درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

The goal of this study was to compare the use of conceptual metaphors in English novels written by native and nonnative writers of English. Therefore, two novels were selected: To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee, a native English writer, and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, a nonnative English writer. To find the instances of conceptual metaphors in each book, approximately 10% of the pages of each novel was randomly selected and examined line by line based on the framework introduced by Lakoff and Johnson (1980). In the next step, to find the number and type of metaphors used in each book, the identified metaphors were categorized under their underlying concepts and counted. Then, the frequencies of different types of metaphors in each book were tallied and tabulated, and with the use of a chi-square test, the possible differences among the 2 writers’ use of different types of metaphors were found. Results indicated that, in both novels, there were significant differences among the 5 types of metaphors that were identified, namely structural metaphors, ontological metaphors, orientational metaphors, metonymy, and personification. Findings revealed that, in both books, ontological metaphors were the most frequently used type and personification was the least frequently used one. Also, no statistically significant difference was seen between the two writers’ use of the different types of metaphors. Findings are claimed to bear some implications for L2 pedagogy, benefiting teachers, syllabus designers, writers, and L2 learners.

Lesson Study is considered as a way of improving teachers’ professional development in foreign language teacher education courses. Integration of collaboration with focused observation within Lesson Study facilitates teacher professionalization and pedagogical practice. Therefore, this study aimed to explore Iranian EFL teachers’ perceptions of the practical implementation of Lesson Study, and examine novice and experienced EFL teachers’ comments about merging their theoretical knowledge with practice throughout the application of Lesson Study. To this end, four novice and three experienced language teachers, both female and male were selected as the participants of this study. Data collection was done through triangulation of teachers’ reflective notes, an unstructured interview, observation, and field notes. The findings indicated that EFL teachers have positive views toward Lesson Study as a means of professional development. Additionally, the novice and experienced EFL teachers have different attitudes regarding lesson planning, reflective teaching, and collaborating with other colleagues. The findings of this study can have implications for EFL teachers and teacher educators to promote ongoing learning in their profession through reflective teaching and collaboration.

Geotourism is a relatively new concept in tourism industry which has considerable growth in recent decade. The variety of geological phenomena in Iran is unique and remarkable. Rageh Canyon, near Rafsanjan city in Iran, with a length of 20 km and a width of 180 meters, and a depth of 70 meters, is beautiful and majestic. This Canyon is the result of the eroding of the water of the permanent river of Givederi, and is related to the Quaternary, and is estimated to be about 20, 000 years old. The erosion of the water in the region has caused a very beautiful shape in the walls of the Rageh Valley, which has added to the beauty of the area. The beauty and uniqueness of this valley has made some people consider the attractiveness of this region to the Shahdad Clement plain in terms of tourism potential. Now the canyon is a place for the presence of some observation tours of the sky, valley climbing and climbing. Rafsanjan is a pistachio pole in Iran, which has a single-product economy. By identifying and introducing natural phenomena such as Rageh Canyon as geotourism attractions, this city can be extracted from the singleeconomy. So the tourism industry in the city booms.

Today, the tourism industry is regarded as the most inclusive service industry worldwide that serves as a substantial source of economic prosperity (job creation, foreign exchange earnings, poverty mitigation, etc.) and elevated exchanges and social interaction. For this, areas with a high potential in tourism should take proper strategies to hold the economic and socio-cultural benefits of this industry. Free trade zones in Iran, particularly Kish, Qeshm, and Chabahar, can primarily consider the tourism industry and attract tourists to achieve economic goals, as declared in the law governs the establishment of free zones and also in the economic, social and cultural program of the country. Herein, this work attempts to identify appropriate strategies for tourism development in Qeshm Free Trade Zone to develop the tourism industry and economic-cultural sectors. For this, the strengths and weaknesses (internal factors) and opportunities and threats (foreign factors) were identified using the SWOT technique and the opinions of experts and specialists. The multi-criteria decision model ANP (an analytic network process) was used to prioritize and rank internal and external factors and determine the ultimate value of a collection of internal and external factors, aiming to prioritize and adopt the best strategy in the form of SO, WO, ST, and WT solutions. And the final value of each of these solutions was respectively 0.28, 0.39, 0.23, and 0.49. Initial results indicated the supremacy of the offensive strategy with the highest value (0.49) that is considered as the predominant strategy. The foremost strengths and opportunities in the region include investment in the private sector, security for tourists, the distribution and variety of tourist attraction sources, and the participation of indigenous people in the Qeshm region.