The article explores lexical units denoting colour in English. The study focuses on colour lexemes in a literary text in terms of their combining potential, structure, and stylistic properties. The undertaken analysis of 11 basic colour lexemes ("black," "white," "grey," "red," "blue,"…

This paper examines phraseology as a lexical feature from a Quranic perspective. It explores the importance of demystifying the phraseological theoretical base in order to facilitate the task of translators and second language learners and deal more efficiently with the challenging language aspects of phraseology. Despite prolific publications and…

This paper draws from comparative rhetoric and contrastive stylistics and, by resorting to corpus linguistics methodologies, looks into possible quantitative descriptions of rhetorical deviations that are present in source texts within different language pairs and genres, in an attempt to map patterns of deviation, actual or expected, in…

The article deals with the analysis of the addressee's factor foregrounding in the limerick discourse. The study demonstrates that the limerick discourse is characterised by an addresser-writer's and an addressee-reader/listener's reciprocality via idiosyncratic protagonists portrayed by an addresser-writer. A limerick presents a laconic…

Weiner (1988. "On Editing a Usage Guide." In "Words for Robert Burchfield's Sixty-Fifth Birthday," edited by E. G. Stanley, and T. F. Hoad, 171-183. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 173) describes usage guides as being 'as broad as the English language, covering spelling, punctuation, phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexis, and…

This article analyzes the rhetoric of public attitudes toward composition, as represented in Stanley Fish's "Think Again" blog in the "New York Times" and in comments posted by his readers. Fish denounces the field of composition as highly politicized and anti-academic and advocates instead a belletristic, current-traditional…

The aim of this article is to illustrate the fluid nature of family language policy (FLP) and how the realities of any one FLP are re-negotiated by caregivers and children in tandem. In particular, the paper will focus on the affective dimensions of FLP and will demonstrate how the same reality--in this case, a grandmother's use of a child-centred…

The phenomenon of style shift in translated texts is ascribed mainly to textual incompatibility in terms of rhetorical asymmetry and divergence at the formality level. Mandatory shifts result from a systematic dissimilarity between the source language and the target language in terms of the underlying system of syntax, semantics and rhetorical…

Research on Spanish/English code switching is reviewed and the definitions and categories set up by the investigators are examined. Their methods of locating, limiting, and classifying true code switches, and the terms used and results obtained, are compared. It is found that in these studies, conversational (intra-discourse) code switching is…

Describes a study that attempts to systematize the criteria required for accurate translations of technical documents. The results of a Linguistic Appreciation Questionnaire-Test, administered to 19 professional translators, were used to categorize the most common translation variables: style, structure, rhythm, and meaning of text in the hope of…

The extensive use of clausal embedding in legal language is examined. The extent and depth of left-branching, nested, and right- branching clauses in the 1972 British Road Traffic Act are also studied. The complexity of the resulting constructions, and the problems created for comprehension are described. The analysis reveals complex sequences of…

Receding languages in contact with an expanding language are susceptible to various forms of transfer, including covert transfer or negative borrowing, the elimination of features not shared by the expanding language. Retention of two Scottish Gaelic grammatical features with English parallels and of two grammatical features without English…

Some aspects of the field of lexicology in general, and of English lexicology in particular, are examined in light of current linguistic theory. Definitions of lexicology, its role in linguistics, the concept and nature of lexical competence, the relationship of grammar and lexicon, and the process of lexicalization are reviewed. Conversion and…

Certain word-order patterns are more basic and less marked than others. The more strongly marked a pattern seems to be in isolation, the stronger must be the contextual forces motivating its use, if it is to seem natural in a text. Various topicalizations (of adverbials, objects, and parts of verb phrases, for example) need various degrees of…

In their study in 1990, Clark and Isaacs identified five properties and seven defining features that distinguished between English ostensible and genuine invitations. To see if Persian ostensible and genuine invitations could be distinguished by the same features and properties, the present study was carried out. 45 field workers observed and…