In this article we examine the development, over 1 year, of mathematical discourse communities in 2 eighth-grade mathematics classes in a suburban public middle school. The curriculum topics included probability, functions, graphing, data analysis, and pre-algebra. The 50 students were heterogeneously placed; most were from upper-middle-class…

This study describes the interactions of three adult-child reading partnerships in a program that matches corporate volunteers with "at risk" students for weekly hour-long story reading sessions. Using discourse analysis within a sociocultural framework, the researcher identified variation in the way these partners were constructing the act and…

The purpose of this study was to examine the language ideologies--the assumptions about the nature of language, language variation, and language learning--reflected in a widespread daily editing activity often known as Daily Oral Language or Daily Language Practice. Through a yearlong ethnographic study of grammar instruction in three urban,…

An analysis of discourse focuses on argumentative strategies used in reply to a complaint. The complaint was in the form of a letter, in English, written to a breakfast cereal company, expressing concern about a stone found in the product. The response, also in letter form, is examined for its text strategy. These elements are discussed: the…

Over the last 3 decades or so, English and its related disciplines of Rhetoric and Composition have adopted new tools of research--tools other than the traditional ones of narrative and description. These other tools are empirical or scientific, those that are common to the social sciences, including experiments, case studies, surveys, and…

Focusing on teachers' perspectives, this report examines sociocultural diversity and teaching by reconstructing the talk of a group of 10 teachers from the Oakland and Berkeley, California areas who met weekly for a school year. The curricular focus of the group was the teaching of writing, but over time the discussions of difference and child…

The ways in which personal narratives, particularly of familiar stories, are used to ratify group membership are examined. Focus is primarily on co-narrated stories, in which more than one group member participates in the re-telling of a familiar story. A typical instance in which family members collaboratively construct a story is offered as an…

In discourse analysis, connectives have been widely suggested as linguistic markers to indicate the logical linkage between utterances. However, the understanding of the interactions among various kinds of connectives in discourse has been limited. A method of quantifying the overall correlation between different kinds of connectives occurring on…

This paper presents the theory of prototype semantics as a useful approach to understanding the relationship between language and culture in second-language texts as it relates word-meaning to social and cultural models. Second-language writing in English may use the same linguistic structures as first-language texts, but the significance of…

Although there are earlier experiences from computer mediated communication (CMC) applications in which e-mail has been used as a forum for argumentation and debate, the literature lacks systematic analyses on the use of CMC for this purpose. This kind of analysis would produce knowledge on the relevance of CMC for practicing argumentation that is…

A study examined discussions on an instructional listserv, an open forum with several hundred subscribers across the world. The study investigated the coherence of a group of electronic mail (e-mail) messages taken from an academic listserv under one topic. Coherence is important as it contributes to the comprehension of a text. Participants on…

A qualitative study determined the impact electronic mail (e-mail) discussion lists can have on a college classroom. The theoretical concepts explored are "community" and "roles." Community is defined by the boundaries it possesses, the dialogue exchanged, and the people interacting in the community. Roles may be defined by the interactions among…

A revisionist account of the development of ideas about semantics in modern theories of language is presented, focusing on the rift between Noam Chomsky and Generative Semanticists about the concept of deep structure, or the role of meaning in grammar. The discussion re-appraises the paradigm that has dominated American linguistics since the…

Using a feminist and subversive perspective, a study examined the testimonies of five adult females each having experienced childhood sexual abuse. All the subjects--participants in a multi-medium art show sponsored by an urban mental health center--contacted the researcher voluntarily. Participants ranged in age from 39 to 54; sexual orientation…

This study of the narratives of 48 black, low-income, urban kindergartners examined the frequency of topic-centered style (a discourse centering on a single topic) and topic-associating style (a discourse of personal anecdotes or episodes whose connections are never overtly stated). The children were from four classrooms in two schools in Pontiac,…