according to coates’s (2004, as cited in zhang, 2010) definition of "conversational dominance" (p.111), it refers to the phenomenon of a speaker dominating others in interaction. specifically, it means how a speaker makes use of certain strategies to get the floor and maintain the floor. thus, the amount of talk is the main measurement for the dominance of the conversation. whether a speaker do...

the concepts of similarity and dissimilarity have been the interest of many researchers. basically, in the studies the similarity between two objects or phenomena, has been discussed. in this thesis, we consider the case when the resemblance or similarity among three objects or phenomena of a set, 3-similarity in our terminology, is desired. later we will extend our definitions and propos...

the present paper investigates how far ideologies can be tease out in discourse by examining the employed schemata by two ideologically opposed news media, the bbc and press tv, to report syria crisis during a period of nine months in 2011. by assuming that news is not a valuefree construction of facts and drawing on micro structural approach of schema theory, for the first time in discours...

abstract: proverbs are of the language materials which of the food of any language depends on the quality and quantity of these same materials. in the present research, the researcher tried to present the ramsarian proverbs according to four variables of color, fruit, plantsand animals that selected from the book of the members of each of these four variables, put them into the spss system fo...

as some definitions show, idioms are expressions whose meanings cannot be obtained from individual words. in every society, people use their own conceptions and feelings through different idioms and expressions. so every culture and society has their own idioms. some scholars proposed methods for translating idioms but baker’s strategies are very important and constructive. this research tried ...

this study investigates the strategies native english and persian speakers employ for expressing gratitude in different situations. the strategies of persian efl learners are also compared with english strategies in order to find the differences that may exist between these two languages. social status and size of imposition of the favor are social variables which are investigated in detail for...

testing plays a vital role in any language teaching program. it allows teachers and stakeholders, including program administrators, parents, admissions officers and prospective employers to be assured that the learners are progressing according to an accepted standard (douglas, 2010). the problems currently facing language testers have both practical and theoretical implications but the first i...

this thesis is an evaluation of poetry of sylvia plath (1932- 1963) and forough farrokhzad (1935-1967) using feminist approach and finds the positive concepts of hope, reason and strength through feminine images in their poetry. plath and farrokhzad are from different cultures and different countries but they share the same concepts and themes in their poetry. by applying feminist theory to the...

a major concern in the last few years has been the fact that the cultural centers are keeping distance with what they have been established for and instead of reproducing the hegemony, they have turned into a place for resistance and reproduction of resistance against hegemony. because the cultural centers, as urban public spaces in the last two decades, have been the subject of ideological dis...

the present dissertation aims to investigate four-word lexical bundles in applied linguistics research articles by iranian and internationally-published writers. the aims of this study are two-fold: first of all, attempts have been made to create a comprehensive list of the most commonly used four-word lexical bundles categorized by their type and token frequency, their structural characteristi...