IJALEL vol 5 no 3 2016

International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature ISSN 2200-3592 (Print) ISSN 2200-3452 (Online) Pioneering in Language & Literature Discovery International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature All papers on which this is printed in this book meet the minimum requirements of "Australian International Academic Centre PTY LTD." All papers published in this book are accessible online Editors-in-Chief · John I Liontas, University of South Florida, United States · Jayakaran Mukundan, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia · Zosia Golebiowski, Deakin University, Australia Managing Editor · Seyed Ali Rezvani Kalajahi, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Journal Information ISSN Print: 2200-3592 ISSN Online: 2200-3452 ISBN: 978 -600-5361-84-1 Website: www.journals.aiac.org.au/index.php/IJALEL E-mail: editor.ijalel@aiac.org.au Publisher Australian International Academic Centre PTY LTD 11 Souter Crescent, Footscray VIC 3011, Australia Phone: +61 9028 6880 Website: http://www.aiac.org.au Hardcopy Providers LuLu Press Inc Digital Print Australia 3101 Hillsborough Street Raleigh, NC 27607 United States 135 Gilles Street, Adelaide South Australia 5000 Australia Website: www.lulu.com/spotlight/AIAC Website: www.digitalprintaustralia.com 2012 – 2016 © IJALEL No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photo print, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher ii IALEL Editorial Team Editor(s)-in-Chief John I Liontas, University of South Florida, United States Zosia Golebiowski, Deakin University, Australia Jayakaran Mukundan, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Managing Editor Seyed Ali Rezvani Kalajahi, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Senior Associate Editors Ahmad M Al-Hassan, Bremen University, Germany Ali Miremadi, California State University, United States Biook Behnam, Islamic Azad University, Tabriz, Iran Christina Alm-Arvius, Stockholm University, Sweden Eugenio Cianflone, University of Messina, Italy Haifa Al-Buainain, Qatar University, Qatar Hossein Farhady, University of Southern California, United States John W Schwieter, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada Juliane House, University of Hamburg, Germany Kazem Lotfipour-Saedi, Ottawa University, Canada Kimberley Brown, Portland State University, United States María-Isabel González-Cruz, University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC), Spain Mats Oscarson, University of Gothenburg, Sweden Meixia Li, Beijing International Studies University, China Mojgan Rashtchi, IAU North Tehran Branch, Iran Moussa Ahmadian, Arak University, Arak, Iran Nurten Birlik, Middle East Technical University, Turkey Roger Barnard, The University of Waikato, New Zealand Ruth Roux, El Colegio de Tamaulipas & Universidad Autonoma de Tamaulipas, Mexico Sebnem Toplu, EGE University, Turkey Seyyed Ali Ostovar-Namaghi, Shahrood University of Technology, Iran Simin Karimi, University of Arizona, United States Wan Roselezam Wan Yahya, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Xitao Fu, Zhanjiang Normal University, China Yolanda Gamboa, Florida Atlantic University, United States Yuko Goto Butler, University of Pennsylvania, United States Zdenka Gadusova, Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, Slovakia Zia Tajeddin, Allameh Tabatabai University,Tehran, Iran Associate Editors Ahmed Gumaa Siddiek, Shaqra University, Saudi Arabia Anne Dragemark Oscarson, University of Gothenburg, Sweden Asghar Salimi Amirghayeb, Maragheh University, Iran Bahman Amani, University of Malayer, Iran Bilge Öztürk, Kocaeli University, Turkey Christopher Conlan, Curtin University, Australia Efstathios (Stathis) Selimis, Technological Education Institute of Kalamata, Greece Fan-Wei Kung, Queen’s University Belfast, UK Ferit Kilickaya, Mehmet Akif Ersoy University, Turkey Javanshir Shibliyev, Eastern Mediterranean University, Cyprus Maryam Azarnoosh, IAU, Semnan, Iran Naser Nayif AlBzour, Al AlBayt University, Jordan Natasha Pourdana, Gyeongju University, South Korea Obaid Hamid, The University Of Queensland, Australia Rachel Adams Goertel, Pennsylvania State University, United States Reza Kafipour, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran Shaofeng Li, University of Auckland, New Zealand Vahid Nimehchisalem, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia iii Distinguished Advisors Brian Tomlinson, Leeds Metropolitan University, UK Charles Goodwin, University of California, Los Angeles, United States Claire Kramsch, University of California, United States Dan Douglas, Dan Douglas , Iowa State University, United States Hossein Nassaji, University of Victoria, Canada Jalal Sokhanvar, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran Roger Nunn, The Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi, UAE Susan Gass, Michigan State University, United States Advisors Ian Bruce, The university of Waikato, New Zealand Kristina Smith, Pearson Education, Turkey Oytun Sozudogru, University of York, UK Saeed Kalajahi, University of Göttingen, Germany Steve Neufeld, Middle East Technical University, Cyprus Editorial Panel Abdolvahed Zarifi, Yasouj University, Iran Ali Albashir Mohammed Al-Ha, Jazan University, Saudi Arabia Ali Asghar Yousefi Azarfam, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Bakhtiar Naghdipour, Eastern Mediterranean University, Cyprus Bora DEMIR, Canakkale Onsekiz Mart University, Turkey Cecilia Chu, Hong Kong Institute of Education, China Dawn Rogier, Embassy of the United States of America, Philippines Ebrahim Samani, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Erdem AKBAS, University of York, UK Farah Ghaderi, Urmia University, Iran Farid Parvaneh, IAU, Iran Gerry Loftus, University of Buckingham, UK Hossein Saadabadi, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Isa SPAHIU, International Balkan University, Macedonia Jiaoyue Chen, University of Southampton, United Kingdom Mahdi Alizadeh Ziaei, The university of Edinburgh, UK Neslihan Ưnder Ozdemir, Uludağ University, Turkey Noelia Malla García, Complutense University of Madrid, Spain Ưnder ÇAKIRTAŞ, Bingưl University, Turkey Orkun CANBAY, Qatar University, Qatar Özge CAN, Dokuz Eylül University, Turkey Reza Vaseghi, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Ruzbeh Babaee, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Seyyed Ali Kazemi, Islamic Azad University, Iran Shannon Kelly Hillman, University of Hawaii, Hawaii Tin T Dang, Vietnam National University, Vietnam Yasemin Aksoyalp, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poland Book Reviews Editors Marilyn Lewis, University of Auckland, New Zealand Former Editors Dan J Tannacito, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, United States Kourosh Lachini, University of Qatar, Qatar Leyli Jamali, IAU Tabriz, Iran Deceased Editors Cem Alptekin, Boaziỗi University, Turkey iv Vol No 3; May 2016 Table of Contents Articles The Planning Policy of Bilingualism in Education in Iraq Bilal Huri Yaseen, Hani Shakir, YM Hajah Tenku Mazuwana Bt T Mansor 1-6 Acquiring the English Causative Alternation: Evidence from the University of Jordan Aseel Zibin, Abdel Rahman Altakhaineh 7-15 Ideology of Exile and Problematic of Globalization in Al Baraduni's Poetry Rashad Mohammed Moqbel Al Areqi 16-25 The Effects of Portfolio Use in Teaching Report Writing: EFL Students' Perspective Hussein Taha Assaggaf, Yousef Salem Bamahra 26-34 Revising and Metadiscourse in Advanced EFL/ESL Writing Urška Sešek 35-45 Whole Language-Based English Reading Materials Dian Erlina, Ilza Mayuni, Sabarti Akhadiah 46-56 Exploring EFL Learners’ Attitudes toward the Application of a Model of Writing Eportfolio Aliasghar Yousefi Azarfam, Arshad Abd Samad, Nooreen Noordin 57-68 Deleuzian Reading of Nomadology, War Machine and Transferring from Being to Becoming in Mahmoud Dowlatabadi’s Kalidar Fataneh Zaheri 69-72 Genetic Study on Jade as the Origin of Chinese Civilization Juan Wu 73-80 The Illusion of Untranslatability: A Theoretical Perspective with Reference to the Translation of Culture-Bound Euphemistic Expressions in the Qur'an A.Ali H Al-Saidi, Sabariah Md Rashid 81-90 Cognitive Systematicity of Semantic Change: Cross-Linguistic Evidence Baseel A AlBzour 91-98 Developing the Basic English Language Skills in Nigerian Colleges of Education: A Case Study of Three Colleges of Education Oris Tom-Lawyer 99-112 Wartime Women Rape: A Means of Moral Attack and Emasculation in Lynn Nottage’s Ruined Elaff Ganim Salih, Hardev Kaur, Wan Roselezam Wan Yahya 113-120 Linguistic Parallelism in “La Belle Dame Sans Mercy” by John Keats and Urdu Poem “Husan ki Divy” by Shevan Rizvi Shaukat Khan, Ajmal Khan, Abdul Majeed Al-Tayib Umar 121-132 Effects of English and Persian Subtitles on Oral Fluency and Accuracy of Intermediate Iranian EFL Learners Fatemeh Khosh Ayand, Sajad Shafiee 133-144 IELTS and Academic Success in Higher Education: A UAE Perspective Kevin Schoepp, Dawn Garinger 145-151 The Effect of Orthographic Knowledge on Word Identification and Reading Comprehension of Iranian EFL Learners Masoud Khalili Sabet, Omid Ostad v 152-160 The Effect of Thematic Classes on English Vocabulary Learning: A Study of Iranian Junior High School Students Zeinab Mahmoudi, Narjes Ghafournia 161-171 Evaluating the Effect of Metacognitive Strategy Training on Reading Comprehension of Female Students at KAU Suhaila Albazi, Nadia Shukri 172-183 Linguistic Aspects of Arabic-English Code Switching on Facebook and Radio in Australia Albtool Alhazmi 184-198 Human Connections in Red Badge of Courage Syed Afroz Ashrafi 199-202 The Portrayal of Liberation and the Niger Delta Question in Arnold Udoka’s Akon, Long Walk to a Dream and Iyene: A Dance Drama Jonas Egbudu Akung 203-211 Audiovisual English-Arabic Translation: De Beaugrande's Perspective Alaa Eddin Hussain, Ahmad Khuddro 212-225 Literary Theory and Criticism: An Unaffordable Buzzword in English Literature? Naushad Umarsharif Shaikh 226-236 Ideological Traces in Political Texts: A CDA Approach towards News Representation and Translation of Iran’s Nuclear Program in English and Persian Written Media Mahdi Aslani 237-246 The Influence of Writing Beliefs on Two Chinese EFL University Students’ Use of Peer Feedback: An Ecological Perspective Ma Jingjing 247-256 The Sacred Sin A Brief Analysis of the Narrative Structure of Dual Irony in The Spire Qigang Liu 257-260 Effects of Board Game on Speaking Ability of Low-proficiency ESL Learners Yong Mei Fung, Yeo Li Min Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) as Sociolinguistic and Sociological Conception: Possibilities and Limits of Theoretical Framework Mariia Rubtcova, Oleg Pavenkov, Irina Khmyrova-Pruel, Tatiana Malinina, Irina Dadianova 261-271 272-281 The Perception of English Modals among Arab Language Learners Mahmoud Al-Qudah, Ayman Yasin 282-289 vi International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature ISSN 2200-3592 (Print), ISSN 2200-3452 (Online) Vol No 3; May 2016 Flourishing Creativity & Literacy Australian International Academic Centre, Australia The Planning Policy of Bilingualism in Education in Iraq Bilal Huri Yaseen (Corresponding author) Al-Anbar Directorate of Education Ministry of Education, Iraq E-mail: byaseen2010@gmail.com Hani Shakir Al-Anbar Directorate of Education Ministry of Education, Iraq E-mail: hanishakir.ird@gmail.com YM Hajah Tenku Mazuwana Bt T Mansor Faculty of Modern Languages and Communication, University Putra Malaysia, Malaysia E-mail: wana@upm.edu.my Received: 06-11-2015 Accepted: 25-01-2016 Advance Access Published: March 2016 Published: 01-05-2016 doi:10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.5n.3p.1 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.5n.3p.1 Abstract Iraq as a multicultural and multilingual country has different languages as Arabic, which is the dominant language, and it also has some other minority languages, such as Kurdish, Turkish, Syriac etc Over the last 80 years, Iraq which was involved in some political struggles, had faced many internal problems regarding the Arabic domination that occurred, and this was owing to the absence of clear language policy used Children learning in the Iraqi system, for instance, speak and study all courses in Arabic, while speaking and using their own culture at home tend to be done in their first language The minorities’ language usage in Iraq was ignored both inside the schools as well as in the curriculum construction So this study focuses on the following issues: the first issue is, What is the strategy of language planning policy in Iraq? the study discusses the strategy and the planning educational system that Iraq applies now, the second issue is, What is the status of minority languages in Iraq? Iraq is a multicultural county and has many minorities communities with different languages, the third issue is, What are the challenges of language in Iraq? as long as there is different languages within one country the study also focuses on the challenges that been faced in the planning policy system, and the last issue is, Is there a homogenous relationship during the current policy? How? the study shows the homogenous relationship inside the current policy and the researches give many suggestions and recommendations regarding to the current policy and what is needed for improving the educational planning policy system Keywords: Planning Policy, Bilingualism, Education, Culture, Harmony, Language Shift Introduction It has been estimated through various estimations throughout the world that two out of three people all over the world are either multilingual or bilingual; or in other words, over half of the world population regularly use at least two languages in their daily communication This new century comes together with social facts like Multiculturalism and Multilingualism evident in most school classes and play fields The interpretation of ‘bilingualism’ comes in different ways; for some, it highlights an opportunity to have the ability to communicate in two languages as with Bloomfield (1933, cited in Mackey, 2000), Macnamara (1967) and Weir (2000) For others, it simply suggests the ability to communicate in two languages, but with higher skills in one language as with Titone (1972, cited in the Harmers & Blank, 2004), states that Bilingualism serves as the capacity of an individual to speak a second language based on its structures and patterns, without any pragmatic transfer from the first language Iraq as a multicultural and multilingual country has different languages as Arabic, which is the dominant language, and it also has some other minority languages, such as Kurdish, Turkish, Syriac etc Over the last 80 years, Iraq which was involved in some political struggles, had faced many internal problems regarding the Arabic domination that occurred, and this was owing to the absence of clear language policy used After the invasion by the Americans and the coalition forces of Iraq in 2003, a new era had begun, in which many international companies, NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations), and the emergence of oil and gas investors were established in the country to urge the government of Iraq to think seriously about many matters that had curbed the development of the new era Thus, due to the lack of clear policy, there were some internal and external needs to use the multilingual system such as adding English and Kurdish languages in the economic, commercial, education system, universities, communication, to name a few In relation to these needs and others from the Iraqi society to look after the IJALEL 5(3):1-6, 2016 minority languages in the new Iraqi educational system, the government had no other choice but to respond to the demands of the various parties Children learning in the Iraqi system, for instance, speak and study all courses in Arabic, while speaking and using their own culture at home tend to be done in their first language In consequence, many children did not receive any education in their mother tongue; the over whelming numbers of students were members of the linguistic minority or an ethnic, while Arabic as language and culture conquered the school Then necessary need for the people of Iraq and especially students is to keep abreast with the globalization and the increasing development to trade and all other economic problems A lot of English institutes motivated the Iraqi government to change its education system policy and move towards internationalism and globalization The higher committee of Education in Iraq had posed a law to the Iraqi parliament on 2005 which asks to make Iraq as bilingual in its education system and to permit the schools to adopt curriculum in English language to be provided and taught to all students and as well as to use Kurdish as substitute language instead of Arabic in their regions of Kurd's majority Actually, this created as at is faction to the parent so the students who may create a jump in the Iraqi educational system Regarding English ,most of the parents are sending their children to private languages institutes in order to give a chance to their children to acquire and learn the English language as is an added value tothe students’ qualifications The mentioned is embedded in the new development that Iraq recently witnessed in all fields as education, trade, human resources, industries and companies and non-governmental organizations; which altogether gave the motive to the government to find feasible policies that serve and lead Iraqis toward upholding internationalism The Study Questions What is the strategy of language planning policy in Iraq? What is the status of minority languages in Iraq? What are the challenges of language in Iraq? Is there a homogenous relationship during the current policy? How? Statement of the Problem Curriculum planners have identified bilingualism between both the home and school in Iraq as a problem, where it does not lead to balanced chance of language usage that may impose harmful troubles in the society, and also, it poses serious challenges for the Iraqi educational system The educational planning system in Iraq has had to brave a number of difficulties and challenges in the last two decades, which negatively dented its efficacy The main difficulty lies in the fact that there was legislation, but it did not have clear execution; instructions or implementations plan because there was either no real interest to implement or due to political problems like quotas and benefits of political parties and which may be used as a tool of political pressure In effect, Arabic is still the dominant language in the educational system in Iraq, whereas the minorities like, Kurdish and Turkish were under the illusion that their language is formal in schools like the Arabic This opinion had led to a problem in the use of the educational system in the schools The minorities’ language usage in Iraq was ignored both inside the schools as well as in the curriculum construction They (minorities) were not given any choice to learn their mother tongue language outside homes, and just headed to learn the dominant language, which was the formal language "Arabic." However, other minorities still suffered in Kirkuk, Ninawa and some parts of Diyala where Arabic is the only language that was allowed to be taught, while there was an exception of Kurdistan Region schools (the north of Iraq) following the independence of this region from the central ruling of Iraq This study characterized the linguistic diversity status in addition to the minority languages inside Iraq covering four stages: 1- 1925-1958: In this first stage, the Iraqi constitution, draws the basis of the language diversity, and it dwelt into the freedom of learning and using different languages in education with some hesitation to find the solutions to the problem, especially through the legislations and declaration of 1932 The constitutions guaranteed the right of citizens of to get free education (Al-Hirmizi -2003) Unfortunately, all these hopeful legislations did not have a clear public policy 2- 1958-1970: In this stage, there was what is regarded as the ‘dark period’ due to the high ignorance for the minor groups’ languages and all other linguistics’ diversity in spite of different versions of the constitution and legislations issued during that stage of history 3- 1970- 2003: There was a series of political attempts in order to create the feeling of anger of the ethnic minorities towards the Iraqi government; for this reason, the government had to find and modify some articles in the constitution In effect, there are some laws legislated to guarantee the linguistic diversity in addition to the languages of minority ethnic group as well Unfortunately, they were far from realistic; instead it was used to suppress the minorities without offering any real solution or policy for this problem 4- 2003- until now: The constitution included many articles concerning the language of minority ethnic groups and the linguistic diversity with good public policy that had placed Iraq back on track; however, the implementation of these policies and legislation was delayed, as a result of the fight against terrorism and poor financial allocations IJALEL 5(3):1-6, 2016 The development and the status change according to these four stages came about, as the people really need peaceful co-existence, and the increased sense of responsibility as citizens, and promote unity and solidarity between the multicultural groups Hence, the study lays an emphasis on the significance of this issue from different sides taking into account the aspects of national unity, sociocultural, economic, human rights and the danger of repeated remissness of this issue Current Language Policy The Iraqi constitution in its approved law in January 7, 2014 considers Arabic and Kurdish as the two official languages of Iraq In addition, it ensures the right of all Iraqis to educate their children in their mother tongues This can be materialized via public educational institutions or in private schools (Iraqi constitution 2014, Articles3, and 7) The constitution establishes specifically what official languages mean and how this policy is to be carried out Firstly, the official gazette will be bilingual, Arabic and Kurdish All speech and official documents in government organizations such as the Council of Parliament will be in one of the two languages Moreover, it allows the opening of schools for all stages of teaching in Arabic or Kurdish or Turkmen or Syriac, or Armenian or Mandaean in government educational institutions, or any other languages in private educational institutions in lieu with educational guidelines Bank notes, passports and stamps as formal documents will also be bilingual (Iraqi constitution2014, Articles 4, and 8) Article 9: Turkmen language and Syriac language have two official languages in the administrative units that constitute the Turkmen or Syriac as part of the population Article 10:Each region or province has the right to take any other local language as additional official language if most of the population give their approval through the referendum Article 11: Finding a higher committee to adhere to the implementation of this law; and it would be attached to the Council of Ministers, chaired by a representative of the General Secretariat of the Council of Ministers, the membership of a representative of the Kurdistan Regional Government, a representative of the Office of the Chamber of Deputies, assisted by a team of linguists, academics and representatives of the Turkmen and Assyrians and Mandeans and also added, a representative of any other Iraqi languages Article 12: The tasks and quorum of the Committee stipulated in Article 12 of this Law follow instructions thathave been released by the Prime Minister Article -13-: This law aims to: - Firstly, guarantee Constitutional respect, other than activate and organize the use of the Republic of Iraq’s official languages - Secondly, raise and spread the linguistic awareness, towards unifying the components of Iraq and a better instillation and consolidation of both humanitarian and national concepts - Thirdly, achieve the spirit of pride in using their mother tongue - Fourth, to make sure that there are equality and balance between Arab and Kurdish’s rights and privileges to enable them to be used in federal institutions - Fifth, offer support and develop Arabic and Kurdish languages and other languages namely Turkmen, Syriac and Armenian, Mandaean Article -14- Firstly, every Iraqi citizen or foreign citizen is entitled to teach his/her children their respective mother tongue Secondly, every Iraqi ethnicity has the right to establish colleges or institutes and cultural centers or scientific synagogues which uphold the development of language, as well as both culture and heritage Article -15-: The Iraqi Academy of Sciences and the Kurdish Academy are the only reference for the interpretation of terms and words, should there be any misunderstanding Article -16-: Anyone who violates the provisions of this law will be dealt with as follows: - First, impose disciplinary sanctions against him/her if he/she happened to be an official employee Second, warning the unofficial employee to remove the violation in the duration of 15 days, and when he refused to be punishable by a fine of not less than (50) fifty thousand dinars for each day the removal of the violation will be deemed failed - Third, for each affected, reinstate the right to move criminal claims when the provisions of this law are violated Article -17- The Council of Ministers has to release the set of instructions to facilitate the implementation of the law provisions Article -18- This law shall be published in the Official Gazette and implemented after ninety (90) days from the publication date Reasons This law is approved according to the Article (4) of the Constitution, which lays an emphasis on respect towards all the national diversity and language in Iraq The law was firm on the consolidation of the human dimension and the harmony with the Islamic teachings, which stress on respect for all languages, and to enable the basic components of the Republic of Iraq to have a free expression of its need and requirements in their original languages IJALEL 5(3):1-6, 2016 Socio-Cultural Effect The development and spread of the ethnic languages were done by schools, and it was not allowed to open new schools or cultural institutes by the minorities until January 2014 All similar schools that previously opened were under close monitoring of the government; hence, the Kurds, Turkmen and other minor groups were in obligation to study in Arabic For instance, during the period of Ba'ath party, which was in 1968-2003, Turkmen had had to succumb to the darkest era of their history They had to address the requests from the government through signed petitions to close all schools teaching the Turkish in Kirkuk and administrating their areas by Arab employees (Mofaq Kerkuklu, 2007) One can imagine the weakness and the untruthful desire of the Iraqi education system towards the ethnic minority regions before 2003 To spark controversy, in the USA, the government provides some concentrated programs for families and children as EHS (Early Head Start); these aim to consolidate children’s willingness and desire to learn their ethnic language As the families are culturally and linguistically varied their children required literacy experiences in multifarious ways Children under five years might have already been exposed to their mother tongue and their ethnic culture, which is the mother language used in their homes and communities If the reason is down to exposure, subsequent children aged 1-3 years can easily work on their first language, which is the non-English language(Centre, E H 2001) The minority languages or ethnic languages are not adequately cared for, like the other countries; for instance, in China, The National Commission for Minorities (NCM) is the main government committee, responsible for all planning strategies of linguistic minority languages in China, and it aims to keep these languages autonomous (Huang Xing, 2003) The minority had given some bad reactions to this kind of injustice, and this reflects their behaviour towards the other people and their culture Obviously, it also reflects on the social status, especially in the marriages of Kurds, Turkman, Assyrian…etc and the Arabs in Iraq (Kerkuklu, M S 2009) Without a doubt, the essential ways of communication with others lie in the language Learning languages, even under very experienced teachers, is usually placed under long-term programs It establishes the different ways of looking out into the world as well as the human communication It is also worthy of note that learning languages is one the most rewarding intellectual activities imaginable (Willems, 2002) At the end, according to(Curran, 2003), people need to establish a great sense of relations between their communities and further confirm and glorify their linguistic diversity Implications for Language Planning "Language planning refers to deliberate efforts to influence the behaviour of others with respect to the acquisition, structural, or functional allocation of their language codes" (Cooper, 1989: 45) The initial implications of this study rest on the status and the acquisition of English in Iraq’s educational system The study results have shown the worthy linguistic, cultural, political and educational aspects with regard to the profile of English in Iraq Schools and highereducation institutions are the basic frameworks in which languages are studied in a systematic way and which ensure maintenance and vitality Allowing diverse attitudes and receptiveness to a language policy can also motivate English learning Prator (in Cooper, 1989: 31) has this to say: "language policy making involves decisions about the teaching and use of language, and their careful formulation of those empowered to so, for the guidance of others." Thus, planning for English involves both the planning acquisition and its status It is seemingly apparent that there is an urgent need for a strategic plan for a language policy of English principally spurred by ideological and political considerations The low linguistic capital value of English in Iraq deemed unable to draw stronger social elements is due to the perceived low instrumentality of the language and its linkage to supposed hostile elements Malice to its speakers must not evoke a sense of hatred to the language learning A strategic plan for English sees that the macro goals of learning English and the weak recognition of the consumers (users) are arranged At the national level, a rise in the demand for English would inexorably raise its linguistic major value From the sociological viewpoint, the promotion of English in Iraq is fundamentally a function of several factors: national necessity, scientific education media, ideological and political considerations A strategic plan must stress on implementing the motivation for the betterment of English learning The acquisition of English as a strategic plan should then be started It must be introduced with a set of definitions, parameters and positions, concluded after extensive studies, establishing a vision of the status of English and how it will be in Iraq A strategic plan for English then might be called strategic preparation, because it constitutes a preparation for successful treatment of future linguistic and extra linguistic challenges and opportunities Hence, a strategic plan of Bilingualism for English in Iraq Language Maintenance and Shift Language maintenance and shift, as qualified by (Joshua Fishman, 1968) encompass the stability or set of exchange in language use in a particular cultural context of certain inhabited populations, who use more than one language or language variety of intra- or inter-group aims (as cited in Garcia, 2009) Garcia notes that language maintenance and shifts always occur under particular conditions in society:  When there is more than one language being in use in a society IJALEL 5(3):272-281, 2016 275 In answer, Wierzbicka continues to postulate the axiom that she outlined at the beginning of the article: Language is a mirror of culture, as well as being a part of culture (Ibid.) In many scientific disciplines, functionalism does not recognize the differences in cultures It is a typical feature of Parsons’s "structural functionalism" (Parsons, 1952) Actually, functionalistic doctrines in social sciences are macrolevel and «holistic» theories establishing the general rules for interaction which not have cultural, national and gender distinctions (at least from the sociological point of view) The genre approach was developed on this basis as a kind of this functional and institutional approach (Christie, 2005) In this sense SFL functions more like the macro-level of sociolinguistics The typical features of institutional approaches are as follows:  a limited set of established institutional structures (e.g., genres), while their national uniqueness is not recognized; this means that genres not have a national specificity and are common to all cultures  socialisation is an extremely positive phenomenon; in the process of socialization a child should learn / learn by heart the established set of genres / institutions;  there are institutional stakeholders (e.g., teachers) who impose this limited set of institutions (genres) as mandatory; but it would be better if they it in a "dialogue" mode, reducing resistance and diversifying language skills However, the set of institutions should remain unchanged The institutional approach has advantages and disadvantages The advantage is the ability to achieve the main aim due to some reduction of secondary aims However, all secondary goals can be removed and that this process can destroy some important dimensions of the development (see Fig.1) Main aim reduce reduce System full support reduce reduce Figure Advantages and disadvantages of the institutional approach (compiled from Tikhonov, 1999) As we can see in Figure 1, when we work with institutional approaches, we not get new resources (for example, development of the academic skills in English at an early age); we just redistribute the resources that we have and put all of them on one aim However, our secondary aims can help us to adapt to new challenges Thus, while we increase the targeting, we reduce the adaptability of the system (Tikhonov, 1999, 2005) There are two basic SFL limits from the sociological point of view:   Lack of diversity Disharmony of development (See Table 1) Table Limits of SFL as kind of institutional and functional approach from the sociological point of view Problems with: Features: Examples: Lack of diversity work with a variety (cultural, ethnic, gender) Stable scientific genres, mainly Anglo-Saxon origin Disharmony development excessive concentration on one aim which can cause damage to the most complex realization of human abilities and lead to disharmony Teaching the academic scientific genres to children at a rather early age of Adapted from: Tikhonov, 1999; Pavenkova, 2001 IJALEL 5(3):272-281, 2016 276 At the same time, the discussion about these limits is not new to SFL Responses to both objections can be found in Vygotsky's theory In his conception, Vygotsky provided idea of development of scientific concepts and claims that:  scientific concepts are always developed by means of purposeful teaching and this is necessary;  learning a foreign language (and consequently also the development of the academic genres in that language) promotes the development of the native language (and consequently also the academic genre's development in the native language) (Vygotsky, 1986) Table Limits of SFL as kind of institutional and functional approach from the sociological point of view and Vygotskian-related idea Problems with: Lack diversity of Disharmony of development Features: Examples: Vygotsky's answers: work with a variety (cultural, ethnic, gender) Stable scientific genres, mainly Anglo-Saxon origin «Success in learning a foreign language is contingent on a certain degree of maturity in the native language The child can transfer to the new language the system of meanings he already possesses in his own The reverse is also true—a foreign language facilitates mastering the higher forms of the native language The child learns to see his language as one particular system among many, to view its phenomena under more general categories, and this leads to awareness of his linguistic operations» (my Italic) (Vygotsky, 1986:195-196) excessive concentration on one aim which can cause damage to the most complex realization of human abilities and led to disharmony Teaching the academic scientific genres to children at a rather early age Early development of scientific concepts has a huge value and develops a child`s thinking, «the greatest value of scientific concepts for all mental development of a child distinctly established» (Vygotsky, 1934:197; this sentence is absent in translation: Vygotsky, 1986) Adapted from: Vygotsky, 1934; Vygotsky, 1986; Tikhonov, 1999; Pavenkova, 2001 However, Vygotsky's arguments based on the empirical Marxist psychology will not be completely accepted by us Vygotsky established norms, and a deviation as pathology (Vygotsky, 1934: XV) It, of course, conducts to the restriction of diversity and responses to this diversity as an abnormality It is a typical situation for Soviet Marxist psychology; we can observe this process in its further development (Yaroshevsky, 1996) In general, national and cultural distinctions could represent such an abnormality that they have to disappear in communism Not incidentally, it was developed the concept of «Soviet people without nationalistic or ethnic ties» (Grenoble, 2003: 210) Therefore, the sociologists will continue to care about variety of genres in different cultures, because «functionally similar genres in different societies have their histories» (Luckmann, 2009: 278) It is important that Vygotsky's concept concerned also children's age, which also was in some way abnormality and immaturity: сhildhood is only a preparation for future life, but not life itself (see e.g Makarenko, 1986) This question is the cornerstone of Vygotsky's and Leo Tolstoy's discussion While Tolstoy was concerned with violation of the natural process of the child`s development and saw a threat in introduction of new scientific concepts ahead of time without an independent thinking, Vygotsky claims that it cannot any harm (Vygotsky, 1986:150-152) This discussion has long traditions in the Russian culture and means some opposition of rationalistic and more art/religious component in the child`s development What has to be developed first of all: reason/mind or soul? We have to be concerned with the education of souls, and not just transfer of knowledge (e.g Zlatoust, 1995) The modern Russian sociology of education and pedagogics may follow Tolstoy and cannot agree with the concept of childhood as an abnormal and previous period It establishes the need of the full-fledged childhood with childish sports and fairy tales that develop art outlook and prepare for life better than scientific concepts and genres (e.g see Balabanova, 2001) The discussion about the advantages and disadvantages of the SFL conceptual background can continue infinitely as everything eventually depends on how it will be used However, we have to consider that for Russia it looks as some step backward On the one hand, it allows us to address our historical experience, but on the other hand, we not know whether we will be able to take out a worthy lesson from this experience and to compensate the limits of this conception 3.3 Perspectives of SFL Development in the 21th century: Halliday and World Englishes Before the end of the 20th century, SFL began to be considered as some kind of "outdated" old conception It is connected with the general crisis of functional theories and institutional approaches in all social sciences It seemed that IJALEL 5(3):272-281, 2016 277 they cannot give the answer to fast change of the world (Vorontsov et al., 1996) Latour's (2005) doctrine was involved in the pedagogical concepts that were originally based on SFL (see e.g Veel, 1997; Dafouz & Smit, 2014) Actually Latour's conception is extremely negative First of all, it is intended for criticism Its advantage is the reflection about flexibility However, it is insufficiently positive to be the basis for pedagogical concepts (Latour, 2005) In similar circumstances, sociology has preferred the conception of neoinstitutionalism that came from economy and economic sociology (Nort, 1997) Neoinstitutionalism considers the mechanism of institutional changes, and it is more adapted for the high speed of these changes that we have now Above we have shown that SFL is not the ordinary functionalistic social conception because it has the Marxist basis I think the response to the discussion about teaching children at an early age (disharmony of development`s limit) will not follow from Halliday He continues to adhere to the concept in the spirit of Bernstein and Vygotsky because he sees the purpose overcoming of a class and social inequality in society But access to meanings is always limited, by inequalities in the social structure Education is designed to increase people’s access, and it does so by steering them through these evolutionary changes in turn: first we teach children written language, then we teach them standard language (or else both at the same time, depending on the circumstances); and then, perhaps, we may teach them world language (Halliday, 2003: 412) Thus, he don`t think about some ideas about childhood as an independent and valuable period in life In this sense, he establishes another form of inequality - an inequality between children and adults; and from this point of view only adults are full-fledged and developed people (see also: Balabanova, 2001) For justice, it should be noted that Halliday wrote about children's language as resistance to adults (Halliday, 1978) But he has not a special emphasis on childhood as a valuable period in life The other limit – lack of diversity and English as an Anglo-Saxon influence– is a serious subject of discussion in modern Marxism The distribution of the English language in the world can be non-voluntary and obligatory It may conduct to new forms of inequality and humiliation Besides the idea of internalization, joint construction of communism for people all over the world and other Marxist ideas, Halliday gives the answer in the form of anticolonialism: At the same time, the “globe” that provides the context for global English is for the moment at least a world in which the voices of international capitalism, with their triumphalist rhetoric about the failure of people’s first attempt to design something more humane, have learnt to exploit all the semogenic strategies that give language its enormous power For corporations it comes as a bonus, inherited from colonial days, that the language of convenience in so many international contexts is none other than English (Halliday, 2003: 416) First of all, Halliday suggests to refuse English as English became on service of corporations: Many people would like to resist this dominance of English The strategic response would seem to be: away with English Don’t teach it, or anything to perpetuate its standing in the community (Halliday, 2003: 416) However, most likely it will not stop the process and will only cause damage to the population: English is too deeply entrenched, and if people are deprived of the chance of learning it they are the ones who suffer (Halliday, 2003: 416) Then, Halliday makes a distinction between the international and global English and develops the theory of two Englishes: International English has expanded by becoming world Englishes, evolving so as to adapt to the meanings of other cultures Global English has expanded - has become “global” - by taking over, or being taken over by, the new information technology, which means everything from email and the internet to mass media advertising, news reporting and all the other forms of political and commercial propaganda (Halliday, 2003: 416) We could shift from global English to international Englishes and start creating the own project of English considering our mentality, culture, a genre and institutional variety Moreover, we can use our option of English in advance of our ideas: It seems that if you want to resist the exploitative power of English, you have to use English to it… If African and Asian varieties of English are not simply vehicles for their regional cultures but also their communities’ means of access to a culture that is already in effect global, those who speak and write these varieties are not constrained to be only consumers of the meanings of others; they can be IJALEL 5(3):272-281, 2016 278 creators of meanings, contributors to a global English which is also at the same time international Meanings get reshaped, not by decree but through ongoing interaction in the semiotic contexts of daily life; and these have now become global contexts, even if those who participate in them are still only a fraction of the total population of the globe Rather than trying to fight off global English, which at present seems to be rather a quixotic venture, those who seek to resist its baleful impact might better to concentrate on transforming it, reshaping its meanings, and its meaning potential, in the way that the communities in the outer circle have already shown it can be done (Halliday, 2003: 416-417, my italic) This moderate Marxist ideology of SFL can be apprehended positively in the Russian society and pedagogics Also as well as Vygotsky's doctrine, it is an integral part of the Russian culture and it can be the cause of reduction of the strong concern and even public fear of the English language distribution Moreover, Halliday’s proposals open new perspectives of more fair work with English when nobody has imperious advantage The Russians concerned with the presentation of their culture can create the own version of English - Russian English - and establish it as the linguistic standard for Russians and those who wishes to work with them Discussion and Conclusion We analysed the ideological and theoretical principles and limits that are derived from the stages of systemic functional linguistics (SFL) development The SFL pedagogical concept is changing due to the changes in the role of English Firstly, English was taught as the native language to improve knowledge of the poorer classes Then the task of nonEnglish speakers` adaptation in English-speaking countries has been added Now we are talking about the non-native English language development in a non-English environment Of course, such changes have led to changes in the ideological /theoretical basis of the concept The original ideological SFL concept was associated with the ideas of social justice and equality, equal opportunities While we need to understand that, the most interesting ideas arose when the SFL representatives thought about the development of English as a native language and were connected with the overcoming of class distinctions For example, in this case, the desire of a genre-based approach for the systematization of genres carries a risk of cultural contradictions and conflict of cultures The combination of Marxism, which is inflexible from its philosophical nature with the same inflexible functionalism cannot be fully successful in the modern world In this regard, it should be noted that some of the basic theoretical SFL principles are still in the stage of formation, as SFL researchers (e.g Veel, 1997) seek to avoid some rigidity of the classical institutional (genre) approach, which is in contradiction with the principles of diversity Moreover the founder M Halliday offered ideas for the organization of a flexible approach based on the basis of International English that "has expanded by becoming world Englishes, evolving so as to adapt to the meanings of other cultures" (Halliday, 2003: 416) Therefore, an SFL approach still needs some alterations to spread outside the Western world and conform to the new culture for it Besides, we can think about proposals of Halliday’s supporters to develop the own version of English for non-Western countries, considering its culture and mentality References Alpatov, V.M (2014) Language policy in Russia and in the world Language policy and language conflicts in the modern world Moscow Amuzie, G.L., & Winke, P (2009) Changes in language learning beliefs as a result of study abroad System, 37(3), 366-379 doi: 10.1016/j.system.2009.02.011 Balabanova, M (2001) Childhood as philosophical and pedagogical phenomenon [in Russian] SpB: Izdatelstvo RGPU Berger, P.L., & Luckmann, T., (1991) The Social Construction of Reality A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge Penguin Books Bernstein, B (1970) A socio-linguistic approach to socialisation: with some references to educability Directions in Sociolinguistics (eds.) 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Published: 01-05-2016 doi:10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.5n.3p.282 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.5n.3p.282 Abstract This paper aims at investigating the acquisition of English modality among Arab learners of English as a foreign language Specifically, the study limits itself to the perception of modal verbs as a means of expressing modality The productive use of modal verbs were analyzed by examining written texts made by 26 fourth-year students majoring in Applied English at the University of Jordan Moreover, the meaning and function of modal verbs were investigated by asking the subjects to explicitly determine them in given sentences The subjects were also asked to translate these sentences into their native language in an attempt to investigate the effect of the native language on the perception of modality The study concludes that there is a gap in the use of English modal verbs as a way of expressing modality It was found that the differences between Arabic and English modality seems to play an integral role in the misperception of English modality among Arab learners Other factors, like teaching methods, seem to widen the gap Keywords: modality, modal verbs, Arabic, translation Introduction The broad term of modality may be regarded as a vague and a controversial one Searching through the meaning of modality, it is noted that linguists adopt different approaches when clarifying modality Being identified as a semantic term, Palmer (1979:16) defines modality as “the grammaticalization of speaker’s (subjective) attitudes and opinions” Hence, Palmer analyzed modality by the use of ‘modals’ which causes the circularity of the definition However, Brewer (1987) criticized Palmer’s modality of being realized apart from referring to semantic considerations For Brewer, ‘modals’ can be formed according to formal criteria and without any need to refer to semantic considerations In the semantics analysis, modality operates at the sentence level It also refers to the various devices used by the speakers to express the varying degrees of commitment to a proposition In this view, moods are analyzed as means of expressing modality that are related to verb forms or inflections (Saeed, 1997) However, from a grammatical perspective, modality has been discussed differently For Halliday (2014:172), the meaning of modality is narrowed down to the “the speaker’s judgment, or request of the judgment of the listener, on the status of what is being said” These judgments fall in between the polarity’s poles of yes or no, i.e the intermediate degrees of modality lie between the negative and the positive poles of polarity In other words, the modality system illustrates the uncertainty or the possibilities that occurred between yes or no Halliday (2014) classified modality as being an element of mood In this regard, mood is the umbrella term that is composed of modality and polarity Notably, Halliday’s moods are analyzed at the clause level Reviewing the related literature, the lack of well-established studies on the topic of the acquisition of English modality among Arab learners is noticed However, the few studies conducted on this topic indicate that there is low performance of learners of English in the perception of modality Thus, this study is an attempt to clarify the acquisition of English modality among Arab learners of English as a foreign language Literature Review Modality has been defined in different ways due to the different perspectives from which modality has been examined Semantically, modality is viewed as the umbrella term under which moods and modes are recognized (Palmer, 1979; Saeed, 1997) On the other hand, it can be grammatically analyzed as a mood’s element (Halliday, 2014) Perhaps, the nature of modality as a system of showing the ‘speaker’s attitude’ towards a proposition causes this overlap Besga (1995) reached the same conclusion and confirmed that the vagueness of modality as a topic of study resulted from two main reasons The first is not having a clear definition of modality, and the other is related to the different types of modality IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 283 The broadness of modality and the ‘intermediacy’ nature of it seem to affect the researchers’ choice of studying modality This can be noticed among the reviewed literature on the topic of modality, since most of the studies tend to be narrowed down to examining the role of modal verbs in expressing modality (Badran, 2001) For instance, in his study, Brewer (1987) investigates the meaning of English modality and fractivity by limiting his work to modal auxiliaries Similarly, Badran (2001) studies English modality in political texts making use of modal verbs In addition, modal auxiliaries are found to play a crucial role in expressing modality in the statement of objectives for academic papers (Olaniyan, 2015) However, the problem seems to be more complicated when it comes to Arabic modality The main reason for such a case may be due to the fact that the term modality is not found in the Arabic linguistic Yet, the idea of modality and moods as a means to express the speaker’s attitudes and judgments is clearly discussed In Arabic, both concepts are covered under the study of the meanings of the types of sentences and the devices used for that purpose Thus, in an attempt to overcome this, it seems that the Arabic studies of modality have their own indirect way of investigating it This seems to be realized either by the means of examining modality in a specialized context or through performing contrastive studies In a biomedical discourse, Wided (2010) investigates the deontic modality in English, French and Arabic He finds remarkable differences among the three languages since each language expresses deontic modality by the use of certain fixed expressions Mukhaini (2008) traces English and Arabic modality in legal context He confirms that despite the differences in expressing modality between the two languages, both languages provide similar syntacticsemantic realization of modality In a study about Arabic and English modality in translation, Al Qinai (2008) studies the use of modal verbs in translated texts He confirms that modality can not only be expressed through the means of verbs, but it can also be guessed from the context In an attempt to have a fixed background in the topic of modality, Moshref (2012) creates an Arabic corpus for this purpose Yet, she limits her study to modal verbs Regarding Arabic modality and corpus building, Al-Sabbagh, Disner and Girjul (2013) try to set rules of Arabic modality in order to ease the task of annotating them However, the nature of modality and the fact that there is no fixed rules of forming it are the main obstacles for their research Concerning the acquisition of modality among Arab learners of English, Sabri (2011) investigates the perception of English modality among Iraqi learners of English as a foreign language He finds that the examined learners mastered the use of ‘would’ when expressing offer, whereas they failed to express deduction using ‘must’ Moreover, Sabri (2011) asserts that the past tense of the modal verb ‘shall’ causes a problem to Iraqi learners of English, as they used 'should' instead of 'would' Similarly, Saeed (2009) pinpoints that the Arab learners of English not master English modals at the levels of recognition and production Problems in the acquisition of modal verbs of obligation by Macedonian Learners of English were noticed by Mitkovska et al (2014) who elaborate that the influence of the mother tongue plays an essential role in the acquisition of modal verbs When it comes to Halliday’s mood, it is noteworthy pointing that he distinguishes between “mood” and “mode” The former operates as a system of the clause, whereas the latter refers to verbal contrasts from the clausal system of mood Thus, mode is the interpersonal system of the verb such as subjunctive, indicative, and optative mode At the ‘traditional modal logic’, Lyons, (1977) classifies modality into epistemic and deontic While epistemic modality indicates the possibility and the probability of the occurrence of an event, the deontic modality shows obligation and necessity of it Along the same lines, Palmer (1989) classifies two main classes of modality: propositional and event modality The propositional modality’s main concern is the speaker’s attitude to the truth value of the proposition and it is subdivided into epistemic and evidential modality The labels of these subcategories of modality indicate their nature, i.e the epistemic elaborates the speaker's judgment about the factuality of the proposition, whereas the evidential sheds light on the evidence that the speakers have for their judgments Similarly, the event modality refers to the potential events that are not actualized The event modality too is divided into deontic modality and dynamic modality Here, the deontic modality is limited to the obligations and permissions given by the speakers, whereas the dynamic modality refers to the abilities, willingness and wishes (ibid) Another classification of modality can be highlighted according to the events themselves: realis and irrealis Realis modality is used to describe events that are in the real world, whereas irrealis is used for events in the future, past or in the imaginary world (Saeed, 1997) 2.1 The Study Questions The acquisition of modality as a system of expressing the speaker's attitude toward a proposition may be regarded as a complicated process This may be due to the 'intermediacy' nature of modality and the different ways of expressing modality Thus, the acquisition of modality seems to be a good indicator of being at a higher level of the foreign language This study tries to find answers to the following questions: a Do Arab learners of English as a foreign language master the use of modal verbs as a way of expressing modality? b What are the factors that affect the Arab learners’ acquisition of English modality? IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 284 2.2 Arabic and English Modality In an attempt to investigate the similarities and differences between the modality systems of English and Arabic, the modality systems of each language would be discussed below 2.3 English Modality English modality can be expressed lexically and grammatically The most common way that has been highlighted by different researcher is the use of modal verbs Some researchers as Perkins (1980) sheds light on the centrality of modal auxiliaries within the system of modality English modal verbs indicate various degrees of possibility, probability, necessity or certainty, and can be used in the present and past tenses to express these functions However, not all of the meanings of modal verbs express modality, since some modal verbs are used to express future actions Other devices can be used to express modality, Perkins (1980) explains that they can be in the form of: a Quasi-auxiliary modal expressions such as have got to, had better b Modal expressions incorporating adjectives and participles like be going to, be willing to, be evident that c Modal adverbs, such as allegedly, clearly, perhaps, surely, etc d Modal nominal like belief, obligation, proposal, warning, etc e Modal lexical verbs as allow, conclude, hope, promise, etc f Modal 'devices' are used to express irrealis modality like: i Tense as in I wish I were ii If-clauses as in: If I were rich, I would buy Ferrari Saeed (1997) too refers that modality can be realized by means of using certain syntactic structures One way of doing so is embedding the sentence under a higher clause that have a modal expression as in it is certain that and it is probable that Another way is formed by having the modal verb in the higher clause as in: I know that S and I believe that S This study will be concerned with the English modality expressed by modal verbs The perception of the learners toward the various degrees of possibility, probability, necessity or certainty expressed by modal verbs would be examined Here, the differences between the use of modal verbs in the present and the past tense would be highlighted 2.4 Arabic Modality Flicking through the Arabic semantic books and papers, it is founded that the terms “modality” and “mood” are not used among the traditional Arab linguists, who lived in the 8th-10th century AD Yet, the notions of modality and mood as a means to express the speaker’s attitude and judgments are clearly discussed In Arabic, both concepts are covered under the study of the meanings of sentence types and the devices used for forming them The two main types of Arabic sentences are the informative sentences, ʔal-dʒumal ʔal-xabarijja and the compositional sentences ʔal-dʒumal ʔal-ʔinʃa:ʔijja The informative sentence refers to the type of sentences that is used to describe facts and events in the real situations (Amin, 1979) Here, the speaker forms such sentences in order to inform something The truth conditions of such type have to be examined by referring to the real situation: Thahab-a ʕalijj-un ʔila go:PAST-IND Ali-NOM to ‘Ali went to school’ l-madrasa-t-i the-school-F-GEN The sentence in (3) suggests that informative sentences match the indicative mood On the other hand, the imperative and the subjunctive moods are realized under different types of compositional sentences which are that type of sentences formed by the speakers to refer to events and situations that are not found in the real world The truth conditions of such sentences cannot be investigated and thus the speaker cannot be judged as a truthful or a liar This is what distinguishes the compositional sentences from the informative ones (Amin, 1979:55) There are various types of compositional sentences, but the discussion will be narrowed down to the types that indicate modality and mood properties The first type of compositional sentences refers to the highest degree of the speaker’s volition to perform an action; it is the vow construction ‘uslu:b al-qasam’ wa-llah-i I swear-Allab-GEN la-ʔadrus-a-nn EMPH-study-SUBJ-EMPH ‘I swear (by Allah) I am going to study’ Here, the highest degree of the speaker’s volition to study appears from the use of the swear particle wa-, and the use of the emphatic proclitic la- and enclitic -nn that are attached to the verb The wishing construction in Arabic ‘uslu:b ar-radʒa:ʔ’ expresses the speaker’s hopes and wishes of something to happen It is also used as a comment to show sympathy for something that happened in the past An example of the first use of this type is: IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 ʕasa may 285 llah-u ʔan ja-nsSur-a-na: Allah-NOM that IMPF-give victory-SUBJ-1PL:ACC ‘We wish that Allah will help us in our way to victory’ Certain verbs, such as ʕasa are used to express the possibility of the event to occur It is noteworthy here that sentences including such verbs have to be formed according to certain syntactical structures Therefore, it can be inferred that modality in Arabic can be realized lexically and structurally simultaneously On the other hand, there are certain particles that are also used to refer to wishes and hopes or to make comments for past events These particles are lajta ‘wish’ and laʕalla ‘hope’ However, the context plays an integral role in determining the meaning of these particles as shown in the following examples: a laʕalla nћida:ra d-damʕi ja-ʕqub-u ra:ћa-t-an hope falling the-tears IMPF-follow-IND relief-F-ACC ‘It is hoped that tears may cause relief’ b laʕalla-hu hope-it xajr-an good- ACC ‘It might be for your privilege’ c ʔala lajta ʃ-ʃaba:b-a Let wish the-youth-ACC ‘I wish that youth come back’ ja-ʕu:d-u IMPF-return-IND It is noted that a realis modality is indicated in (6a), whereas an irrealis modality is found in (6b&c) There are other ways of pointing to irrealis modality like using interrogative sentences to indicate that something impossible may occur Irrealis modality may also be captured through the use of certain expressions like: a saqa irrigated Allah-u Allah-NOM ‘What a pity (for the past)’ b raћima Allah-u mercy Allah-NOM ‘May Allah have his mercy on’ c d ʕala Allah-i on Allah-GEN ‘Leave it to Allah’ li-llah-i darr-u-k for-Allah-GEN milk-NOM-your ‘May Allah reward you’ Once more, the context plays a crucial role in indicating the meaning and the polarity of such type of modality, i.e whether the irrealis modality refers to positive or negative proposition For example when the expression saqa Allah ‘What a pity’ is found in a sentence that describes past events or situations, it indicates a positive attitude as in: a saqa irrigated Allah-u ʔajjam-a S-Siba: Allah-NOM days-ACC the-youth ‘I long for the days of youth’ On the other hand, this expression indicates negative attitude when it is used to refer to the future: a saqa irrigated Allah-u fura:q-a-k Allah-NOM leaving-ACC-you ‘I wish to get rid of you’ Studying these expressions carefully, it can be inferred how the Arabic environment affects the semantic choice of modality Knowing that our ancestor Arabs made their living by farming and raising cattle seems to be the reason beyond the modality of such expressions Moreover, it can be noticed that the Arabs alluded everything in their lives to Allah and his willing as evident in these expressions This conclusion matches Brewer’s argument for the role of the environment in the selection of modality (Brewer, 1987) IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 286 On the other hand, Arabic realis modality can be formed by the use of certain verbs that refer to possibility, probability, or certainty It has to be highlighted here that the verbs used here indicate various degrees of possibility, probability, and certainty: 10 a jumkinu b justaћsanu c jufaDDalu d juћabbathu e juTHannu ‘may’ ‘it is better’ ‘it is preferred’ ‘I would rather’ ‘It is dubted’ In addition, such modality can be observed through the use of certain syntactic structures and certain modal expressions: 11 a mina b mina c mina d mina l-mumkini l-muћtamili l-mustaћi:li l-muftaraDi ‘It is possible’ ‘It is probable’ ‘It is impossible’ ‘It is supposed that’ To sum up, it can be concluded that Arabic modality is expressed in different ways: 12 a The use of certain modal expression within fixed syntactic structure, like the wishing construction b The use of certain modal lexical verbs and nouns such as ‘mustaћi:l’ and ‘jastaћi:l’ ‘it is impossible’ c The use of certain fixed expressions in certain contexts that determine their polarity 2.5 Mood Apart from Halliday’s definition, mood can be defined as the property of verbs that indicates the speaker’s attitude toward the factuality or possibility of an expressed action or condition (Huddlestone, 1984) It is achieved through a set of verb forms or inflections (Saeed, 1997) In this regard, the ‘mode’ of Halliday’s (2014) interpersonal system of verb can be realized through the use of some modal verbs There are several types of mood which vary according to the factual attitudes expressed by the speakers The major three kinds of mood in Arabic are the indicative mood, the imperative mood, and the subjunctive mood (Huddlestone, 1984; Saeed, 1997) The indicative mood is used to describe factual or real situations like making factual statements, asking questions, or expressing opinions as if they were facts: 13 a Ahmadu Ahmad-NOM mari:D-un sick-NOM ‘Ahmad is sick’ The imperative mood expresses commands, orders, or request .It reveals the speaker’s desires for the action expressed in the sentence to take place: 14 tana:wal Taʕa:ma-k have food-your ‘Have your food’ The subjunctive mood, however, is used for conditional or imaginary situations It does not refer to factual situation; rather, it expresses wishes, doubts, or any situation contrary to facts: 15 ʔa-amanna law kun-tu I-wish if was-I ‘I wish I were an accountant’ muћa:sib-an accountant-ACC Huddlestone (1984) distinguishes other minor moods like English tag declarative, tag imperative, pseudo-imperative, and exclamative as in: 16 a You’ve been stealing again, haven’t you? b Go out, will you c Move and I’ll shoot! d What a nice house! In general, Jumingac and Othmand (2015) distinguish five different types of moods in Arabic, which are the indicative, subjunctive, jussive, imperative and emphatic moods IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 287 Methodology The perception of English modal verbs as a mean of expressing modality were analyzed for 26 fourth year students majoring in Applied English at the University of Jordan Several steps were followed to assess the perception of English modal verbs The first of which was analyzing the productive use of modal verbs that occurred in written texts made by the subjects The texts were about the students’ responsibilities in the field of a training course Thus, a good amount of imperative and subjunctive mood would be used, i.e verbs that would indicate obligation, command, necessity, etc The second step was measuring the perception of the meanings and functions of modal verbs This was carried out by means of a questionnaire (see the appendix) The questionnaire consisted of two parts The first part is composed of two pairs of sentences; each pair has a different type of modality which was expressed by the use of the past tense of modal verb such as shall vs should, and can vs could In this part, the students were asked to determine whether the sentences share the same meaning or not In case they indicated that the sentences did not share the same meaning, they had to specify why and how they differed from each other To double check the subjects’ knowledge of modality expressed by modal verbs, the subjects were also asked to translate the sentences into their native language This was done in order to investigate the effect of the native language on the perception of modality, if there was any Finally, the written texts and the questionnaire were collected, tabulated and analyzed Findings and Discussions Regarding the written task, it was found that 60% of the students did not use any modal to express obligation or necessity; instead they preferred to use the infinitive preceded by a phrase like ‘my responsibilities’: 17 The main responsibility is to translate medical texts from English to Arabic However, 15% of the students expressed the same task by using lexical verbs like ‘suppose’: 18 I am supposed to collect the students’ notebook The other 25% of the subject referred to obligation by making use of modal verbs However, it is noted that most of them used only the modal verb ‘should’ for the task: 19 I should answer the phone calls The use of the modal verb ‘should’ to refer to obligation and ruling out any other variation of modal verbs may indicate the low performance of the students regarding the modal verbs Here, it can be inferred that the flexibility of the modal ‘should’ is the reason beyond its usage in the students’ writing since should refers to advice and obligation Sabri (2011) maintains that when it comes to obligation, should is commonly used by language learners more than must which only expresses necessity or strong obligation It is evident, then, that students are not fully aware of the different uses of modal verbs, i.e they opted for using other structures and when they used modal verbs, they struck to using only one modal Only a third of the subjects made use of should For the second procedure of assessing the students’ perception of the meaning and the function of the modal verbs in sentences, it was found that 53% of the students indicated that the two pairs of sentences share the same meaning In addition, 33% of the students asserted that the first couple of sentences (20a&b) have the same meaning, whereas the second couple (21a&b) not 12% of them claimed that the two couples of sentences not convey the same meaning However, they did not know why and how the first couple differ in meaning 20 a I shall eat my breakfast b I should eat my breakfast 21 a Can you help me my math assignments? b Could you help me my math assignments? From the overall percentages, it seems that students could not differentiate between the meaning and the use of the modal verbs in the present and past tense This is clearest in the case of shall and should It seems that they not know that shall in the first sentence lays an obligation to be done in the future, whereas should expresses an irrealis modality about an action Different reasons may cause such a confusion One of these reasons may be the effect of L1 Strategy and L2 Strategy This is because modality as a system is found in both of Arabic and English, yet the devices of expressing it is different in the two languages For example, the difference of the use of the past tense and the present tense in Arabic to express IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 288 the speaker’s attitude is expressed by the particle qad before verbs to either indicate emphasis when it comes before a past tense verb, or possibility when preceding present tense: 22 a qad daras-tu d-dars-a Indeed study:PST-1S the-lesson-ACC ‘I have indeed studied the lesson’ b qad perhaps ʔa-drus-u d-dars-a IMPF:1SM-study:IND the-lesson-ACC ‘I may study the lesson’ Here, it is noteworthy highlighting that in the previous Arabic examples, modality was expressed through the use of lexical verbs and not modal verbs as it can happen in some cases in English This may indicate that unless the students were taught or being exposed to such usage of modal verbs, they cannot master them With regard to the second couple of sentences, 45% realized that there is a difference between can and could in interrogative sentences Studying the reason for this, it is likely that most of the students refer to the formality of the use of could, i.e they consider that could is more polite than can Notably, the students’ curriculum covers such cases of modals However, only few modal verbs are covered and not all functions are studied The most crucial point to stress here is that the teachers focus on the grammatical aspects of modal verbs In other words, they teach the students the environment in which these modals occur and the students depend solely on the literal translation of the modals However, the students are not given the chance to grasp the functions of the different modal verbs, neither are they taught in a communicative way that focuses on the use and function of every structure in the language rather than on the grammatical and translational aspects of it In brief, the method of teaching English in general and modal auxiliaries in particular is the main reason behind the dissatisfactory achievement of the students even when they are majoring in English In the translation part of the given sentences, it was found that most of the subjects gave one translation for each couple of sentences Thus, a misunderstanding of the use of some modal verbs in certain context must have occurred This is especially the case for the 45% of the students who indicated that there wasn’t any difference in the use and function of the second couple In sum, it seems that the use of English modal verbs to express modality is not fully perceived by the Arab learners of English Conclusion and Recommendation This study focused on the proper use of some modal verbs by Arab learners of English It was found that there was a gap in the use of English modal verbs as a way of expressing modality The differences between Arabic and English modality seem to play a crucial role for the misperception of English modality among Arab learners Other factors such as the teaching method seems to widen the gap since it focuses on grammar and translation rather than on using the communicative approach Thus, the study recommends taking action toward the acquisition of modality Arab language learners of English need to be exposed to the different meanings and uses of modal verbs in a communicative environment References Al-Sabbagh, R., Diesner, J and Girju, R (2013) ‘Using the semantic-syntactic interface for reliable Arabic modality annotation’ International Joint Conference on Natural Language Processing, pp.410–418 Amin, B (1979) The Arabic Eloquence in its New Form Lebanon: Dar El-Ilm Lilmalayin Al Qinai, Jamal (2008) ‘Pragmatic Interpretation in Translated texts’ Vigo International Journal of Applied Linguistics 5: 9-36 Badran, D (2001) ‘Modality and ideology in translated political texts’ Nottingham Linguistic Circular, 16: 41-61 Besga, C (1995) ‘Modals and Modality in English’ Miscelánea: A journal of English and American studies, 16: 165188 Brewer, N.M (1987) Modality and factivity: one perspective on the meaning of English modal auxiliary PhD dissertation, University of Leeds Halliday, M.A.K (2014) Introduction to Functional Grammar London: Routledge Huddlestone, R (1984) Introduction to the Grammar of English Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Jumingac, M.F amd Othmand, M.S (2015) ‘Critical review about the differences of the linguistic mood between Arabic and English languages’ Journal of Advances in Linguistics 5(3): 661-666 Lyons, J (1977) Semantics Cambridge: Cambridge University Press IJALEL 5(3):282-289, 2016 289 Mitkovska, Liljana and Buzarovska, Eleni and Kusevska, Marija (2014) ‘Corpus evidence for the acquisition of modal verbs of obligation by Macedonian Learners of English’ Continual professional development - opportunities and challenges, 1(1): 55-63 Moshref, O.A (2012) Corpus Study of Tense, Aspect, and Modality in Diglossic Speech in Cairine Arabic PhD Dissertation, University of Illinois Mukhaini, Yasser (2008) Modality in Legal Texts: an Analytic study in Translation between English and Arabic PhD Dissertation, Universiti Sains Malaysia Olaniyan, K (2015) ‘Modality in statement of objectives in art-based research article abstracts’ British Journal of English Linguistics, 3(1): 42-51 Palmer, F R (1979) Modality and the English Modals London: Longman Perkins, Michael (1980) The Expression of Modality in English Doctoral dissertation, Council for National Academic Awards Saeed, J.I (1997) Semantics Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd Saeed, A T (2009) ‘Arab learners’ acquisition of modals’ Research in Language, 7: 75-98 Sabri, N (2011) ‘The Iraqi learners’ acquisition order of epistemic and deontic modal verbs’ The Journal of Kuliat Al ma’moo Al Jameah 18: 1-26 Wided, B (2010) Modality in English, French and Arabic Biomedical Discourse: A Contrastive Study of Drug Information Leaflets MA Dissertation, Mentouri University Appendix: Questionnaire: Part1: Indicate whether each couple of sentences shares the same meaning or not In case of ‘not’ elaborate why and how they differ? a b I shall eat my breakfast I should eat my breakfast Answer: c d Can you help me in my math assignments? Could you help me in my math assignments? Answer: Part 2: Translate the previous sentences into Arabic