Preservice teachers acting as participant-observers coded questions of 544 elementary students and 25 teachers. Students asked few questions; one-third were procedural, one-third content focused, and one-fourth involved social functioning. Teachers asked many questions, two-thirds informative. Both groups asked few imaginative or heuristic…

Describes an undergraduate writing course on communicating public policy. Discusses how academic instruction in professional and technical communication can show students, by simulating practical experience and by developing a discourse analytic perspective, what elected officials, governmental staff, and non-profit non-governmental organizations…

Notes that less skilled readers have difficulty suppressing active, but irrelevant, information during comprehension. Investigates whether the mechanism responsible for suppressing the inappropriate meaning of a word is an automatic process or a strategic, controlled one. Finds that less skilled readers may have difficulty executing a strategic…

Demonstrates that the degree to which something is learned is the degree to which valued new and contextualized behaviors are exhibited. Suggests that learning is commonly assessed by matching learner discourse with "what is in the teacher's mind," a process of discursive colonization. (SK)

Traces development of the campaign history genre by exploring two key exemplars: T. White's "The Making of the President 1960" and R.B. Cramer's "What It Takes: The Way to the White House." Reveals that the books make sense of the election, develop a reciprocal relationship between private man and public figure, and create an authoritarian reading…

Examines the metaphor of the "wall separating Church and State" for its argumentative functions in the discourse of Supreme Court argumentation. Traces the rise and fall of this influential metaphor over time as it achieves paradigmatic status, becomes regulated by common usage, and achieves contested status. (PA)

Argues that discourse knowledge (knowledge readers have of the way a text or story is organized) can be taught from the earliest grades using authentic contexts and quality children's literature as well as the children's own writing. Suggests specific books and specific strategies to foster the students' knowledge of three patterns of…

Deconstructs the "kiddie porn" media frame used by the industry and mainstream media to characterize Klein's ad campaign. Extends scholarship on the construction of youth in the media, showing how the kiddie-porn frame produces and reproduces common-sense beliefs about the nature of youth. Suggests a metadiscourse encompassing the…

Suggests that, as more students gain access to the Internet and learn to write in electronic environments, literacy researchers in computers and composition need to study the discursive practices of these students outside the classroom in relation to the classroom. Explores the emergence of a lesbian, bisexual, and gay youth cyberculture as an…

Presents a functional grammatical analysis of the writing that 128 seventh- and eighth-grade students produced in response to their science teacher's directive to describe a picture. Identifies the register elements of the task and the grammatical difficulties it posed for students. Shows that teachers can help students use grammatical resources…

Analyzes four topics: (1) everyday discourse and judgments about language usage; (2) "social linguistics" and explanations for language differences in terms of categories such as class and gender; (3) the proposition that identity is constructed by language; and (4) the extent to which social categories are discursively constructed. (SK)

Contends understanding preservice teachers' beliefs about grammar and conventionality through studying how they write about it is important since these beliefs will likely influence the kind of teachers they become. Finds preservice teachers' written discourse about grammar/conventionality reveals largely negative attitudes toward writers who made…

In years 1 and 3, the cognitive level of classroom discourse was assessed for 28 agriculture faculty. In year 2, interventions included either awareness workshops, workshops plus readings, or workshops plus teaching meetings. Percentage of higher-level discourse increased; faculty experiencing positive change with higher-level discourse increased…

Contributes to scholarship on technology and society by examining portrayals of the information highway in a wide range of magazine articles. Finds that a sense of powerlessness pervades these narratives, which portray the world as autonomous economic forces toward which individuals must adjust their actions. Argues that these narratives close off…

Examines discourses in the academic and information science literature that attempt to justify and promote, to criticize and resist, or to explain and interpret transformational social change. Surveys literature about organizational change in academic libraries and builds a syncretic interpretation to overcome some of the traditional problems of…