This paper examines the adequacy of Bowers and Ochs' theory of social movements as applied to the escalating agitative strategies of a dissident group, the homosexual-rights organization Mattachine Midwest. The group's activities are described chronologically, in terms of the strategies employed: petition, promulgation, polarization,…

This investigation explored the conversational practices and conversational rule-conformity of children aged four, six, and eight. Procedures included observation of the conversational behavior of children in classroom interaction among peers and a controlled laboratory investigation of the conversations of 18 children, of varying age levels, who…

"Thought reform" is a calculated strategy of social action designed to convert individuals to another ideology through a long-term process, during which threat underlies all experiences. In this article, part of the "Freedom of Speech Newsletter," insights from a phenomenological view of rhetoric are used to explain the nature…

To analyze historical trends in job opportunities available to speech communications graduates, a content analysis was conducted of Speech Communication Association bulletins over a ten-year period (1967 to 1977). All bulletin listings were analyzed for state, type of institution, rank, areas of specialization, job requirements, and salary range.…

Communication researchers have typically specified either cognitions or behaviors as the crucial units of analysis. This cognitive/behavioral dichotomy is evident in current conceptualizations of social relationship as a summative combination of separate behaviors, or a joint product that goes beyond the constituent parts. Choosing cognitive or…

This study sought to refine the concept "procedures" in small group communication. Two categories with eight corresponding properties were delineated and incorporated into a Likert-type scale designed to assess a person's preference for procedural order in task-oriented groups. The instrument was checked for reliability and then…

Because the many definitions of rhetorical situation, genre, and movement have been based on differing conceptions of rhetorical motive, there is a need for fresh inquiries into the meaning of these terms. This paper first examines the varying usages of situation, genre, and movement in the contemporary literature; discusses the confusion that…

Kenneth Burke's Dramatistic Pentad is an analytical device intended to be used by critics to discover the roots of motivation for particular acts. The five elements of the pentad are the scene, act, agent, agency, and purpose. Using the Burkean Pentad, this symposium presents the following five analyses of Watergate: "Scenic Responsibility:…

Because of problems involved in traditional impromptu contests, which require contestants to speak on topics that they know little or nothing about, administrators of the Big Sky Intercollegiate Forensic Tournament at the University of Montana modified the traditional contest structure in 1969 to permit impromptu speeches on sub-topics of general…

This paper presents a new mathematical approach, fuzzy mathematics, for defining, classifying, and analyzing concepts within communications. Fuzzy mathematics is based on the premise that real world phenomena contain characteristics that overlap any artifically created category system or classification rules. Therefore, set membership is…

A set of data collected by researchers at the University of California at Riverside and presented to the Southwest Regional Laboratory (SWRL) is described in this document. The data consist of 14 hours of recorded interviews of 60 Mexican-American children in Riverside in grades 1-3. Comments are directed at the linguistic characteristics of the…

Based on the rationale that improved literacy skills in children can be most effectively obtained by first improving their oracy skills (auding and speaking), a special oracy instructional program was developed consisting of a workshop to train teachers in teaching oracy skills, sets of structured stimulus materials for use by teachers in teaching…

The audio-lingual method of foreign language instruction predominant in the United States emphasizes the lingual at the expense of the aural. Language acquisition is viewed as verbal behavior. Instead of a response-oriented learning approach, a stimulus-oriented one should be used, with listening as the focal skill from which speaking would…

Political language employed in serious inquiry differs systematically from language employed to promote loyalty to authority in respect to syntax; grammatical completeness and complexity; proportion of nouns, verbs, and other parts of speech; and forms of qualification. Formal language entails continuous effort at verfication or falsification and…

Entires listed in this selected bibliography were published in 1973 and should be of interest to students of public address. Items are listed under five major categories: (1) bibliography; (2) criticism: oratory; (3) argumentation: logic: debate; (4) practitioners and theorists--general (American, international); and (5) religious communication…