The speech communication department at California State University, Northridge, offers a course entitled, "Rhetoric of Women," that combines a traditional rhetorical criticism approach with recent women's studies research. The course is organized topically, moving from the general to a more specific examination of variables that operate in the…

This book discusses the relationship between gender and language use in a framework of social interaction. In so doing, it reports on research concerned with sexism in language, the use of language by women and men, and the evaluations of language use by women and men. Language is considered within four theoretical frameworks in which assumptions…

Two studies were undertaken to determine first whether language characteristics attributed to females are more socially desirable than those attributed to males and second whether a double standard exists such that language traits seen as socially desirable for adults in general are viewed as negative when assigned to either females or males. For…

The variation seen as deviation among the nonstandard styles of English does not represent a decay of the language, but rather, is necessary for simplification and other changes of English structure. The modern-day English pronominal system resulted from the incorporation of Scandinavian forms in the North and East Midland dialects of Middle…

IN ADDITION TO GIVING A COMPLETE DESCRIPTION OF THE GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE OF VIETNAMESE, THIS TEXT CONTAINS A STUDY OF VIETNAMESE PRONUNCIATION, BASED ON THE EDUCATED SPEECH OF HANOI, WHICH IS CONSIDERED STANDARD. ANOTHER ENTIRE SECTION IS DEVOTED TO DIALECTAL DIFFERENCES, SPECIFICALLY TO COMPARISONS WITH THE SPEECH OF SAIGON. ALL PHONOLOGY IS…

THE THIRD IN A SERIES OF TEXTS PREPARED AT SETON HALL UNIVERSITY, THIS ADVANCED TEXT PRESUPPOSES MASTERY OF "BEGINNING CHINESE,""BEGINNING CHINESE READER," AND LESSONS 1 TO 6 OF "INTERMEDIATE CHINESE READER." A COMPANION VOLUME TO THIS ONE, "CHARACTER TEXT FOR ADVANCED CHINESE," PROVIDES READING PRACTICE AND…

THIS CHARACTER VERSION OF "ADVANCED CHINESE" CAN BE STUDIED FOR READING PURPOSES AT THE SAME TIME THAT THE TRANSCRIPTION VERSION IS STUDIED FOR SPEAKING PURPOSES. THERE ARE 904 NEW CHARACTERS INTRODUCED HERE AMONG THE 150,000 CHARACTERS OF RUNNING TEXT. IT IS ASSUMED THAT THE STUDENT HAS MASTERED THE BEGINNING AND ADVANCED CHINESE TEXTS…

THIS IS THE FIRST OF A THREE-VOLUME, NINE-UNIT COURSE IN BASIC AMHARIC. VOLUME ONE TOGETHER WITH VOLUME TWO (UNITS IV-VIII OR LESSONS 16-35) DEAL WITH THE PROBLEMS OF PRONUNCIATION AND THE ORAL-AURAL MASTERY OF BASIC GRAMMATICAL CONSTRUCTIONS. EACH LESSON INCLUDES A DIALOG, GRAMMATICAL NOTES, PATTERN DRILLS, EXERCISES, AND A VOCABULARY LIST. AT…

THIS IS THE SECOND OF A THREE-VOLUME COURSE IN BASIC AMHARIC. FOLLOWING THE SAME FORMAT AS THE FIRST VOLUME, EACH LESSON IN UNITS IV-VII CONTAINS A DIALOG, GRAMMATICAL NOTES, PATTERN DRILLS, EXERCISES, AND A VOCABULARY LIST. ENGLISH-AMHARIC AND AMHARIC-ENGLISH GLOSSARIES ARE APPENDED. THIS COURSE WILL PREPARE THE STUDENT TO PERFORM AT A…

The first part of this essay argues specifically that legal speech acts are not statements but question/answer constructions. The focus in this section is on the underlying interrogative structure of the legal decision. The second part of the paper touches on significant topics related to the concept of legal speech acts, including the philosophic…

This paper reports the personal experiences of a Fulbright scholar working in the Egyptian government's Cairo broadcast facility, offering an inside understanding of some of the broadcasting procedures used by Egyptian mass media. Besides descriptions of the broadcasting procedures at Cairo Radio, the paper contains notes on announcers' training…

The results of two experiments on understanding metaphors were found to be incompatible with the popular view that deaf children have particular problems in understanding metaphorical uses of natural language. Profoundly deaf children were presented with several short stories and were instructed to select (from a set of four alternatives) the…

A survey of 210 professional communicators measured their sensitivity to the problem of readability, especially as it has been treated in the plain English movement (the drive to improve written materials and to make the unreadable readable). The results of the survey showed that 23% of the communicators rated the plain language concept…

An experiment was conducted to investigate the hypothesis that English cliches reflect sex-specific styles of speech and that sex-specificity of expressions is related to differential usage by male and female speakers. Hypotheses were derived from Tyler's claims that the "neutral sphere" is infused by the male style, rendering it an inhibiting…

The initial stage of second language learning usually aims to develop the ability to converse. This conversational ability is, however, rarely the ultimate object of second language instruction. The student may want access to the literature of the culture of the second language, or to get an education in it. For these reasons, interest shifts…