A required freshman English course at Berkeley was designed on the assumption that: (1) students have already developed a set of sophisticated skills for reading popular culture texts--movies, television, and commercial literary genres--against and in terms of one another; and (2) these skills are not categorically different from those inculcated…

A microanalysis of social interaction in a preschool classroom revealed ways in which children and teachers "co-constructed" the rudiments of school culture during the first three days of school. Findings are based on videotapes, teachers' notes, and daily field notes taken by a group of observers. The three domains of the establishment…

Using young adult literature from other countries in the classroom provides a common ground from which to build the tolerance and appreciation of cultural diversity so needed in today's world. By viewing books from other countries as artifacts of culture, it is possible to learn about other lands and their peoples. It is also possible to…

Principals as school leaders have the potential to transform school culture in positive ways. A review of "Principal's Role in Shaping School Culture," by Terrence Deal and Kent Peterson, is offered in this report. The book defines school culture, presents examples of principals' school improvement strategies, and compares similarities in their…

The "Doctor Bird Readers" represent a first attempt by the Jamaican government to produce readers for children in grades four-six by using Jamaican authors and artists. This study examined whether cultural relevancy was achieved in the development of stories for the "Doctor Bird Readers." A quantitative questionnaire combined…

In this book, 17 psychologists, anthropologists, social workers and others explore important theoretical and applied issues concerning the mental health of Appalachian people. Rejecting the view of Appalachia as an area dominated by a culture of poverty, these papers portray a strong regional culture based on family, community, and religion. This…

The twentieth century has been an era of rapid, world-wide industrialization. Very little is known about the psychological impact of this process, and traditional assessment methods which universalize Western values are largely inappropriate. A prime example of universalizing Western characteristics is Inkeles' and Smith's popular Modernity Scales…

Defining myth as a cultural narrative in symbolic form that articulates a world view and offers consensus with that view, this paper uses a brief "New York Times" report on the Soviet shooting down of South Korean airline flight 007 as the basis for comparison of international news and myth. Following a review of the literature on myth…

A study examined the influence of nation states' self-interests on their media's coverage of a major news event, in this instance, the Soviet shooting down of a Korean airliner. It was hypothesized (1) that there would be discrepancies between different accounts of the KAL 007 incident, a complex news event with international political…

Some errors in adult black students' writing cannot be analyzed merely within the traditional hierarchy of grammatical rules; a look at sociological factors is germane to an evaluation of students' writing ability or inability. Data for an analysis of black adult students' writing at the syntactic level have shown that problems of clarity might be…

Using a language effectively involves both expressing oneself and acting upon one's surroundings. Linguistic theory has focused on the study of speech acts, but speech activity is basically pragmatic, that is, the conversational context determines the individual speech acts and not the other way around. Theorizing about the speech act independent…

This study reports a survey of 35 teachers of English as a second language in general, vocational, and academic preparation programs in a British Columbia community college, which used ethnographic interviews to study teachers' perceptions of their role as mediators of culture in the classroom. Four dimensions of a teacher's cultural role were…

A text is the locus of many intersecting processes, the origins, character, and operative principles of which should be the main focus of its discussion in a writing class. These processes can be classified into the four major components of the communicative act: the writer, the reader, the social conditions of communication, and the historical…

This critical analysis examines the claim that learning within the student's zone of proximal development is enhanced by "making connections to what the learner already knows." It is argued that Rogoff's and Gardner's use of Vygotsky's theory to explain learning in school-like tasks places primary emphasis on how the adult should connect…

A study examined the quantity and quality of language produced by kindergarten and early primary Native American pupils in relation to selected factors in the classroom context in which the language was produced. Observations of about 50 classrooms were conducted in schools serving predominantly Native American pupils on and off reservations in…