درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

The present research aimed to investigate gender-specific charactonyms in the Persian Translation of John Bunyan’s (1684) The Pilgrim's Progress, Part 2. It also aimed to reveal whether the TL preferred equivalents for the SL gender-specific charactonyms could convey the meanings and the characteristics of the names in the Persian translation. The material was borrowed from the book Seir-o Solouk-i Za’ir, Bakhshe Dovom (‘سیر و سلوک زائر، بخش دوّم’) translated by Golnaz Hamedi in 2002 (1381), and also its French and Arabic translations. Thus, SL gender-specific charactonyms were compared with TL equivalents in Evelyn Hatch’s (1992) macro-level analysis. According to Hatch (1992), characters, as one of the main elements of a story, play a significant role and affect the macrostructure of the story. The results showed that the Persian equivalents used by Hamedi (2002) ranged from transparent to problematic ones. Hamedi (2002) less preserved the meanings of the names and sometimes replaced the female charactonyms with already-used male charactonyms that affected the novel due to the change of the characteristics and additional information the charactonyms bear in their inner forms.

A needs analysis (NA) study was carried out to determine how well course objectives and actual classroom activities aligned with the English language needs of learners enrolled in a communicative EFL course in Iran.  Brown’s (2016) NA framework was adapted with a focus on the democratic and discrepancy view of NA. A case study design utilizing triangulation of data collection was employed to collect and analyze both quantitative and qualitative data. A questionnaire, classroom observations, and post-observation interviews were among the methods used to collect information from 143 learners and 10 teachers. The questionnaires were quantitatively analyzed using frequency counts, percentages, and one-way repeated measures ANOVA analyses to identify learners'' language needs. The qualitative dimension of the study provided a complete picture of course objectives and classroom activities and tasks. The results of the questionnaire showed that the majority of learners agreed that all general English skills were fundamental to communicating in English and ranked speaking skill, followed by writing, as the most needed skills. Also, a review of course objectives indicated that the learning objectives of the English course aligned with learners’ English language needs.  However, according to classroom observations and post-observation interviews, classroom goals were not focused on attaining communicative tasks and activity objectives. In fact, teachers’ teaching objectives did not meet the learners'' communicative needs and were limited to teaching four skills at comprehension, grammatical, and lexical levels. Misalignment between assessment tasks and course objectives was reported as one of the contributing factors.

The present study aims at scrutinizing the inference complexity level (henceforth ICL) of test items of the Iranian State University TEFL Ph.D. entrance exam (ISUTPEE) from 2010 to 2017 through the lens of Kintsch's construction-integration theory (C-I) (Kintsch, 1988, 1998). Though there is ample research on inferencing in the field of reading comprehension, the existing literature reveals a serious gap in relation to inferencing complexity of test items in high-stakes exams that exert profound effects on the academic achievements of the individuals. Inferencing is examined in this study to explore the ICL of the test items of the Special Knowledge Test (SKT) according to three levels of memory representations of Kintsch's model: the surface model, the textbase, and the situation model. To this end, the test items for eight consecutive years of the ISUTPEE were examined in relation to the three distinct kinds of mental representations. To ensure the reliability of coding by the researchers, two other specialist coders assessed the ICL of 33% of the items. The intraclass correlation among the three sets of codes was 0.91. The results of the study showed that a large number of questions, accounting for more than 80% of the items, merely activate the surface and the textbase model of information representations in memory. Furthermore, the ICL for each of the four parts of SKT was examined. This analytical study carries a stark warning regarding a deficiency of systematic attention to ICL in the development of test items.

Developing textbook material is a crucial component of any curriculum, which should be based on sound and systematic techniques. In a detailed view, considering the importance of knowing English not only as an international language but as the language of commerce, tech and science, English course needs to be programmed efficiently to provide a suitable circumstance of learning for learners. In this regard, the present study is to develop a new English textbook for Iranian Senior High Schools to provide an opportunity for high school students as well as teachers to be actively engaged in the text, questions, and images of the textbook based on William Rummy’s Technique to keep up with the developments of the field. The results of the study demonstrate demonstrates that the involvement index is appropriate enough to actively engage the learners in the newly developed English textbook. That is, the texts, questions, and images within the textbook are suitably developed to engage the students actively.

The current quasi-experimental research aimed at exploring the influence of Lexically-Based Language Teaching (LBLT) on task response and coherence and cohesion aspects of the writing proficiency of Iranian university EFL learners. The research sample of the study included sixty male and female university students (N = 60) attending two university classes. They were selected by using a convenient sampling procedure and were assigned to experimental and control groups. To ascertain the groups' homogeneity at the beginning of the study, the researchers gave two groups the Key English Test (KET). Prior to starting treatment, two groups took the pretest writing task. While the participants comprising the experimental group were instructed consistent with the lexical approach's underlying practices and activities, those constituting the control group were instructed based on conventional techniques applied to present essay writing in universities. At the end of the experiment, the posttest writing, identical to the pretest, was given to both groups. To compare the two groups' mean scores with respect to coherence and cohesion and task response aspects of post-test writing, One-way Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) and independent T-test were drawn upon. Version 20 th of the SPSS software was applied for this end. The attained results were indicative of a significantly positive influence of the lexically-based language teaching on both coherence and cohesion and task response aspects of writing proficiency. However, the attained improvement was greater in the task response aspect. The findings suggest some implications for English language teachers and university instructors.

Given the importance of assessment in language education, this study was aimed at investigating the effects of interventionist and interactionist Dynamic Assessment (DA) on Iranian EFL learners’ perfectionism, willingness to communicate (WTC) and foreign language anxiety (FLA). The participants of the study were 166 pre-intermediate female and male learners at two public schools and one private language institute in Karaj. The participants were divided into three experimental groups and were given three separate questionnaires to measure their perfectionism, WTC, and FLA before the treatment sessions. During 14 sessions, groups A and B received instruction using interactionist DA and interventionist DA, respectively. Group C was instructed conventionally as the control group. At the end of the treatment sessions, they were given the same three questionnaires as the post test. The collected data were analysed using one-way ANCOVA. The results showed no significant differences among the two approaches of dynamic assessment and the control group in terms of their effect on learners’ perfectionism and willingness to communicate. Although there was no significant difference between the interventionist and interactionist models of DA, they were both significantly more effective than the control group on learners’ FLA. The findings suggested that dynamic assessment could reduce learners’ anxiety in language learning and lead to an effective teaching and learning process. These findings can have implications for teachers, students, and material developers.

Synesthesia, among other rhetorical devices, has played a prominent role in conveying the intended messages in the realm of poetry. Nonetheless, it has not grabbed adequate attention to its nature and function. Belonging to the domain of comparative literature, this essay has benefitted from analogy studies as its methodology to render novel perspectives in the meaning and reading of the poetry of Sitwell and Ebtehaj. Here, we have attempted, firstly, to foreground the function of synesthesia and, secondly, to enrich the understanding of the mentioned poets. This paper concludes that the realization of synesthesia heavily and helpfully affects the perception of literary poems. In addition, to showcase such influence, a reasonable number of poems by Sitwell and Ebtehaj were subjected to scrutiny, indicating that a great deal of their poetry is best understood only after investigating synesthesia. This essay is merely concentrated on two poets, yet its findings can be helpful for the whole field of poetry.

As building blocks of coherent discourse, lexical bundles, frequent word combinations that commonly occur in different registers, have attracted the attention of researchers in corpus linguistics in the last decade. The importance of these word clusters lies in their often necessary functional contribution to the development of evolving discourse. While most previous studies of bundles have been mainly concerned with variations in the use of these word sequences across different registers (e.g., conversation, classroom teaching, and lectures) and a number of disciplines (e.g., history and biology), postgraduate genres have not been the subject of adequate rigorous analysis. This corpus-based study explored possible differences andor similarities between two students' genres in terms of the variety, structure, and function of lexical bundles. Through two corpora of master theses and doctoral dissertations in one single discipline of applied linguistics, the study showed that not only was there a large intradisciplinary difference between the two genres in the range of bundles employed, but also there were some striking differences in the total frequency and function of these word combinations. Some implications for academic writing instruction have also been discussed.

The present study aimed to investigate the relationship between attitudes towards cheating, academic self-confidence, and general language ability among Iranian EFL learners. One hundred and thirty-nine university EFL students participated in this study. Findings showed that attitudes towards cheating negatively correlate with academic self-confidence and ability as measured by students’ GPA. The relationship between age, gender, level of education, and attitudes towards cheating was examined too. Analyses showed that there is a negative correlation between age and attitudes towards cheating. However, no relationship was found between gender and level of education, and attitudes towards cheating. Furthermore, psychometric qualities of the Attitudes towards Cheating Questionnaire were examined. Analyses revealed that some items had low and negative item discrimination indices. When malfunctioning items were deleted the reliability of the scale improved. Implications of the study on correlates of cheating among Iranian EFL learners and the validity of the Attitudes towards Cheating Questionnaire are discussed.