The purpose of this study is to explore the image of loss in modern American drama in the theme of family. The image of loss prevails the post-war era of American drama in three levels of psychological, physical, and moral space. This image is clearly observable in two of the prominent works of the era, Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie and Arthur Miller’ s Death of a Salesman. Moreover, this image of loss is closely connected with the notion of time. The familial breakdown appears as a sustaining motif that plays a central role in the psychologically shattered personality of the major characters, as a result of the profound changes in the American post-war society and family. World War II was a milestone in the society as a whole, and in the family as a smaller society, and correspondingly among the people as entities which the image of loss seemed inseparable from. American post-War drama fully represents the tough conditions of that era particularly in the themes of familial breakdown and the image of loss.

The harrowing memories of lynching as a method of historical implementation of terror and violence imposed on generations of Afro-Americans have been portrayed in numerous dramatic works. Lynching is generally referred to as a quasi-ritual and extra-legal act of punishment and retribution, which has been exercised throughout history as a method of intimidation. What should be accentuated is the far-reaching impact of such an atrocity on its victim's mentality and identity. Collective trauma and agonizingly invisible memories of humiliation, exploitation, racial discrimination, physical assault and sexual abuse experienced by black people resonate in dramatic renderings of many black playwrights. This article investigates the long-term impact of lynching and racial atrocities on the black collective psyche and the mechanisms through which one can articulate traumatized memories and experiences. By examining black people's traumatic encounter with savagery and coercion, this research explores its ensuing psychic impact on the black community. For this purpose, Angelina Weld Grimke's Rachel (written in 1916 and published in 1920) and Adam and Adrienne Kennedy's Sleep Deprivation Chamber (1996) are analysed in order to trace the footprints of ubiquitous racism and its jarringly traumatic impact on the black psyche. The horrendous account of police atrocity, the 'modern day lynching', against Teddy Alexander, a black youngster, and its subsequent repercussions in the private and public lives of his black family finds its way in the fragmented pieces of memory and repetitious moments of nightmare. Psychological and emotional effects of lynching resembling permanent burns inscribed both on black bodies and black minds are reflected in Rachel's traumatized mind colliding with many rising conflicts in a white supremacist society that eventually leads to her total abandonment of sexual life and motherhood. Theories of Christina Wald, which rely heavily on the psychological and psychoanalytical aspects of dramatic works, will be employed. By explaining and defining "Trauma Drama", Wald has striven to discover and analyse the hidden traces of racial violence on the soul and psyche of the victim's personality and its conspicuous impact on the quality of life and decision making in the real world. This study also explicates the psychological effects of racially motivated hatred and hostility toward black people and illustrates how the characters of the aforementioned plays face racist assault and agonizingly atrocious behaviour from the white supremacist society through expressing their lived experiences derived from trauma and post-traumatic aftermath of the racist incident in the form of linguistic mechanisms. What the authors of this article, by providing concrete examples, is to depict how the characters of the aforementioned selected plays attempt to assert their traumatized personality through remembering first-hand accounts of racially motivated attacks and strive to elicit empathy and understanding from both people surrounding them and the audience.

Textbooks play a pivotal role in language learning classrooms. The problem is that among a wide range of textbooks in market which is appropriate for a specific classroom and a group of learners. In order to evaluate ELT textbooks theorists and writers have offered different kinds of evaluative frameworks based on a number of principles and criteria. This study evaluates a series of ELT textbook, namely, American English File by the use of Littlejohn’s (1998) evaluative framework to see what explicit features of the book are, what pedagogic values it has, whether it is in line with its claimed objectives, and what its merits and demerits are. Littlejohn believes that we should evaluate a textbook based on its own pedagogic values and we should see what is in it not what teacher and evaluators think must exist in it. Consequently his framework is claimed to be devoid of any impressionistic ideas and it is in-depth and objective rather than being subjective. Nine ELT experts and ten ELT teachers helped the researcher rate the evaluative checklists. The results of the study show that although a number of shortcomings and drawbacks were found in American English File, it stood up reasonably well to a detailed and in-depth analysis and that its pedagogic values and positive attributes far out-weighed its shortcomings. The internal consistency between ratings was computed via the statistical tool of Cronbach’s alpha that indicated a desirable inter-rater reliability.

During the period between the two wars, although some theatre critics were considering the work of the producer more important than the drama text, a few dramatic writers created some poetical plays which derived all their power and influence from accurate poetical texts.Jean Giraudoux occupied an important place amongst masterpieces and his works brought him universal reputation.The fact that a very large public praised his dramatic works in spite of the different levels of their knowledge and the ambiguity of his ideas and intentions raises an important question: What do we expect from a drama? The question is to know if someone who reads or watches a play has to understand clearly all the author's ideas and intentions.This article attempts to answer this important question as far as possible with an analytical look on Giraudoux's most famous play, Intermezzo and also would consider his ideas and those of the critics who have written about his work.

Classic Aristotlian drama based on essential elements in its connection with the spectators is practically a one way course of action that ultimately aims to entertain and influence viewers. New approaches of interdisciplinary studies on narratives have provided the grounds for the possibility of increasing the role of the audiences and their mutual participation in story making. The emergence of computers into dramatic domains has caused new aspects of narrative models. Dramatic logic of the narrative based on computer factors are pointed out and classified. This classification provides the possibility of creating and generating various narrative models for user-audiences who, as well, are viewers, the intervening agents of narrative softwares. Generally, interactive dramas have been limited in a the sense that the audiece is although considered a vibrant player, he/she can only make decision that have already been decided and set forth in the program. Here, we are propsing a new strategy of taking new directions. The interpretive process for writer/player/domain could pave the way for creativity. As a new kind of virtual dramatic relationship, interactive drama, is the result of an interaction between computer and dramatic disciplines. This interaction itself is the consequence of a modern alliance between traditional audiences and dramatists. In this new process, the audiences are able to aesthetically manipulate the development of a narrative formation and change the actions taken by characters. They can actively alter and modify the directions a story may take. The user of narrative sofwares reestablishes his/her own position during the process as a new key factor. Hence, a new domain of narrative story telling has been establishes in which the dramatists and audiences work within the boundaries of imagination and the probabilities available within the computer algorithms. One of the main characteristics of this interactive drama is that it is an open-ended narrative which can be influenced by the player/audience. The effects of this type of drama may therefore go beyond catharsis through identification with the main character(s). Very close to the idea of the "willing suspension of disbelief' theory, the (active) audience might immerse himself/herself in the work to have a unique and independent experience. Thus becoming a powerful agent who can perform independent actions based on the character's intentions and could in effect transform himself/herself. If we consider the uses of computer drama in conjunction with the possibilities of multimedia in a way that the users, while in a text, would be able to move their characters in desirable environments and, based on their characteristics, can change locations at will and thus redefine their relationships with other users on-line, we can appreciate the strength of the dramatic value of the interactive virtual multimedia potentials. Analyzing the dramatic models by computer logics reveals undiscovered possibilities which could help recon figurate fictional dramatic events. Interactive Drama indicates a dynamic relationship for the virtual aesthetics and also for the interdisciplinary study of arts and technology. These new grounds may provide fresh material for the already established dramatic media and hence their use in the development of material for theatre and film.

The main approach of this paper is the discourse analysis of the American Dream and the critical approach of American modern or new drama toward this discourse in the True West Play by Sam Shepard. The discourses have an important role in each society. The main cultural and social events are under the effect of a discourse or reaction to it. In twentieth-Century, the writers, artists, and the others considered the significance of thought in the art and also the effect of discourses in their works. The contemporary artists all consider the meta-narrations in their works as the focus of their arts. Sam Shepard, as one of the great play writers of America, is one of them who have written several plays about the American dreams. American dream is one of the most important of contemporary discourses. This kind of discourse played a role as a country in the formation of America and a main role toward immigration to America. For this reason, all political, cultural and economical aspects of this country are under the effect of these discourses. Therefore, in order to understand the contemporary theatre of America, analysis of American dream is necessary. True West play is one of the best works which shows the critical analysis approach of America modern drama to this discourse. This work criticizes and tries to clarify the hidden layers. American theatre, against the American cinema, shows, presents and criticizes the violent viewpoints as well as the other hidden layers of American Dream. This critical approach existed before in the American theatre and we can see this approach in the works of Arthur Miller, Eugene Gladstone O’ Neill, and Tennessee Williams. In fact, although, the theater of America does not have a long history, it separated its way from Europe by the aid of the above-mentioned writers in the domain of dramatic literature. This critical approach of American Theatre toward this discourse was continued after Second World War by the arrival of great writer called Edward Albee and by writing a play called ‘ American Dream” and also “ who is afraid of Virginia Woolf? ” This process again continued after Edward Albee. The best samples of this approach are limited to the works of Sam Shepard such as True West play who criticized this discourse by presenting its effects in the human relationships. This research focuses on the analysis of “ True West” play as one of the most important plays by Sam Shepard and the American modern drama is based on its relation with the American Dream discourse. This is done with an aim to demonstrate how this play explicitly criticized this discourse in an immediate and reckless manner, and to reveal its hidden layers. This research primarily focuses on the definition and analysis of the cultural discourse of the American dream and the emergence and domination of this meta-narrative work. It then examines its representation in True West play. The data collection of this paper has been done by the library-based studies.

The author attempts to view the Greek tragedy as a literal- dramatic genre and a kind of work which its creation prepared during particular social-political conditions in Athens 5th century B. C. Tragedy as one of the Greek dramatic genres had importance more than merely a dramatic performance. This was exactly due to the Athenian democracy which governing manner, but rather to its cultural aspect. So, the article examines the Athenian democracy as a cultural phenomenon which differs from democracy as a form of government.

One of the most important. aspects of drama and definitely drama translation is that it should be performable. In order to preserve the perform ability, the communicative function of linguistic forms should be recognized and conveyed by the translator.As noticed by some translation scholars (e.g. Snell-Hornby [1988] and Hatim [1998]), speech acts have a vital role in this process. Translators may employ different strategies to overcome difficulties in translating speech acts.Knowledge of difficulties of drama translation, speech acts (especially their different linguistic forms in different languages) and the different strategies of translating speech acts can help translators fulfill their duty as communicators.Studying speech acts as linguistic tools which can contribute to the production of better translations and recognition of the strategies adopted by translators in treating speech acts may pave the way for further researches on this neglected genre and may contribute to producing more adequate translations. This research, which was based on parallel and a comparable corpora, intended to present a classification of the linguistic forms representing the most Frequently-used speech acts in Persian dramas by analyzing randomly-selected pages of authentic Persian.