درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

The purpose of the present study is to employ René Girard’s concept of “metaphysical desire” in a comparative study of Pinter’s The Lover and Stoppard’s The Real Thing. René Girard has investigated the idea of imitative desire in a rather distinguished way. He contends that the nature of desires is neither innate nor autonomous, but rather we borrow them from the others. He argues for the idea that human beings are always looking for stronger mediators to gratify their desires. The imitative desire itself, once satisfied, is not gratified and the search for stronger impulses or mediators always continues in a never-ending process that Gerard refers to as “metaphysical desire”. The present research intends to look for metaphysical desire in the lives of the characters, wherewith they can examine the role of the mediator in the characters’ lives as well. Since metaphysical desire, as Gerard argues, leads individuals either to perfection or destruction and alienation, the characters are shown to imitate their metaphysical desire leading them to experience destructive consequences and family corruption. Consequently, the characters who have pursued their metaphysical desire on the verge of a negative sideline all fail to enjoy a life they long for, and are subject to alienation and misfortunes within which they constantly experience great pains. The characters also turn into obstacle-addicts who, metamorphosed into masochists and losing their lives for good, find no chances to change life as they long for.

The purpose of this study is to explore the effectiveness of utilizing humorous versus non-humorous texts on receptive and productive vocabulary learning. This research is also conducted to seek whether language proficiency of the participants would be a factor influencing the effectiveness of two types of treatments used in the study. The materials employed in the present study include 17 humorous and 17 non-humorous texts which contain the target words. 87 students at two proficiency levels participated in the study and almost half of them were exposed to the target words through humorous texts and the second half learned the words through non-humorous texts. The target words with their English definitions were presented to the participants. Each text was accompanied by some comprehension questions, either in the multiple choice format, fill in the blanks or open ended questions. Following the treatment, an unannounced immediate post-test was administered to measure the effectiveness of two text types on vocabulary learning. After a three-week interval, an unannounced delayed post-test was administered to check the efficacy of text types on long-term vocabulary learning. The findings suggest significantly better vocabulary learning both in immediate and delayed post-tests for the less proficient participants learning target words through humorous texts. However, in the case of the more proficient learners, it turns out that humor is considerable in long-term learning of the target words. Based on the results, it is recommended that teachers and materials developers include more elements of humor in the language classes and course books.