Common threads running through the social studies curriculum reform recommendations include the following: (1) the study of democratic beliefs; (2) student civic participation; (3) the study of modern issues that call for global interactive connections; and (4) restructuring survey courses to avoid repetition and add depth. (MLF)

Studied the critical points made in 402 reviews of 153 papers submitted to 12 editors of American Psychological Association journals. Criticisms dealt with all steps in research activity from early conceptualizing to final writing. Typically, 2 reviews of the same paper had no critical point in common. Recommendations about editorial decisions…

Disputes assertions by some academics that Chaucer was the first technical writer in English. Suggests that numerous examples of technical prose predated Chaucer's works. Argues that technical writing historians will find it more profitable to investigate the tradition of English practical prose than to find further firsts for their field. (SG)

Contrasts two conferences that occurred in the 1960s: one considered significant by historians of composition studies, the other recognized as important in the development of poststructuralism. Argues that theoretical currents associated with the conferences can usefully critique each other. Proposes a variation on the new advocacy of…

Ruminates on and analyzes the author's experiences in teaching the first course in women's literature and feminist criticism at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Asserts that the course brought to consciousness the author's femininity, feminism, and a new understanding of feminist criticism. (MM)

Explores how argumentation in the eighteenth-century miracles controversy (a century-long debate in Britain over the reasonableness of revealed religion) exhibited a controlling concern for procedural considerations. Discusses how the Deists and the Orthodox apologists used their argumentative force to advance rival methods for evaluating miracle…

Refutes the dominant interpretation of the British Parliamentary debates on slave trade abolition, examining the argumentative strategies employed. Finds that slavers claimed that abolition would destroy the nation's prosperity, while abolitionists depicted the slave trade as irrational and economically inefficient, thus undermining its economic…

Examines vilification (a rhetorical strategy which discredits adversaries as ungenuine and malevolent advocates) in the rhetoric of pro-life and pro-choice movements in Minnesota between 1973 and 1980. (SR)

Argues that excommunication was the principal strategy of antimasonic rhetoric during the late 1820s and early 1830s, seeking to remove Freemasonry from the community and to relieve Masons of their political power. Notes the transition of antimasonic rhetoric from that of moral crusade to mainstream political issues. (KEH)

Traces the early history of the electronic digital computer and the viewpoints held concerning the computer from its inception to its present status. Highlights three key words ("mimesis,""topic," and "decorum") to develop the rhetoricality of the personal computer as a communications device. (KEH)

Methods for teaching foreign-language literature actually teach students how to approach, understand, and develop their own method of literary criticism through scholarship, interpretation, and theory. (21 references) (CB)

Argues that students and teachers of literature should begin the study of literary texts with the emotional immediacies and humanistic sympathies that the texts evoke, rather than with an examination of literary critical theories. (MM)

Explores aspects of "The Way to Rainy Mountain," through which Momaday incorporates Native American oral narrative modes into Euro-American written autobiography, and blends mythical, historical, and personal narratives of the Kiowa migration and Momaday's own journey from Montana to Oklahoma. Contains 36 references. (SV)

Examines several books on the emergence and impact of the New Left which, as a collective resource, may give new direction and impetus to the rhetorical study of movements. Culls recurring themes that might inform the next phase of movement scholarship. Advocates this new scholarship as both due and promising. (SR)

Investigates characteristics of young adult romance novels, particularly their lack of humor. Discusses ways to use romance in the classroom. Provides a list of young adult novels that deal with romance, humor, and body image. (MM)