Analyzes the use of verb-noun collocations by advanced German speaking students of English in free written production. Types of mistakes that learners make when producing collocations are identified. The influence of the degree of restriction of a combination and of learners' first language on the production of collocations is investigated. (VWL)

This article argues for widening the research base on reading from the specific constraints of reading in alphabetic scripts to a larger database covering a variety of scripts. Several recent studies on reading the alphasyllabaries of India are reviewed. Findings indicate that alphasyllabaries are not processed in the same manner as alphabets.…

Examines individual differences in the ability to integrate information from word parts and context in interpreting novel kanji compounds. Also investigated the relationship between students' beliefs about the effectiveness of using kanji and/or contextual clues and their abilities to use the clues. (Author/VWL)

Describes the unicode project, which is working toward a single computer encoding scheme for all the worlds' scripts. It focuses on the special challenge of encoding Chinese characters, and uses the example of Hokkien, a Chinese dialect spoken by most people in Taiwan, to explore the problem of unorthodox, unstable, or unofficial scripts.…

Uses a conversation analytic framework to analyze a practice used by teachers in 1-0-1, second language writing conferences when eliciting self-correction of students' written language errors. This type of turn used to elicit a knowledge display from the student is labeled designedly incomplete utterance (DIU). Teachers use DIUs made up of…

Reports on the use of Systeme-D, a writing tool for learners of French that combines a bilingual word processor with an interconnected set of language reference materials, as a research tool to investigate the types of queries language learners use during the composing process. (24 references) (CB)

Discusses four general areas of linguistics studies that are particularly relevant to literacy issues: (1) discourse analysis, including text analysis, spoken and written language, and home and school discourse; (2) relationships between speech and writing, the distance between dialects and written norms, and developmental writing; (3)…

Reviews 33 children's books which stimulate beginning readers. Divides the books into four categories: books that bridge between oral and written language, predictable books, easy-to-read books, and books of special interest to young children. (MG)

The analysis of 2,979 subject-verb pairs in an American science magazine to determine the relative frequency of inanimate subjects with active verbs found that such usage was more prevalent than the use of inanimate subjects with passive verbs, especially when the subject was abstract, typically to show causality or to explain. (22 references)…

Gives an account of the origin and development of the Russian language as it relates to the cultural history and nationalism of various Slavic groups. (90 references) (Author/OD)

Investigation of Spanish speakers' methods of recognizing written English suggested that speakers of Spanish, which has a highly regular spelling system, may rely on a phonological route because subjects performed quite poorly on exception words. (Author/CB)

Examines the syntactic and stylistic features of an emergent phenomenon called Interactive Written Discourse (IWD), the written language occurring in simultaneous terminal-to-terminal typed dialogues. Finds that IWD is a naturally occurring register and a hybrid language variety, displaying characteristics of both oral and written language. Notes…

Argues that if the study of language is to become important again in the teaching of writing, it will be through an expanded notion of rhetoric that understands language as the site of struggle over socially produced meaning. (RAE)

Demonstrates how a dynamic programing algorithm can be developed to segment unusually long written inscriptions from the Indus Valley Civilization. Explains the problem of segmentation, discusses the dynamic programing algorithm used, and includes tables which illustrate the segmentation of the inscriptions. (GEA)

Examines Korea's experience with abandoning Chinese characters for an all-phonetic script. Despite efforts to replace characters with "all-hangul" in South Korea, reform opponents reinstated Chinese characters. In North Korea, a similar reform was also rescinded. Certain "linguistic" problems need to be solved for the reform to…