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The present article highlights some of the important aspects to be taken into account when teaching commercial correspondence and business English. The most important points that the paper discusses are related to the use of modal verbs, to the ways in which they can be mistaken for other structures (like auxiliary verbs for instance), and to the ways in which students can be taught to grasp the respective meanings correctly. Also, traditional language structures are compared to the new, modern uses of some of these modals.
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Before blaming the seductive charms of the eye-caching and mind-shaping ads, one should remember that advertising has so far successfully adapted to new fashions, topics and ideologies. In my paper I refer to how the advertising message qualifies as a sort of "moral trumpet" for social engagement and how a low-involvement matter (the recycling of used materials such as beer cans) can be presented in a persuasive manner. And what you see is not only what you get. The recipients of this message are taught a nice lesson in German "ecological correctness": people are being educated via ads and consumerism goes along with environment-friendly policies; "greenness" turns out to be also an aspect of the German political landscape and "flower-power" is more than an attitude, it already represents a well developed industry.
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The present study discusses the consequences free speech may have in today's society, making reference to the case of one of the most controversial novels of the twentieth century, namely the book Salman Rushdie published in 1988: "The Satanic Verses". By presenting the different aspects of the controversy surrounding the novel, we hope to reveal significant points related to the intricate and at times potentially dangerous connections established between religion and fiction and to show how a multitude of elements – including religious, political and social factors – combine in shaping the effect a piece of writing has on its audience.
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The study analyses Jean-Paul Sartre's view of the place the human beings hold in the world, a place which focuses on the ideas of freedom and responsibility. Also it takes into consideration the means used by the author to make this view known: theoretical studies, novels, theatre plays, articles and political action. In the final part of this paper Sartre's doctrine of engagement and its large social influence are presented.
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The present article, which is meant as a brief introduction to the "antimetaphysical" deconstructionist project, is a paradoxical attempt to make sense of a peculiar type of critical discourse that obstinately resists intelligibility. As such, to deconstructionists themselves it would necessarily appear as one more illustration of the illegitimate, totalising, yet unavoidable gesture condemned by both Derrida and his Yale followers – a gesture ironically performed by its own critics, at times. Given the deconstructionist inconsistency that we have just mentioned, we prefer to look at it as one more example of logocentric "blindness" understood in the highly ambivalent, demannean sense of the word, as both a hindrance to, and a condition for valuable critical "insights".
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Persuasion is of utmost importance in business and the students who are going to become businesspersons deserve a special training in this respect. The topic could be introduced for study during the language classes, when communication skills are taken into consideration; the results obtained could make the attempt worthwhile.
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Commercials – entertainment, business or something more? "A means of moulding social stereotypes" seems a formula a little too pretentious. This paper appeared because at one point I was struck by the commercials' power to intrude in people's choices and to strengthen their preconceived ideas or social stereotypes. The recurrent theme that I noticed is related mainly to household products and the idea of marriage where advertisers felt like it was necessary to focus on the woman's wedding ring (it is always the woman), especially when there are some kids involved. The point I want to make here is that it is not the advertisers' role to mould or strengthen social or religious morale: they need to promote a product, not social behaviour or personal choice.
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When students take the exam in English, they are asked to answer various questions concerning a text they have heard once or twice. So we should ask ourselves a few questions concerning the problem of listening comprehension assessment.
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This article aims to present an overview of the benefits of education, training and skills and their consequences on individual development. Education and training can take quite different forms as regards their type, content, degree of formality and resources invested. As concepts of education, as well as training and skills, differ strongly not only among European countries but also because of different schools of tradition, it is necessary to clarify the definitions of education and training.
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The use of dictionaries in the teaching of English as a foreign language was not considered as an indispensable tool in the learning process for many years. The emphasis was laid on different strategies pursuing the acquisition of meaning. It is our sincere opinion that it is highly important to promote their use, both in and out of the classroom, and from a very early stage. The benefits of dictionaries over other techniques for learning vocabulary could be summarized in two basic points; they provide autonomy to the student to continue learning outside the classroom and they give the student complete information about the world. Therefore, teachers, have to dedicate special attention to the presentation of good dictionaries, and also their proper use in the classroom.
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The article looks at one of the topics for research within the field of second language acquisition. In particular, it presents an experiment of speakers of a [+ pro drop] language, Romanian, learning a [- pro drop] language, English, with an analysis of whether the Romanian speakers can reset their pro drop parameter from the L1 value to the L2 value. The experiment was carried out with 27 speakers of 4 main levels, elementary, intermediate, upper intermediate and advanced and it presents evidence to support the hypothesis of the Full Access Full transfer with respect to second language acquisition, i.e. although speakers have access to UG when learning a L2, they cannot reset the parameters completely. The article presents a discussion of the experiment in terms of all the properties related to the pro drop parameter.
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This article presents a non-prescriptive modular approach to designing tests in relationship with teaching English - using certain coursebooks - to engineering students of the Bucharest Polytechnic. The main aim is to create ways of developing a database of tests pertinent to each particular book. The role of a modular Test Specification, as well as that of a Taught Materials Card is described. The possible limitations and risks taken in various concrete situations are briefly discussed.
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Teaching a foreign language goes beyond teaching the language itself. Language is rooted in culture; it reflects customs and sets of values that people display when they speak. So, in the context of globalisation, teaching a foreign language involves the intercultural communicative competence as a key component, essential for communicating effectively with people belonging to various cultures, which helps one better understand one's own culture. Teaching intercultural communicative competence to our students of Business English is all the more important today, with business going more and more international as an immediate consequence of the recent European integration and as a general consequence of the broader phenomenon of globalisation.
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