A commonly held belief is that language is an aspect of the biological system since the capacity to acquire language is innate and evolved along Darwinian lines. Written language, on the other hand, is thought to be an artifact and a surrogate of speech; it is, therefore, neither natural nor biological. This disparaging view of written language,…

The vast majority of American-born adults are exposed to written language from a very early age. Most Americans live in a print-based society where letters and words are everywhere! Drive, walk, or bike down any American street and you will see numerous eye-catching billboards, signs, and storefronts. Our towns, cities, neighborhoods, and homes…

The ultimate goal of reading is to construct text meaning based on visually encoded information. Essentially, it entails converting print into language and then to the message intended by the author. It is hardly accidental, therefore, that, in all languages, reading builds on oral language competence and that learning to read uniformly requires…

Recent research on Chinese orthography is reviewed in a discussion of the relationship between orthographic symbols and reading processes. Specifically, these issues are addressed with relation to research findings: the difficulty of learning Chinese logographs, particularly with regard to learning disabilities and biliteracy; whether reading in…

This issue of "Exploring," is devoted primarily to examination of alphabets and the languages they represent. Major articles include: "Shrinking the Alphabet" (Pat Murphy), a comparison of alphabet composition for different languages; "The Puzzle of Linear B" (Paul Doherty), a history of archaeologists' deciphering of an early form of written…

Four group summary papers from an Australian national workshop on discourse analysis discuss verbal and written discourse and the classroom. Papers reflect the four workshop discussion groups of casual conversation, classroom discourse, expository discourse, and literary narrative. They include: "On Casual Conversation" (M. A. K.…

In this paper, an elementary school teacher describes her experiences with the Memory Stack--a HyperCard based tool that can accommodate a voice recording, a graphic image, and a written text on the same card--which she designed to help her second and third grade students integrate their oral language fluency into the process of learning how to…

A few of the relationships between visual and verbal components are explored. Visuals are considered to be things that can be seen, visible things other than printed words that are used in a communication process. The term verbal applies to written or spoken words. The natural tendency for visual and verbal components to be mutually supportive has…

A ethnographic study examined the ways a young child's mind grasps the idea of the written word. The 5-year-old subject, called "Craig" in this article, had an unending thirst for print, read at the second grade level, and had fluent speech and vocabulary. Craig was followed over the previous 8-month period from the time he first gained…

A book of writings by adult students in the Hartford, Connecticut, area is presented. The book represents a celebration of the students and their tutors, whose writings about the students' work are also included. For many of the writings, the prompt is provided as an aid to other teachers who may want to talk and write about similar subjects.…

This guide describes adaptive technology for reading printed text and producing written material, to assist the student who has a visual impairment. The special technologies discussed include auditory text access, text enlargement, tactile text access, portable notetaking devices, and computer access. The guide concludes with lists of the…

Nine papers from a British conference on applied linguistics are compiled in this report. Introductory comments point out the traditional primacy of spoken language while acknowledging the demand for literacy and the importance of the written mode. Papers and authors are as follows: "An Educational Theory of (Written) Language" (Michael Stubbs);…

This paper reconsiders the nature of literature as a school subject. Musing on three anomalies that occur when language arts teachers consider their professions about school literature and what occurs in literature classrooms: (1) the anomaly of the text and the textbook; (2) the anomaly of the idolatry of naive readers whose heads have been…

A serious study of discourse particles (DIPs) must be founded on the analysis of orality in its two main dimensions: oral communication in its ordinary functioning (i.e., discourse, conversation, enunciation), but also in expression ritualized by the oral tradition of cultures that do not have a writing system. The association of the two…

This study explores the belief that if students of Spanish do not write a word correctly, they can not pronounce it correctly. Particular attention focuses on the interrelation between using accent marks in orthography and pronunciation. It is demonstrated that: (1) accent marks may not always be relevant for second-language (L2) speakers,…