درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Speaking is a significant skill that many foreign language learners are trying to master. In this study, the effectiveness of two different speaking activities, i.e. oral presentation vs. free discussion, was investigated from quantitative and qualitative points of view. To achieve this purpose, 44 intermediate learners from a language institute in Tehran participated in the study. Half of the participants experienced oral presentation while the other half (22 in two other classes) experienced free discussion for eight sessions. The two activities were exchanged between the two groups after the end of the quantitative phase of the study for eight more sessions. The results of an independent samples t-test performed on the scores ofthe speaking section of a sample Preliminary English Test (PET, 2012 ) after the first phase of the study (the first 8 sessions) indicated that the learners who experienced oral presentation significantly outperformed the learners who experienced free discussion though both activities proved to be significantly useful. Furthermore, the results of the interview with 10 participants from each activity through purposeful sampling, after the second phase of the study (the second 8 sessions) through thematic analysis indicated that both free discussion and oral presentation activities had some merits and demerits. Based on the results it can be advisable to include the two activities as complementary.

Morpho-syntactic patterns device encompasses a subcategory of the cohesive devices that assists hearers to have an adequate mental representation for understanding speech. This article investigates the morpho-syntactic patterns employed in some Persian live sport radio and TV programs adapting Dooley and Levinsohn’s theoretical and analytical framework. The research data includes around 30,000 words extracted from 20 live sport radio and TV recorded programs. The morpho-syntactic patterns functionality is presented via comparing their frequency using descriptive statistics. The t-test is run to evaluate whether the differences in the utilization of morpho-syntactic patterns used in live radio and TV talks is significant or not. The results show that such patterns in Persian can be studied in the same way as Dooley and Levinsohn’s perspective, among which consistency of inflectional categories receives the most frequency while echoic utterances do the least. The consistency of inflectional categories catches a meaningful difference between its applications in the research data. Furthermore, there are not significant differences between the application of echoic utterances and discourse-pragmatic structuring in the corpora. Finally, morpho-syntactic patterns device, generally speaking, is reported as not having any significant relation in its applications in Persian live radio and TV talks under study.

Rhetorical structure is helpful in improving how the writers maintain cohesion in their writings. This study examines how the Iraqi writers maintain cohesion in the text by analyzing the various rhetorical moves in Azzaman, an online Iraqi newspaper. To this purpose, twelve opinion articles from Azzaman Iraqi newspaper, published from January 2013 to June 2013 were analyzed. The findings revealed a common rhetorical pattern: the introduction section, the intermediate section, and the coda section (conclusion stage). All these were frequently used, but the use of intermediate section (solution stage) and coda section (moral stage) were less frequently-used in comparison with the introduction section. The findings of this study reflect the way Iraqis write opinion articles in English newspapers, and generally show that the use of similar patterns in the rhetorical structure mirrors the writing of second language writers’ writing to convey information to second language readers.

The present study, following Vygotskyan Sociocultural theory in education, and inspired by Rogoff’s conceptualization (1995, 2003) of development, aimed at conceptual development of in-service EFL teachers. To this end, two Iranian EFL teachers with pseudonyms (Tara and Sara) were selected as participants of the study. The participating teachers were first taught the sociocultural concepts related to language, teaching, and learning taken from Johnson (2009) and Rogoff’s (2003) mediatory model of development in six workshops through dialogic mediation. The data for the study comprised two semi-structured interviews, and three video-recording of critical reflection of each teacher on their video-taped classroom behavior. The recordings and transcripts were analyzed using Hatch’s (2002) procedure for interpretive analysis. The results of the study showed that participating teachers, over a process of struggle with their past experiences, gradually replaced their old everyday concepts such as grammatical accuracy, correct samples, and teacher interruption with new scientific concepts such as grammatical apprenticeship, guided grammatical participation, and grammatical appropriation through assisted participation. The results of present study can be illuminating for teacher educators and teacher education programs which have aimed at changing the classroom practice of in-service teachers

در این مقاله به بررسی اثر «کلامی درباره هنگ ایگور» از دیدگاه کاربردشناختی خواهیم پرداخت. مبنای کار، ترجمه واژه به واژه لیخاچف از این اثر است. این اثر به عنوان گفتمان و در چهارچوب تئوری کنش گفتاری جان سیرل بررسی شده است و کنش های گفتاری به کاررفته در آن تفکیک شده اند. چنین رویکردی در تحلیل اثر، این امکان را فراهم می آورد تا بلوک های ارتباطی متن را تفکیک و مقاصد نویسنده را تعیین کنیم که چگونه از طریق تغییر استراتژی ارتباطی گفتار، سعی در تأثیرگذاری بر روی مخاطبان دارد. علاوه براین در مقاله حاضر اهداف منظوری گفتار سایر شخصیت های اثر تعیین شده و تحلیل آماری انواع کنش های گفتاری به کاررفته در آن ارائه می شود. نتایج این پژوهش می تواند برای ترجمه این اثر به زبان های دیگر و نیز برای اهداف آموزشی در کلاس های خارجی زبانان سودمند باشد.

Advertisement has long been used as a tool for informing and attracting audiences in different ways. This study aims at investigating the linguistic tools of advertisement in Persian on the basis of Halliday’s systemic-functional grammar theory. The data of this study were gathered from written and verbal commercial advertisements which were recorded and rewritten in order to investigate verbal groups in the sentences in terms of process and function types and subsequently compare the two bodies. The results showed that material and relational processes had highest frequency in Persian language in terms of ideational metafunction. From the interpersonal metafunction perspective, information function was frequent in most cases. Regarding these factors, there was no significant difference between verbal and written bodies.