Do we view the world differently if it is described to us in figurative rather than literal terms? An answer to this question would reveal something about both the conceptual representation of figurative language and the scope of top-down influences on scene perception. Previous work has shown that participants will look longer at a path region of…

Two divided visual field priming experiments examined cerebral asymmetries for understanding metaphors varying in sentence constraint. Experiment 1 investigated ambiguous words (e.g., SWEET and BRIGHT) with literal and metaphoric meanings in ambiguous and unambiguous sentence contexts, while Experiment 2 involved standard metaphors (e.g., "The…

This dissertation draws on textual reader response theory and humanities-based Disability Studies theories to explores the ways in which preservice teachers participating in a course called "Issues of Diversity in Children's and Adolescent Literature" and their instructor, who is also the researcher, made sense of representations of disability in…

This article argues that a modified version of Bourdieu's "habitus" concept can generate insights into moral culture and the ways people use culture to make changes in their lives. If revised in light of recent findings from cognitive neuroscience, the habitus allows for the analysis of culture as embodied cognitive structures linking individuals…

This essay offers Neil Postman's thermostatic metaphor as a model for critical teaching. In this model, the role of the composition teacher is that of a thermostat that responds to a changing ideological environment by offering counterbalance. Such a stance is an anti-stance since it requires the teachers to enact philosophies and pedagogies,…

The paper reports on a study of emergent adult instructed L2 German writing ability in a college-level program that developed an explicit curriculum-based approach to supporting L2 writing. It uses systemic-functional linguistics (SFL) as its theoretical framework and traces writing development through a central construct in the theory, the…

In this paper we examine the transferability of the Jigsaw and Fishbowl collaborative learning techniques to the Second Life platform. Our aim is to assess the applicability of Second Life for collaborative learning by developing virtual tools and metaphors and exploiting the representational richness of this novel medium. In order to enhance the…

The author builds on arguments he has made elsewhere that good commercial video games foster deep learning and problem solving and that such games in fact promote mastery as a form of play. Here he maintains that some good video games engage players with an important type of play, namely of play as discovery, of play as surmising new possibilities…

Universities today need to become quicker on their toes. They must continually scan the environment and seize emerging opportunities--and institutional advancement must lead this effort. An unfortunate number of institutional advancement operations are ill equipped for the task at hand. Many suffer from high staff turnover and overly hierarchical…

The work reported here takes place in the educational domain. The authors propose a learning environment based on a graphical representation of a course. The emergence of online multiplayer games led the authors to apply the following metaphor to the digital work environments: The method of acquiring knowledge during a learning session is similar…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of game-like activities on adult learning during a computer-based simulation. This research also studied the use of visual metaphors as graphic organizers to help make the underlying science principles explicit without interfering with the interactive nature of the simulation. A total of…

Two experiments tested whether phonological phrase boundaries constrain online syntactic analysis in French. Pairs of homophones belonging to different syntactic categories (verb and adjective) were used to create sentences with a local syntactic ambiguity (e.g., [le petit chien "mort"], in English, the "dead" little dog, vs.…

By using straight and white teeth as a metaphor for a straight and White identity, the author reflects on how this identity is performed, maintained, and often problematic. Using literature about identity performance, three different voices speak to and from straight and White identity. Using irony by blending arrogance and ignorance in the voice…

The rising incidence of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) diagnoses and consequent medication prescriptions has stirred great controversy in the USA. The very meaning and social utility of the disorder are hotly contested in the public sphere and in the schools. Since 1997, changes in federal law have led to increased involvement of…

The metaphor is typically viewed as a verbal form of expression in traditional talk therapies. However, this definition excludes nonverbal metaphors that children use when they express themselves through play. In this article, the authors examine the use of therapeutic metaphors, both verbal and nonverbal, with children. The roles of the child,…