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This study was an attempt to determine the effect of task-based approach vs. traditional approach on the narrative and expository writing of the Iranian EFL learners. There were two control groups as well as two experimental ones in the current study. In the two control groups namely G1 and G2 narrative and expository writing were taught respectively using the traditional approach. Whereas، in the two experimental groups، namely G3 and G4 narrative and expository writing were taught respectively on the basis of task-based approach. After the treatment، a narrative writing post-test was given to the two narrative groups (G1 and G3) and an expository writing post-test was given to the two expository groups (G2 and G4). Data analysis showed that experimental groups outperformed control groups. So it was concluded that task-based approach was more effective in teaching narrative and expository writing compared to the traditional approach. It was also found that although there was a difference between the narrative and expository experimental groups (G3 and G4) in favor of the narrative group، this difference was not statistically significant

For the Western Iranian languages the transition from the Old Iranian to the Middle-Iranian period is characterised by – among other things – the loss of word-final syllables. This loss had a far-reaching impact on the nominal and verbal systems since it caused the loss of categories which had been expressed by suffixes. The consequences include the emergence of the so-called ergative system. Although descriptions of the ergative construction in Balochi do exist، there is no treatment yet which takes into account the material of the different dialects. Furthermore، the ergative construction in Balochi has been compared with data from Old Iranian، but not with data from Middle Iranian languages، and the development from the Middle Iranian stage to the different types found in present-day Balochi has also not yet been studied. The aim of this paper is therefore to present the data from the Balochi dialects as far as they are known today and to update، complete (and in some points، correct) previous descriptions of the matter.

The main West Iranian languages، i.e. Old Persian، Parthian، Middle Persian، New Persian and – in some respects – Avestan، may be studied in a uniquely continuous development stretching over close to 3 000 years. These languages are not only the result of their genetic inter-relations but also of their cultural، religious and political history. They may be labelled ‘high languages’ (‘Hochsprachen’)، in the sense that they are cultured and standardized and used for a great number of purposes by people of various linguistic backgrounds. This article presents an over-view of their development seen from a specific perspective. The traditional Iranian walled-in garden، the pairi-daēzaof the Avesta، is used as a metaphor for a high language in contrast to the free vegetation of spontaneous human speech in social interaction. The latter is here called ‘dialect’، a concept that includes both ‘geolect’ and ‘sociolect’. These high language ‘gardens’ are thus viewed as a kind of cultural artefacts. Among other things، this has implications for views on the dichotomy literacy/orality، showing that writing is not language and that ‘orality’ belongs both to ‘high language’ and ‘dialect’. It is furthermore argued that literacy and orality were present in complementary distribution throughout the whole known history of the Iranian cultural sphere.

Among factors that might manipulate translators’ mind while producing a text is the notion of ideology transmission through text or talk. Adopting Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) with particular emphasis on the framework of Van Dijk (1999)، the present investigation is an attempt to shed light on the relationship between language and ideology involved in translation in general، and more specifically، to uncover the underlying ideological assumptions invisible in the texts، both source text (ST) and target text (TT)، and consequently ascertain whether or not translators’ ideologies are imposed in their translations. The corpus consists of the full text of two different Persian translations of the book Media Control by Noam Chomsky، written in English. In a qualitative phase، a detailed contrastive/comparative study at the micro-level in terms of fore/back-grounding mechanisms including explanation of lexical items and dominant grammatical metaphors (passive vs. active، nominalization vs. denominalization، addition vs. omission، and modalization) was conducted to examine، describe and subsequently interpret the patterns in the English source text and its Persian translated versions. In order to make the research data interpretations as objective as possible، having computed frequencies of ideologically significant instances، and percentages، Chi-square formula was applied to find out any difference between proportions of information extracted from the target text concerning their fore/back-grounding and their positions against the source text as well as to test the research null hypothesis، which was consequently rejected. The findings reveal that there are significant changes made by the two translators، either intentionally or unintentionally، in their selection of lexical items and syntactic structures in comparison to those in the source text. The findings of the study also show that many distortions or transformations between the original and the two translated versions were not only arbitrary، but also ideologically encoded in the texts، with specific purposes and functions