درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Instagram, a widely popular platform, has become an influential tool for teaching and learning English by delivering daily updates of new language content on various Instagram pages and accounts. This study examines the effect of Instagram on learners' motivation to learn English and evaluates its advantages and disadvantages for educational purposes. A mixed-methods approach was utilized, incorporating quantitative data collected through a questionnaire distributed among 100 Iranian EFL learners and qualitative data gathered via semi-structured interviews with five teachers who actively employ Instagram in English instruction. Findings revealed that Instagram significantly boosts learners' motivation, with participants expressing positive views about the platform. Key advantages include its engaging and diverse content, as well as its potential to enhance skills and subskills like speaking and vocabulary. In spite of these benefits, certain drawbacks were identified, such as the presence of distracting non-educational content, limited interaction opportunities, and restrictions in fostering deep learning and comprehensive teaching. The study concludes that Instagram offers notable benefits for English education, particularly in motivating learners and providing varied content. However, to fully benefit from its educational potential, it is important to implement strategies that address the challenges identified. Balancing its strengths and limitations is essential to make Instagram more useful in English language education.

In this article, the ideas of some prominent Iranian and Western scholars about metaphor are analyzed comparatively. In addition to “the introduction”, the article includes two main parts: in “Metaphor in the West”, the ideas of some well-known figures of the West such as Aristotle, Richards, Lakoff, and Johnson about metaphor are analyzed; and, in “metaphor in Iran”, the ideas of some prominent Iranian scientists concerning metaphor are reviewed and analyzed, namely, Raduyani, Jurjâni, and Sakkākī Khwārizmī. This research shows that in the West, the viewpoints of Aristotle concerning metaphor have made the foundation of most of the discussions about metaphor even till the twentieth century. However, the ideas of Lakoff and Johnson in the 1980s changed the old consolidated Aristotelian-based perspectives toward metaphor. The research also indicates that there is a close similarity between the ideas of Iranian classical scholars' viewpoints about metaphor and those of Aristotle, and the viewpoints of some of them are also close to what latter has been said about metaphor in the framework of cognitive linguistics.