In this interpretative case study, the researchers examined the beliefs and practices of 10 self-identifying race-conscious social studies teachers. Using critical race theory as the lens, the results showed that most of the teachers made race explicit in their classrooms, included race in units not typically considered race-related, and focused…

This paper reports on an exploratory case study of learner participation within the context of online language learning in virtual world platforms. Data for this investigation was collected through a case study of a Business English course within a qualitative Case-Study Research framework. This study examines learner activity in virtual worlds in…

This paper discusses both the persistent and changing features of rhetorical criticism during the past 60 years. From a review of 75 critical studies that were published from 1915 to 1925, from 1965 to 1968, in 1973, and from 1975 to 1977, three observations are made: First, most studies of rhetorical criticism have been, and continue to be, case…

Since its formation, the Speech Communication Association's Committee on Freedom of Speech has played a critical leadership role in course offerings, research efforts, and regional activities in freedom of speech. Areas in which research has been done and in which further research should be carried out include: historical-critical research, in…

The 5th International Conference on Language, Literature and Culture has been hosted by Mehmet Akif Ersoy University (Burdur, Turkey), in cooperation with Çankaya University (Ankara, Turkey) and Süleyman Demirel University (Isparta, Turkey). Our main aim has been to provide a forum for discussion, to facilitate integration in these fields, and to…

Based on a newly developed holistic theory of knowledge and learning, this paper critically evaluates several contemporary theories of adult learning. Most of existing adult learning theories tend to narrowly define knowledge and learning and fail to offer adequate explanation for adult learning. Implications for HRD theory, research, and practice…

This paper proposes the examination of the "rhetorical compact" as a new genre of rhetorical criticism. The paper contends that the study of rhetorical compacts and the resulting influence on rhetorical patterns can serve as a tool to the scholar seeking to identify the implicit strategies in textual analysis. It suggests a linear…

This paper considers the ongoing debate between two organizations (National Association of Scholars and Teachers for a Democratic Culture) in higher education. The rhetorical positions of each side resemble those of the "cold war" between the United States and the Soviet Union of the 1950s and 1960s where each side created a mirror image…

Seeking the answers as to what makes one speaker more charismatic than another and why some speeches are merely effective while others move audiences to a transcendent state is a difficult task. This paper follows up on this challenge and seeks to provide some answers as to how the prophetic works of Richard Brothers moved his followers to a…

Research on the assessment of naturalistic inquiries is reviewed, and criteria for assessment are outlined. Criteria reviewed include early foundational and non-foundational criteria, trustworthiness criteria, axiomatic criteria, rhetorical criteria, action criteria, and application/transferability criteria. Case studies that are reports of…

Little of the scholarship that focuses on the professional lives of women faculty addresses how faculty women mobilize or how and with whom they create networks to work in academe. Women now make up more than 50% of the undergraduate student population, and just over 40% of Ph.D. recipients are women. Many campuses house women's centers and other…

The existence of children's literature as a genre has, to a large extent, depended on its function as a force of social manipulation, rather than on any concern with literary value. The need to consider children's literature in the light of developments in literary theory that emphasize the importance of the semiotics of the text, and in…

The following study explored the structures and themes found in a few episodes of a popular TV sitcom ("Friends"). Drawing on James Gee's ideas about critical discourse analysis as the main analytical lens for this study, this study discussed the language found in a sitcom and analyzed the complexity of structures and vocabulary in the…

A mythic interpretive framework can explain how the use of an uncontested term--a word which "seems to invite a contest, but which apparently is not so regarded in its own context"--is legitimated and perpetuated. By examining John C. Calhoun's nullification rhetoric as a case study of political myth (specifically his "Disquisition…

Few empirical studies have focused on how composition students draw on classroom interactions to develop as writers. For instance, when students disagree fundamentally in their interpretations of what they have read, how are the range of voices reflected in their subsequent writing? The student-led format for discussions proves conducive to…