Useful Reference Material

From time to time, we create or find reference material that is so useful, we do what is necessary to make it available to everyone.

• The Grammatical Metaphor: this fascinating diagram (PDF format) was presented by Dr John Gibbons (Department of Linguistics, University of Sydney) at an Australian Technical Society for Communication national conference and again, through popular demand, at one of the Society's monthly meetings.

The diagram shows how simple, every day language is changed into "academic" style we think is perfectly clear.  But about 40% of adults cannot easily understand it .  Especially people who don't use English as their first language.

The "academic" style takes people out of the discussion.  (Technically: we form mental perceptions - abstractions - without people by changing one part of speech into another — not just the occasional word, but many words.)  When we make assumptions about the literary and language skills of our audience, we cut off parts of our audience.  Think about it.

• Expanded Figures of Speech: this PDF file is a reformatted the Table of Contents of Bullinger's Hebrew and Greek Figures of Speech (Baker Book House Company, 1968).  The layout helps you easily find the Figure cited by Bullinger in his Companion Bible margin. (With permission from Baker Book House Company.)

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Thank you.