Comparison of language-impaired two- to three-year-olds (N=10) and normal one-year-olds (N=15) matched for expressive language revealed that the language-impaired subjects acquired a greater number of object concepts presented in a no-action condition than the normal children, although language-impaired subjects' extensions of the names to new…

Explores (l) the role of pre-text in translating ideas into linguistic forms, and (2) the relationship of translating and pre-text in the planning and reviewing process. Suggests four observations worthy of further study concerning the nature and function of pre-text. (NH)

The use of generic "the" and its alternatives "0" and "a(n)" is investigated at a range of discourse levels in a series of articles from "Scientific American." Generic "the" was found to occur less frequently than generic "0" but much more frequently than generic "a(n)." (Author/LMO)

Questions the prevalent attitude of English as a second language teachers regarding the teaching of writing skills. Weaknesses in syllabi and teaching strategies are cited, indicating deficiencies in the teaching of discourse analysis--the manipulation of words, structures, and ideas--all skills necessary for the development and production of a…

Lexical phrases such as deictic locutions, phrasal constraints, sentence builders, and situational utterances are examined using categories from artificial intelligence. It is argued that these and other types of patterned speech should be carefully organized and given a greater place in English as a Second Language curricula than at present. (PMJ)

Analyzed personal pronoun use in 36 scientific journal articles, focusing on how use of personal pronouns may reveal writers' perceptions of their own role in research and their relationship with expected readers and the scientific/academic community. Use of first-personal plural pronouns was most common, with a number of semantic references and…

A collection of essays on the comprehension of text brings together perspectives of different disciplines on discourse. Articles include: "Naturalistic Texts and Naturalistic Tasks" (Herre van Oostendorp, Rolf A. Zwaan); "Psychological Studies of Naturalistic Text" (Arthur C. Graesser, Joseph P. Magliano, Karl Haberlandt);…

United States President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev have strongly emphasized in several speeches that their ultimate goal is peace between their respective nations. However, this apparent shared goal has not come about, largely because they lack a common understanding of the meaning of peace. Both have stated that they wish…

In order to design a cognitive model of ethnic attitudes, an interdisciplinary project has analyzed strategies used in everyday conversation among majority members about minority groups, e.g., immigrant workers from Turkey and Morocco and people from Surinam. Data were collected through undirected interviews among people in an Amsterdam…

Eleven texts in Diababawon are presented. Diababawon is a Manobo language of the Indonesian branch of the Malayo-Polynesian family and spoken primarily in the province of Davao del Norte, Mindanao, Philippines. An introductory section describes some aspects of the language's phonology. The texts, which include stories and descriptions of common…

A study examined young children's use of the Mandarin "jiu" in its adverbial form in conditional sentences. The language corpus included: (1) spontaneous speech samples of 66 children aged 4, 5, 6, and 7 years in 20 Taiwan locations and (2) story repetitions by 461 4-, 5-, and 6-year-olds in 22 locations. The data indicate that children…

Noam Chomsky's transformational-generative grammar model may effectively be translated into an equivalent computer model. Phrase-structure rules and transformations are tested as to their validity and ordering by the computer via the process of random lexical substitution. Errors appearing in the grammar are detected and rectified, and formal…

This paper argues that traditional techniques of content analysis which have been applied to classroom verbal interaction studies fail to account for certain types of implicit information, and presents a technique, called "reconstruction," that provides for the inclusion of such information in a content analysis. It is argued that if…

The purpose of this study was to determine statistically significant linguistic features of oral and written discourse rated quite high or low by teachers, and to make recommendations based on these findings to supplement existing guidelines for teaching composition. Fifty-five paired oral (tape-recorded) and written compositions were elicited…

This volume presents five languages of India-Nepal from four different language families: Halbi and Kupia (India) of the Indo-Aryan family, Parengi-Gorum (India) of the Munda family, Dhangar-Kudux (Nepal) of the Dravidian family, and Tamang (Nepal) of the Tibeto-Burman family. Papers are entitled "Semanitc Relations between Whole Propositions…