Examines the conditions under which children and adults use indexical words to refer to objects or to corefer with nouns in discourse. Subjects at three ages (6, 10, and adult) performed simple tasks and described their actions. (Author/AS)

The study investigated changes in frequency of language used by six Down's syndrome children (six to seven years old) as they interacted with nonretarded peers within a normal school playground setting. As a group, Ss demonstrated a positive relationship between percentage of time engaged in interaction and increasing frequency on language use in…

An analysis of the use of simple and immediate future tenses in French shows that the expression of time is controlled more by context and modals than by specifically temporal cues. The role of negation in this situation is discussed. (MSE)

Three versions of a rating scale were compared for reliability and level of ratings. Results indicated that the wording of items influence these factors; that items should be written in order to maximize their meaning; and that response categories should be unique to each item. (Author/RW)

Formal semantic analysis appears to be capable of handling certain cases where kin terms appear to cover an illogical assortment of relatives, an assortment which constitutes a disjunctive class. Two examples are the kin terms "ngaraija" and "tjilja," used by the Njamal, an Australian tribe. (CFM)

Discusses the satisfactions that children may derive from performance in the culturally important medium of language--performance that embodies their own intentions. (RB)

This article briefly discusses the proper way to speak to or about someone who has a disability and why it is important to say it differently for a person with a disability. In speaking or writing, remember that children or adults with disabilities are like everyone else--except they happen to have a disability. This article offers a few tips for…

This paper discusses research on the English of Mexican Americans, arguing that in focusing primarily on description of vernacular Chicano English, the literature describing English spoken by Mexican Americans presents an incomplete picture of the complexity of their linguistic situation. Researchers may lose sight of the range of linguistic…

This paper reports an exploratory study of the words used by U.S. presidents in inaugural speeches. Language signifying inclusive relationships as in the words "we,""us," and "our," was found to have changed dramatically since the first inaugural in 1789. Study implications suggest that elected leaders and managers in…

This paper discusses the importance of stylistic variety to the writing of beautiful language, even as that writing is used as a tool of critical consciousness. It begins by discussing the application of style for socially responsible rhetorical communication, through revealing to students that language used in multiple rhetorical situations both…

This study investigated which categories of downgraders in requests is more learnable, and therefore, more teachable. Specifically, the study compared three categories of downgraders: internally modified syntactic downgraders (e.g., conditionals, aspects, interrogatives); internally modified lexical-phrasal downgraders (e.g., politeness markers,…

The editor of Elementary English'' discusses editing procedures now that an important new aspect of editing has been added, the avoidance of sexist use of language in all National Council of Teachers of English publications. (RB)

Part of Lexicography and Dialect Geography, Festgabe for Hans Kurath''. (DD)