Discusses perspectives and approaches that teachers can utilize in demonstrating for students the importance and complexity of ethical decisions in the oral and written composition process. Explores the use of religious, legal, political, dialogical, situational, and human nature perspectives. (Author/GC)

It is suggested that native speakers understand that narrative in literature is a form of transcript of full discourse, and students of English can learn the same clues of transaction and interaction in texts through exercises in plot analysis, plot mutation, and scenario derivation. (MSE)

To determine the extent to which current theories of persuasion are used or advocated by homileticians (i.e., preachers), this study examines 21 frequently used homiletics textbooks for their treatment of persuasion. After describing the characteristics of classical, premodern, humanistic, and rhetorical models, the study suggests that these…

Free speech of subjects with somatization and paranoia was analyzed to identify and compare self-concept dimensions reflected in their lexical choices. The somatization disorder group conveyed a sense of negativism, distress, and preoccupation with an uncertain self-identity. The paranoid patients portrayed an artificially positive, grandiose…

Ten head-injured adults were compared to normal adults on a narrative picture description task. Subjects were similar in amount of pertinent content expressed, narrative length, and rate of speech, but were significantly slower in rate of information imparted as they required lengthier and slower verbal outputs to convey essential information.…

A study investigated the genre, structure, and delivery of oral presentations in engineering delivered in English as a first and as a second language. Eleven manufacturing engineering presentations, four by non-native speakers of English and seven by native speakers in Loughborough, United Kingdom, were analyzed with reference to the discourse…

A classroom-oriented therapeutic program was devised for four pragmatically impaired preschoolers who showed little spontaneous language use within the classroom. Intervention strategies focused on facilitating interactions during free play and were based on four principles for practitioners: be child-oriented; engineer the environment; use…

Twelve learning-disabled children, aged 8-11, were compared with normal peers on various discourse errors. No significant quantitative differences were found in the total number of discourse errors between the disabled and normal groups, but the errors were qualitatively different. Male subjects made significantly more errors than female subjects.…

Describes a one-semester conversational course taught at Harvard University designed to teach basic oral communication skills in French with the main emphasis on teaching students to pause while speaking. (AM)

Noting that classroom communication is a central issue in school systems, because spoken language is the medium by which much teaching takes place, this book investigates classroom discourse within the framework of applied linguistics, and discusses research drawn from elementary, secondary and postsecondary classrooms. The first section deals…