et al. (1981). The questionnaire was adapted to this thesis with four additional questions, and the respondents were asked to focus only on the vitality perceptions of Uyghur community. Additionally, data from 24 second-generation Uyghur students enrolled at Uyghur Mother Language School was collected in order to address the concept of heritage language education. The purpose in this regard was to determine the students’ degree of biliteracy and bilingualism by using the Language Rating Scales (self-ratings) of reading, writing, speaking, and understanding tasks in Uyghur and German languages. The collected objective data from various sources, the subjective vitality perceptions, and the Uyghur students’ self-ratings of language skills were analysed both qualitatively and quantitatively. The results demonstrated the current outline of the Uyghur diaspora in terms of language maintenance. It was indicated that Uyghurs in Munich act as a distinct entity with collective values. A noteworthy amount of scepticism was determined among the respondents regarding the future aspect of Uyghur language maintenance. Nevertheless, the majority of the respondents showed positive attitudes for the future of Uyghur as a heritage language in Munich. The results of the Language Rating Scales identified a gap between bilingualism and biliteracy levels amongst Uyghur students, with lower proficiency in the heritage language literacy skills and a dominance of the German language. Overall, it is believed that the results of this study contributed to filling in the context of heritage language maintenance of Uyghur diaspora in Munich.

Humoras – dažnai vartojama ir gerai žinoma sąvoka, kurią galime aptikti įvairiose srityse. Dėl savo sudėtingumo, humoras sukelia nemažai vertimo problemų, stengiantis jį perteikti iš vienos kalbos į kitą. Šiuo magistro darbu siekiama išanalizuoti ir palyginti humoro vertimą tiriamojo filmo subtitruose, lyginant originalius subtitrus anglų kalba bei vertimus lietuvių bei vokiečių kalbomis. Darbe aptariamos pagrindinės humoro vertimo problemos, pasirinktos strategijos, minimi humoro tipai bei pasirinktų specifinių sprendimų priežastys. Taikant lyginamąjį, kiekybinį ir kokybinį duomenų analizės metodus, dėmesys sutelkiamas į lingvistinio ir kultūriškai grįsto humoro atvejų palyginimą filmo „Ratai” (2006) subtitruose. Pirmoje darbo dalyje (2 ir 3 skyriai) pristatoma humoro sąvoka (Vandaele 2012) ir tipologija (Schmitz 2002; Crystala 2003), apžvelgiamos pagrindinės humoro vertimo problemos (Lendwai 1996, Zabalbeascoa 1996) ir strategijos (Attardo 2002) bei subtitrų vertimo specifika (Pedersen in Chiaro 2008). Taip pat pristatomas humoro vertimas animacijoje (Harvey 2009; Chiaro 2010). Ketvirtasis skyrius pristato šiame darbe naudotus metodus ir duomenis. Antroje darbo dalyje (5 ir 6 skyriai) pateikiama filmo subtitruose nustatytų kultūrinio ir lingvistinio humoro atvejų analizė. Joje atskirai nagrinėjami kultūrinio humoro (tyrimo metu jų buvo nustatyta dvidešimt aštuoni) bei lingvistinio humoro atvejai (tokių buvo nustatyta septyniasdešimt du). Pateikiami ir lyginami pavyzdžiai anglų, lietuvių ir vokiečių kalbomis pabrėžiant tiriamasias humoro vietas bei atliktos gimtakalbių vokiečių kalbos apklausos rezultatus. Atlikto tyrimo rezultatai parodė, jog filmo „Ratai” (2006) subtitrų vertimuose į lietuvių ir vokiečių kalbas ženkliai didesnė humoro dalis buvo perteikta išlaikant humoro efektą nei jį prarandant. Tai buvo pastebėta tiek kultūrinio tiek lingvistinio humoro vertimo atvejais. Buvo pastebėta, kad sėkmingai pasirinkta vertimo strategija lėmė sėkmingą humoro perkėlimą į vertimo kalbą. Pagrindinės vertimo strategijos humoro perkėlimui į lietuvių ir vokiečių kalbas buvo substitucija bei reprodukcija. Taip pat tyrimo metu paaiškėjo, kad, norint identifikuoti atskirų lingvistinio ar kultūrinio humoro atvejų humoristiškumą, būtina subtitrų tekstą sieti su filmo vaizdais, kontekstu ir intonacija, nes tai padeda suprasti konkretaus atvejo situaciją.

Creating natural-sounding chatbots is increasingly more difficult given their wide range of applications. Use of a particular register may make a patient’s experience more comfortable and satisfactory, or the opposite, and previous studies have shown that register may be a factor in evaluating trustworthiness and credibility. Furthermore, there are many ethical implications, which may or may not be linked to register, involved in the interaction between user and chatbot during consultation or treatment. To understand how formality may be adjusted to fit appropriate circumstances, it is necessary to identify the characteristics of register amongst existing healthcare chatbots. This thesis will replicate the method that Chaves et. al 2019 applies in their study to conduct register analysis. To do so, this master’s thesis analyses the linguistic register of various English chatbots in the healthcare field, applies the results to establish guidelines for healthcare chatbot creation, and produces a corpus of existing healthcare chatbot scripts.