Having been adapted by instructors in various disciplines over many years, Aristotle's "topics" have retained their original, heuristic value, inviting students to more deeply consider issues using a communicative pedagogy. In the author's teaching of Advanced Speaking for Academic Purposes, Aristotle's "topics" have been a useful mediating tool…

During a study designed to examine the processes of learning English as an additional language as manifest in the interactive behaviour of small groups of bilingual school children playing specially designed board games, several instances of "private speech" were captured. Private speech is commonly described as speech addressed to the self for…

There are few well-standardized measures of conversational breakdown in Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). The study's objective was to develop a scale for measuring pragmatic impairments in conversations of individuals with ASD. We analyzed 46 semi-structured conversations of children and adolescents with high-functioning ASD using a functional…

Purpose: This study provides preliminary reference data for speech and articulatory rates of school-age children in conversational and narrative speaking contexts. Method: Participants included 36 typically developing children in 3 groups of 12 participants at ages 7, 9, and 11 years. Conversational and narrative speech rates were measured in…

This study reflects a social constructivist theoretical framework in which the zone of proximal development (ZPD) is a central element, as two teaching approaches, communicative language teaching (CLT) and explicit focus on form (FonF) are examined. Research questions include: Are CLT and explicit FonF conducive to reaching the ZPD? Is there a…

While some social constructionists are unprepared to confront the role of ethics in the process of communication, the fact must be faced that as a person constructs reality, he or she makes judgments about that reality. Here are four situational perceptions that affect how decisions are socially constructed as ethical or not ethical within…

Speech communication in general and rhetoric in particular address suggestions for protecting the "space" in which public conversation occurs in a democracy. Although the framers of the Constitution clearly envisioned significant citizen involvement in policy making, citizen access to the process has greatly declined, especially at the…

The best way to develop a unique identity for the National Education Debate Association (NEDA) is to debate propositions distinct from National Debate Tournament (NDT) and the Cross Examination Debate Association (CEDA). A neglected area of debate includes propositions temporally framed in the past. Yet, the present propositional categories of…

A substantial number of published articles in speech communication research today is experimental/social scientific in nature. It is only in the past decade that scholars have begun to put the history of communication under the lens. Early advocates of the adoption of the method of social scientific inquiry were J. A. Winans, J. M. O'Neill, and C.…

This paper calls for the standardization of the speech communication basic course at large universities where many sections are taught a semester by graduate students and adjunct faculty. The paper discusses the faculty vision for a standardized basic communication course and suggests that standardization is one of the ways that communication…

One problem with state speech organizations is the lack of common sense sometimes shown in selecting the geographic locations of the conventions. The best solution is for the conference to be held in the middle of the state, so that attendance will be greater and representation more even-handed. Some have suggested the elimination of state…

Presenting lecture material, an in-class activity, and example transparencies, this paper is the first installment of a 3-part series of lecture/in-class activities that are used to get feedback from students on the effectiveness of teaching strategies in the area of audience analysis and adaptation in the classroom. The paper combines several…

Kenneth Burke was a college dropout who did not enjoy notable success until quite late in life. His major interest was the development of a meta-theory of language, which he called "rhetoric." Denied the resources and material rewards of academia, Burke was both scapegoated and redeemed by the academic community. Furthermore, the…

Noting the centrality of the competence construct in current pedagogical practices and basic communication course design, this paper questions assumptions about how communication is taught and assessed in the classroom. The paper begins by addressing disagreements on communication competence, focusing on normative measures of communication…

This bibliography presents annotations of 28 selected items (mostly journal articles) which deal with conflict communication in intimate relationships. It updates a similar bibliography on conflict management and resolution in close personal relationships published in 1986. (SR)