Argues that metaphorical language and metaphorical thought pervade the sciences and science writing. Asserts a useful bond between technical writing and poetry. Provides numerous poems uniting scientific themes with metaphorical language. (HB)

Poetry to be used with primary school children should be selected by the same criteria as other literature, so it neither promotes bias nor omits reference to diversity. Poems should be selected for their intrinsic quality and their potential as a resource in the curriculum for equality. (Author/SK)

Argues that in Europe over several centuries, the relationship between democracy and language policy in multilingual countries has been complex, noting that Catalan has thrived in democratic periods where devolution has advanced, and the causes of most problems facing Catalan are nonlinguistic. The paper examines language and democracy, language…

Focuses on the acceptance of lexical items, the spelling and treatment of such items in text, particularly the italicization of those words and phrases considered to be doubtful in legitimacy, and on information gained in a survey of participants at conferences in Manila and Bangkok on the theme of "English is an Asian Language."…

Analyzes parents' use of indirect requests and other types of figurative language (metaphor and idiom) addressed to their children. Finds that indirect requests occurred most frequently but that parents also used other nonliteral forms as well. Shows that parents were using the range of nonliteral forms primarily to achieve the single goal of…

A trainer in personal development gives advice, in the form of reflective questions, to group facilitators on appropriate language use, interpreting nonverbal communications (body language), and the appropriate use of nonverbal communications. (TD)

Several problematic issues in second-language teaching and testing are discussed, including artificial distinctions made between the four language skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing) and appropriate usage in each, the relationship of language skills and language ability, and the distinction between language usage and language use. (MSE)

Builds on arguments in risk communication that the predominant linear risk-communication models are problematic for their failure to consider audience and additional contextual issues. Argues that "risk" is socially constructed. Argues for an approach that involves the public in fundamental ways at the earliest stages of the…

Presents a talk addressing "language issues"--issues of student writers who are not native speakers of English, who are struggling with standard English usage, and/or who are unfamiliar with the conventions of academic discourse. Offers an explanation of what writing-to-learn pedagogy should be and do. (SG)

Investigates French and German undergraduate engineering and computer science students' comprehension of phrasal verbs. Concludes that phrasal verbs may make texts less accessible to non-native speakers of English. Indicates there are features of Plain English that are less applicable when the intended audience consists of non-native speakers of…

Compared the use of selected epistemic modals in the English speech of Chicano barrio residents and Anglo visitors to the community. Transcribed conversations served as the database. Discusses the epistemic modal functions used the most disparately between groups. Differences are shown to relate to cross-culturally different uses of epistemic…

Proposes a shift from ideological critiques of the English language teaching industry to an exploration of the emancipatory potential for minority groups in appropriating the language systems of dominant social groups so as to take their own cultural visions into the forums of everyday politics. (Author/VWL)

Attempts to use a construct of literary theory to solve a linguistic problem: the notion of narrative perspective to explain tense variation in Bulgarian narrative. The specific phenomenon of variation is between the past indefinite and the indirect tenses in passages where all the verb forms should be indirect. (24 references) (Author/CK)

Relative own-language preference (ROLP) depends on: the publication share of the language and the self-citing rate. ROLP and the openness of one language with respect to another can be represented by partial order. Logarithmic dependence on the language share(s) seems a natural additional requirement for measuring language preferences. Gives…

A study identified second-person singular pronoun usage among Salvadoran speakers living in Houston, Texas, to see what changes, if any, have been caused by contact with other Spanish speakers with different speech patterns. Although the results confirm some linguistic behavior observed by others, some unexpected facts and diverging trends were…