Argues that consideration of discipline and culture are complex and interrelated issue in academic writing and that this complexity and interrelationship can be seen at several different levels in specialized academic texts. Reviews research on contrastive rhetoric to investigate the impact of cultural and disciplinary factors on text construction…

Contrasts students' presymbolic and symbolic procedures in generalizing activities. Uses the semiotic-cultural theoretical approach and focuses on the role of body, discourse, and signs when students refer to mathematical objects. Identifies types of generalizations and discusses a specific kind of rupture in the ostensive gestures and…

Fourteen Mother-Infant pairs were studied at three, six, and nine months to determine whether mothers simplify speech during the second half of the infant's first year and whether speech adjustment influences later language acquisition by infants. A mother's mean length of utterance (MLU) was predictive of later language development by her infant.…

Responds to Bowey's comments on an earlier article--"Rhyme, Language, and Children's Reading." Here, the statistical model used in the earlier analysis is clarified, and it is asserted that the new analysis presented by Bowey supports the hypothesis that children's sensitivity to rhyme/alliteration and reading is independent of general…

Examines and tests the hypothesis that left-branching (LB) sentences are judged to be more formal than right-branching (RB), and that center-branching (CB) sentences would behave like LB. Two studies involving university students are described in which LB, RB, and CB sentence structure formality were judged. (17 references) (GLR)

Analyzes the rightward movement of noun and prepositional phrases in the Early Old English poem "Beowulf." Evidence is provided for heavy noun phrase shift, with a characteristic major intonational boundary between the main verb and the postponed noun phrase, and preposition phrase extraposition, where the intonational boundary was much…

Describes an investigation of the differences and similarities existing between the intonation systems of French and English. The unity of the procedures described here is confirmed by an analysis of intonational errors made by English-speaking learners of French. (Author/VWL)

Discusses the role of the infinitive in Russian verbal morphology, and points out the advantage of the single-stem system of analyzing and presenting Russian verbs. (32 references) (Author/OD)

Demonstrates second-language acquisition (L2) is module and parameter sensitive. It is proposed that the acquisition of English by adult Japanese speakers is sensitive to the agreement parameter as well as the principle of structural government. (45 references) (GLR)

The Test of Problem Solving (TOPS) was evaluated by 20 speech-language clinicians based on designer claims that the test assesses integration of semantic, linguistic, and reasoning ability and taps skills needed for academic and social acceptance. Results challenged the content validity of the test. (Author/DB)

Argues against the use of an alternative model of Language Awareness (LAw), which rejects Transformational Grammar-based applications of language study in favor of a semiotics-based approach, and presents examples of teaching English to native Bengali speakers to support the use of the more traditional LAw. (CB)

A major challenge for the English-as-a-Second-Language program evaluator is to address the questions posed by those individuals who want the evaluation without compromising academic research standards. Development of a form of "disciplined inquiry" that maintains standards while addressing real-world concerns is discussed. (71 references)…

Discusses recent research about contesting the deficit models of language and class. Criticizes the work of Barbara Tizard and Martin Hughes, claiming that, in fact, they create a new version of the deficiency model and fail to analyze the differentials in access to schooling. Notes that such a model ignores social circumstances. (KO)

Traces the history of English in Fiji, especially in relation to education. The role of English in interethnic communication and as a language of wider communication with the outside world is discussed, and features of Fiji English, a local language variety, are described. (Author/CB)

The hypothesis was tested that adults have difficulty learning the pronunciation of a second language because atmospherically conducted vocal feedback is masked by the speaker's bone-conducted feedback. A technique delaying atmospherically conducted feedback until bone-conducted feedback was completed was found to help learners modify German…