VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Non-conflating Roots: The Syntax of Light Verbs and Complex Predicates in Ngarinyman

A long-standing view of light verb constructions (LVCs) is that they fundamentally differ from regular verbal predicates (Jespersen 1940, Butt 1995). Underpinning this view is the idea that LVCs are complex, while regular predicates are simple (Butt 2010). However, neoconstructionist theories of syntax, especially since Hale & Keyser (1993), have taken the view that all verbal predicates have complex syntactic structure, comprising at least an abstract v/Voice head and a complement (VP/NP/AdjP or acategorial root) (Marantz 1997, Borer 2005a, Harley 2008). As a result, LVCs can be modelled using the same underlying syntactic structure as proposed for regular predicates, with the difference between the constructions reducing to surface level phonological exponence (Folli, Harley & Karimi 2005). I present evidence from Ngarinyman (Pama-Nyungan, Australia) that supports the identical syntactic analysis of LVCs and non-LVCs, obviating the need to resort to a construction-specific syntactic operation, such as Argument/Event Fusion (Butt 1995) or Predicate Merger (Baker & Harvey 2010), which is required to map two verbs with their arguments onto one predicate with a single set of arguments. I argue that Ngarinyman LVCs constitute the most transparent spellout of a regular underlyingly complex vP. Specifically, I assume an exoskeletal syntax (Borer 2005a,b, Acedo-Matellán & Mateu 2014) in which acategorial roots Merge with functional heads in the vP. In the absence of a further phonological operation (e.g. conflation) to produce a monomorphemic lexical verb, roots in Ngarinyman are spelled out separately by coverbs, while the span (Merchant 2015, Svenonius 2020) of functional heads in the vP is spelled out by a light verb. I show that this analysis explains asymmetries between light verbs and coverbs, which are unexplained in approaches that treat them both as verbs. I further argue that this analysis accurately predicts the argument structure of Ngarinyman LVCs, which can be modelled solely on the light verb. This proposal entails that Ngarinyman light verbs remain ‘light’ even when they appear in non-LVCs as a so-called ‘heavy verb’ (see Ramchand 2014), correctly predicting Butt’s Generalisation (Butt 2003, Butt & Lahiri 2002). Implications for other languages are discussed.

Keywords: acatagorial roots
Australian languages
complex predicates
coverbs
exoskeletal
light verbs
Advisor: Johns, Alana
A Computational Value-Based Framework for Dynamic Emotion Expression, Suppression and Exaggeration

Psychological research emphasizes that emotion expressions serve important adaptive and communicative social functions to coordinate behavior between people. Yet an equally extensive body of research also suggests that people do not always express the emotions they feel, sometimes even suppressing them to the detriment of their own long-term social, psychological, and physical well-being. Implicit in this tension is the assumption that despite furnishing communicative benefits, expressing emotions, particularly negative emotions, sometimes incurs substantial costs to the expresser. However, researchers have only more recently begun to quantify these costs, and little is known about whether and how people consider these potential benefits and costs when expressing or suppressing their emotions. In my thesis, I propose that emotion expression constitutes a value-based decision and develop both a novel experimental paradigm and computational model to map out the dynamics of this cost-benefit analysis during real-time expressive decisions. I then leverage these tools to show that people flexibly regulate their expressions by calibrating the anticipated costs and benefits of expressing different emotions to the relevant attributes of the social context (e.g., self-interest, partner’s welfare, and overall inequality). Additionally, I subsequently demonstrate how interpersonal processes like reputational concern and its salience during these social interactions influences expressive decisions by selectively priming people to default to expressions of positive emotions like joy and driving them to use their emotion expressions to signal normative social preferences like inequality aversion more strongly. In sum, my thesis presents a novel approach to understanding emotion expression and demonstrates how such an approach can reveal the social cognitive processes that enable people to flexibly express, suppress, or even exaggerate their emotions in different social contexts. My work here lays a foundation for further research to examine not only how other contextual factors influences dynamic emotion expression, but also whether these expressions are effective in signaling their intentions to perceivers, and what perceivers infer from them.

Keywords: Emotion
Expression
Social Behavior
Advisor: Hutcherson, Cendri A
Seeking Health in a Transnational World: A Case Study of Guyanese Citizens and Migrants in the US and Canada

Migrants and people who remain in the country of origin experience structural inequalities and exercise individual agency, resulting in material effects on their health. Transnational theory compels us to look beyond national borders to understand the migrant experience as one that is neither confined nor defined by the country of settlement. Non-migrants, in the country of origin, play an important role in supporting those who have left and are themselves supported by the maintenance of cross-border connections. Drawing on 62 in-depth interviews, this research explores how understandings of health and health-seeking behaviours of Guyanese citizens and Guyanese migrants in Canada and the US are affected by the maintenance of transnational connections across national borders. I employ the concept of therapeutic landscapes to suggest that participants’ understandings of health are not static but informed by their current positionality as a migrant or non-migrant as well as their ability to access care in multiple spaces. This research also extends conceptualizations of migrant medical returns by highlighting the importance of visiting friends and family as a non-biomedical health intervention that forms part of a holistic conceptualization of migrant health. Last, by examining the movement of health products across borders, I show the roles that contemporary and historic inequalities play in shaping the health-seeking behaviours of Caribbean people at home and in the diaspora.

Advisor: Joseph, Janelle
Indigenous Teacher Education Programs: Supporting Indigenous Sovereignty through Indigenous Education

Since the early 1970’s, the Indigenous peoples of Canada have partnered with post-secondary institutions to develop and deliver Indigenous Teacher Education Programs [ITEP], specifically to train and provincially accredit Indigenous teachers to develop and support community-based educational systems and schools. Building from a community’s knowledge, language, and traditional practices, Indigenous teachers are expected to deliver two distinct educational experiences; one that grounded in the community’s cultural worldviews, relationships, and philosophies and the other that delivers non-Indigenous knowledge and skills. Since that time, numerous changes to Indigenous Teacher Education Programs programming have occurred in relation to their structures, delivery formats and content, in response to changing provincial accreditation standards for teacher education, changes to the universities’ mainstream teacher education programs and the changing political and cultural dynamics of Indigenous communities. Although numerous Indigenous teachers have graduated from ITEPs, the rate of academic achievement at secondary and post-secondary levels of Indigenous peoples has not reached parity with Canada’s non-Indigenous population, most notably amongst the on-reserve population of Indigenous peoples in Canada. This case study of one Indigenous Teacher Education Program in central Ontario asked Indigenous graduates, faculty, and community educational leadership to define and articulate an understanding of how Indigenous Teacher Education Programs are perceived in relation to community and grassroots definitions of Indigenous education and the development of Indigenous certified teachers. The findings from this case study demonstrate that individuals involved with Indigenous Teacher Education continue to view ITEPs as essential partners in the development of teachers who can develop and deliver an Indigenous-centered education that is grounded in Indigenous knowledge systems, and to facilitate and strengthen connections to Indigenous philosophies, community relationships, and personal understandings of Indigeneity, wellbeing, and success. ITEPs train Indigenous peoples to become teachers who can critically examine pedagogies, build supportive and caring relationships, and to develop educational leadership capabilities for the implementation, maintenance and strengthening of sovereign Indigenous education systems.

Advisor: McCready, Lance
“Under the guise of change, but not with the intent of change”: Relationship Repair and Renewal in a Required Indigenous Education B.Ed. Course

This dissertation takes up Indigenization within teacher education to argue that institutions of higher education are modern-day Forts. It asked the following three questions of instructors who were teaching a required Indigenous studies course within a Bachelor of Education program: What pedagogical understandings and commitments do the instructors articulate through the descriptions of their teaching? What do the instructors’ narratives reveal about the workings of the institution as a Fort? And, what does the operation of the institution as a Fort suggest about the work of bringing Indigenous knowledges into the institution? These questions shed light on the vision, intentions, and experiences of the instructors (all of whom, in the case of this research, were Indigenous) who were doing this teaching work within settler-colonial institutions where epistemological violence, inclusion as enclosure, and Fort logic are entrenched and normalized.I conducted semi-structured interviews and collaborative conversations for this qualitative project. I was influenced by and drew inspiration from Indigenous Research Methodologies (IRM), though my methodological approach is one where I prioritize ethical commitments to relationality and a slow research process over a prescribed or predetermined set of methodological procedures. As much as the format of a single-authored dissertation allows, I sought to hold up the voices of the individuals who contributed to the research (the participants) and let them speak for themselves. Findings from this research suggest that the instructors’ pedagogies were deeply rooted in ceremony, place, and relationship and were working towards a pedagogy of repair and renewal; ‘The Course’ made the humanness and presence of Indigenous people visible, even while the institution’s structures, systems, procedures, and culture prevented ’The Course’ from creating substantive and transformational change. This research speaks to the need to create both cultural and structural change and bring Indigenous knowledge to the centre of teacher education.

Keywords: Fort logic
Higher education
Indigenization
Pedagogy
Relationship repair and renewal
Teacher education
Advisor: Gaztambide-Fernández, Rubén
“Let the music win!” Towards a Reimagined Choral Pedagogy: A Phenomenological Case Study of Chorister Experience at the Toronto Children’s Chorus

"[The Toronto Children’s Chorus] is committed to the enrichment of children’s lives through the discipline, teamwork, and unique camaraderie of fine choral singing. The unparalleled music education and life-changing opportunities to perform exceptional music in local, national and international venues help to promote the personal welfare, growth and a portfolio of life skills that prepare children to become effective citizens." In this research project, I conduct a critical examination of the Toronto Children’s Chorus (TCC) by providing a phenomenological exploration of its Head Choristers, “the most visible chorister leaders in the Chorus, [who] perform critical roles as ambassadors, role models and leaders,” in an attempt to identify, describe, and document how their experiences have been shaped by the mission, artistic vision, structure, and program of this choral organization. Utilizing data collected from Head Chorister speeches and semi-structured interviews, and informed by Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA), this research seeks to understand the experience of choristers at the TCC and the experiential impact on choristers’ lives in and outside the choral classroom. In understanding the impact of such experiences, this research then assesses whether elements of the organization’s programming and curriculum respond to a ‘reimagined choral pedagogy’. Through the primary lens provided by its Head Choristers, this research investigates the TCC’s vision, structure, curriculum and programs, assessing to what extent it expresses a reimagined approach to choral music education. In so doing, the project articulates what elements of the current TCC approach constitute promising pedagogical practices, and how these practices respect the unique contribution of its choristers, honour the community of which it consists, and its impact on the lives of the choristers as citizens. As promising practices are revealed throughout this research, growing edges and areas of concern also come to light, which are included in the recommendations section of this dissertation.

Keywords: children and youth choirs
choral music education
chorister experience
community singing
Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis
musical encounter
Advisor: Dolloff, Lori-Anne
Academic Writer Identity Construction and Awareness in the Canadian Context: The Experience of Undergraduate Multilingual Student Writers

Many studies have focused on academic writer identity and how it manifests in English writing as an additional language (LX) (Lehman, 2018; Zhao, 2019). However, few studies on multilingual student writers (MSWs) writing in English as their LX have examined students’ awareness of their academic writer identities and the contribution of such awareness to their academic texts. To bridge this gap, I investigated the experiences of undergraduate MSWs in a Canadian academic context. Specifically, I explored the academic writer identity construction of these learners, the extent of their awareness of these identities, and how awareness of such identities contributes to their actual writing. I also examined the extent to which reader-instructors construct learners’ academic writer identities, the (non-)linguistic features of the texts that support readers’ inferences about students’ academic writer identities, and whether there are discrepancies or similarities between the academic writer identities that student participants intended to project in their text and the identities that readers constructed. The study’s theoretical framework encompassed a social constructivist view of identity (Ivanič, 1998), critical language awareness (Fairclough, 2013), translanguaging theory (Garcia, 2009), and systemic functional linguistics (Halliday, 1994). Nine undergraduate students and three instructors participated in this research. Semi-structured interviews, final papers, and an-open-ended questionnaire were used to collect data. Data analysis followed Creswell’s (2015) six step process for interpreting qualitative data. Findings suggest that (a) MSWs’ respective academic writer identities are (re)constructed and influenced by various elements, such as privileging power and instructors’ biases in their academic setting; (b) their academic writer identity awareness is associated with their (non-)linguistic choices, and such awareness affects their self-representation in their texts; (c) readers draw on various (non-)linguistic features to construct the academic writer identities of the writers, and (d) many factors can cause discrepancies between writers’ intended identities and the identities inferred by readers, such as the extent of writer’s awareness of influential factors on self-representation in the text, challenging writing conventions, and cultural differences between reader and writer. The study concludes by discussing the implications of the results and proposing recommendations for future research.

Keywords: academic writer identity awareness
academic writing
identity
multilingual student writers (MSWs)
voice and academic writer identity
Advisor: Rehner, Katherine
Gothic acoustemology: Listening for presences in pandemic arts education

This dissertation employs a Gothic lens to identify the fundamental disruptions and alterations to arts educator acoustemologies (Feld 1996, 2003, 2006, 2015) during the COVID-19 pandemic. I ask two central questions: How did the COVID-19 pandemic impact arts-based acoustemologies for participating educators? How can the application of a Gothic lens to pandemic-impacted arts acoustemologies help educators respond to the new realities of pandemic-emergent education? I here forge a new connection between public school teaching and acoustemology (Feld 1996, etc.), or knowledge through sound. Acoustemology, as Feld (2020) intended it, is about “thinking about ordinary, everyday practices of listening and hearing and … how they are connected to meaning making” (p. 129) which is highly relevant to classroom teaching. I identify education as a largely un/sounded phenomenon that has been utterly transformed since March 2020. Even prior to this time, sound has been a neglected aspect of education (Wargo, 2018a) with significant implications for learning spaces and student experiences (Gallagher et al., 2017). This is evidenced throughout this dissertation in sound’s presence – and, most noticeably, its absence. Through field trip methodology, I examine sound-based media ‘artefacts’ shared by seven high school arts teachers – drama, dance, and visual art, with a focus on music – which serve to highlight the dramatic changes in education during the 2020-21 and 2021-22 school years in the Toronto District School Board (TDSB), one of the largest public school boards in North America. The Gothic presents a vital critical framework for revealing these pandemic-impacted acoustemologies, as it validates the barely-there, the barely-seen, the barely-heard. It legitimizes silences, un/soundings, the imagined, and the audiated as knowledges; and honours the sonic surreal, and the sonic surreality, of pandemic teaching in a way that resonates with participant experiences. Through the application of eight key Gothic tropes – architecture, the uncanny, transmogrification, spectrality, melancholy, nostalgia, resilience, and existential dread – I argue that the pandemic was a truly Gothic experience. This understanding provides a helpful tool for revealing the odd and eerie ways in which education and its sounds have been utterly transformed. Some – but not all – of the radical pandemic sonic alterations to ‘classroom life’ were ephemeral; and so this dissertation also serves, importantly, as both earwitnessing (Schafer, 1994; Foreman, 2011; Hemsworth et al., 2017; Wargo, 2018b), and testimony.

Keywords: acoustemology
arts
education
Gothic
pandemic
sound studies
Advisor: Dolloff, Lori A
Implementation of Clinical and Molecular Strategies for Modeling and Interrogation of STAT1 Gain-of-Function

Signal transducers and activator of transcription (STATs) are homologous transcription factors, which bind DNA competitively to exert both overlapping and opposing functions. STAT1 mediates the signaling of some type I, II and III interferons (IFNs), pivotal cytokines in host immunity. STAT1 gain-of-function (GOF) is a rare monogenic disorder identified in 2011, caused by enhanced STAT1 activation. The most common STAT1 GOF manifestation is chronic mucocutaneous candidiasis (CMCC), caused by an imbalance between STAT1 and STAT3 signaling, leading to decreased anti-fungal immunity. However, beyond CMCC which is shared by all patients, the clinical spectrum of STAT1 GOF is broad. Some patients experience isolated CMCC, while others suffer from opportunistic infections, severe autoimmunity and early mortality. As STAT1 GOF is both rare and a recently-coined entity, much remains unknown regarding its molecular mechanism(s), pathophysiology, and course. As the only curative treatment for STAT1 GOF is allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant, it would be prudent to know early what high-risk patients should be offered this invasive and challenging treatment. However, there is no established genotype-phenotype correlation for the disease, hindering our ability to intervene proactively. From a mechanistic standpoint, some patients develop disease manifestations which appear out of keeping with enhanced IFN-dependent gene expression, such as severe viral infections. Moreover, while a third of patients develop autoimmunity, it is not known whether this phenomenon is a direct outcome of abnormal STAT1 signaling, or mediated by recurrent infections. In this work, I clinically established that patients with mutations in the DNA-binding domain (DBD) of STAT1 had a severe phenotype, with increased prevalence of invasive/opportunistic infections, autoimmunity, and lower probability of survival compared with patients with other mutations. Subsequently, I created a series of cell models of known STAT1 mutations, identifying mutation-specific transcriptional profiles in response to various stimuli. Finally, I generated a mouse model of a human DBD mutation, studying the development of spontaneous autoimmunity and its accompanying immunophenotypic and transcriptional changes. I anticipate that this work will have both an immediate impact on patient counselling and clinical management, while generating further avenues for exploration of both STAT1 GOF and STAT1 biology.

Advisor: Cohn, Ronald D
The Decolonial Potentialities Inherent in Dreaming for the Teacher and the Classroom: Reawakening the Dreamer

Abstract This doctoral dissertation examines the intersections of dreaming, decolonization and teacher praxis. The research questions that have propelled this work are: Can cultivating a relationship with dreaming initiate and or facilitate the decolonizing process for the teacher? How does engaging the teacher in dreamwork help to decolonize the teacher’s praxis in the classroom? What are the impacts of colonial systems and structures within schooling that influence teacher and student wellbeing? This qualitative study utilized the phenomenological method and theoretical frameworks grounded in anticolonialism, decolonization and critical spirituality. During this study I conducted dreamwork with four teachers over the course of approximately six months to a year. Through the data collected in interviews and focus groups, this study explored the participants experiences of the schooling system that they were working in and their internal dreamworlds via dreamwork. The themes that emerged from this study are about participants processing the colonial experience and reconnecting to what colonization has invalidated through four main themes: relationships, connection with nature, honouring emotions and self-empowerment. The main findings also demonstrated an enhancement in wellbeing and mental health in terms of empathy and self-reflection. Moreover, the study highlighted the emergence of the decolonial potentialities of dreaming and dreamwork which were the reconnection of mind, body and soul, symbolic thinking, validity of spirituality and the honouring of multiple worldviews. The implications for the teacher and the classroom are extrapolated as well as the recommendations for the classroom.

Keywords: Decolonial Pedagogy
Decolonization
Dreaming
Teacher Praxis
Advisor: Wane, Njoki N