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Azerbaijan. He speaks Azerbaijani and Russian as his first languages along with
English as a second language.
Kaan (pseudo-name for the Azerbaijani participant) is 17 years old,
undergraduate civil engineering student at METU originally from Baku,
Azerbaijan. He speaks Azerbaijani and Russian as his first languages along with
English as a second language.
3.3.2. Turkish participants in detail
Detailed information about Turkish participants is as follows:
Serkan (pseudo-name for the Turkish participant) is 20 years old,
undergraduate English Language Teaching student at METU originally from
Zonguldak, Turkey. He speaks Turkish as his first language along with English,
German and Italian as his second languages.
Busra (pseudo-name for the Turkish participant) is 20 years old,
undergraduate English Language Teaching student at METU originally from
Tokat, Turkey. She speaks Turkish as her first language along with English,
German and Italian as her second languages.
Fadime (pseudo-name for the Turkish participant) is 23 years old, graduate
English Language Teaching student at METU originally from Ankara, Turkey.
She speaks Turkish as her first language along with English and German as her
second languages.
Ayşe (pseudo-name for the Turkish participant) is 25 years old, graduate
English Language Teaching student at METU originally from Muğla, Turkey. She
speaks Turkish as her first language along with English and German as her second
languages. Table 8 presents detailed information about Turkish and Azerbaijani
participants.
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Table 8: Demographic information about Turkish and
Azerbaijani Participants
Participants in detail
Turkish participants
Azerbaijani participant
Features
Ser
Bu
Fa
Ay
Features
Fahir
Kaan
Age
20
20
23
25
Age
17
17
Gender
M
F
F
F
Gender
Male
Male
Hometown
Zongul
dak
Tokat
Ankar
a
Muğ
la
Hometown
Baku
Baku
Languages
known
Tur.
(Nat.)
Eng.
(Adv)
Ger.
(Ele)
It.
(Beg)
Tur.
(Nat)
Eng.
(Adv)
Ger.
(Ele)
It.
(Beg)
Tur.
(Nat)
Eng.
(Adv)
Ger.
(Ele)
Tur.
(Nat
)
Eng.
(Ad
v)
Ger.
(Ele)
Languages
known
Azb.
(Nat.)
Rus.
(Adv.)
Eng.
(Adv.)
Fre
(Ele)
Azb.
(Nat.)
Rus.
(Adv.)
Eng.
(Adv.)
3.4. Setting
Three sessions of word guessing party game Taboo were played by
Turkish and Azerbaijani interlocutors in the researcher’s office at Middle East
Technical University in which a comfortable and silent atmosphere were meant to
be provided. The reason for such a comfortable atmosphere comes from the need
for a structured task which will allow creating a communicative and natural
atmosphere in which interjections are frequently used by the interlocutors. In the
first session of Taboo game, four people, two of whom were Azerbaijani (Kaan
and Fahri) and the others were Turkish interlocutors (Serkan and Kübra), played
through pairing each other and forming two groups. This session took place on 22
October 2012 and was video-recorded. Second session of the game was played by
a Turkish (Fadime) and an Azerbaijani interlocutor (Fahri) on 30 October 2012.
Lastly, a Turkish (Ayse) interlocutor and an Azerbaijani (Kaan) played Taboo by
forming two groups on 30 October 2012.
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3.5. Data Collection Instruments
3.5.1. Questionnaire
As
for the task, first of all, a language background questionnaire developed
for a TÜBİTAK research project (Scientific and Technological Research Council
of Turkey) (Project Number: 110K432) investigating the rate of receptive
multilingualism between Turkish and a variety of Turkic languages was utilized in
order to find out the interactants’ language background. (See Appendix B)
3.5.2. Taboo Task
A worldwide popular word guessing party game called Taboo was utilized
in this study. Players are given cards on which there is a ‘guess word’ and five
‘taboo (forbidden) words’. One of the teammates in a team tries to prompt his/her
partner to guess the keywords as possible in the allotted time without using taboo
words. This player is called the ‘clue-giver.’ The other who can be named as the
‘information requester’ attempts to guess and understand it. Taboo words are the
ones which have strong associations with the guess words. For instance, if the
guess word is ‘samba’, taboo words are ‘dans (dance), Brezilya (Brazil), müzik
(music), Rio (Rio de Janeiro), salsa (salsa)’. The clue-giver prompting his/her
partner to guess ‘samba’ is not supposed to use these taboo words, which makes
the game challenging for the teammates. This leads the teammates to negotiate to
reach the ultimate mutual goal, which is mutual understanding. Since it is the
clue-giver in each team who holds the information, and the other one requests the
information in order to reach goal, the task can be defined as an information-gap
task. Additionally, there seems to be a one-way flow of information; however, if
the information requester provides the information holder with information
requiring confirmation then it may also be two-way flow information exchange.
‘Taboo’ and ‘Guess’ Word Selection