Discusses reusable digital learning resources or objects in distance education and training. Focuses on the pivotal role of metadata and issues relating to classification, description, and meaning, specifically issues of semantics; and describes the CanCore Learning Object Metadata Application Profile. (Author/LRW)

Notes that words such as "can" and "may" are routinely interchanged in casual conversation and professional writing and broadcasting. Proposes that because journalism students are likely to be supervised by people who care about standards, they should make the distinctions between such words. Explains why 10 pairs of words need…

Notes that using words effectively and creatively make for interesting reading. Explains 19 oxymorons scholastic journalists might use. Proposes that some students may use oxymorons to try to make sense out of the strange world of words that are used for communication. (PM)

Proposes that because student journalists and professional mass communicators put their words on public display, they cannot afford to take risks with being misunderstood. Argues for making word distinctions that are as precise as possible. Explains 10 commonly interchanged word pairs. (PM)

Presents a study in which German-English bilinguals decided whether a visually presented word, either German or English, referred to an animate or to an inanimate entity. Bilinguals were slower to respond on a language switch trial than on language non-switch trials but only if they had to make the same response as on the prior trial. (Author/VWL)

Two studies used a comprehension task and an elicited production task to examine whether preschool children and adults appreciated the semantic properties of generic utterances. Findings indicated that in both tasks, 4-year-olds and adults treated generics ("bears live in caves") as distinct from both indefinites ("some") and universal quantifiers…

Explains the Open Archives Initiative (OAI) which was developed to solve problems of digital library interoperability on the World Wide Web. Topics include metadata; HTTP; XML; Dublin Core; the OAI Metadata Harvesting Protocol; data providers; service providers; reference linking; library policies; shared semantics; and name authority systems.…

Discusses how to translate your data from Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) to other formats. Explores key features and concepts of tools that address this problem and relates the problem to the Document Style Semantics and Specification Language (DSSSL) standard. Also investigates translation problems and the roles of SGML and DSSSL in…

While investigating a novel toy, infants heard a novel label applied to the toy by a speaker seated within the infant's view and attending to the toy (coupled condition) or by a speaker outside the infant's view (decoupled condition). Found that infants registered a link between the label and toy in the coupled but not the decoupled condition. (BC)

Discusses the vocabulary of biology and the problem of semantics. Focuses on "dominant", "recessive", and the puzzling role of alleles. Highlights students' conceptions of these terms. (JRH)

Explains the concept of a semantic Web where software agents perform jobs for end-users by using hierarchies, metadata, and structured vocabularies. Discusses taxonomies; defining ontologies and taxonomies; standardized language and conceptual relationships; different points of emphasis; and topic maps as new Web infrastructure. (LRW)

Describes a qualitative study which investigated the attitudes of literary scholars towards the features of semantic markup for primary texts in XML format. Suggests that layout is a vital part of the reading process which implies that the standardization of DTDs (Document Type Definitions) should extend to styling as well. (Author/LRW)

Contends that though words evolve in their usage and meaning over time, few words in the business language have changed as much as the term "win-win." Explains that once confined to literature on conflict management, the term has been co-opted in the trade press and used incorrectly in place of the term "compromise." Describes…

Explores factors affecting the ease or difficulty with which new words are learned in a second language, focusing on such intralexical factors as pronuncability, length, parts of speech, inflexional complexity, derivational complexity, semantic features, abstractedness, specificity, idomaticity, register restrictions, and multiple meaning. (52…

Presents a biographical sketch of S. I. Hayakawa and the results of a recent interview with him over the impact of his writing. (KEH)