Contributions in this book illustrate the many methods available for researching language in context and for the analysis of everyday text types. Each chapter highlights language as a resource for the expression of meanings—a social semiotic resource. Text analysis is used to reveal our capacity to formulate multiple meanings for participation in different social practices—in relationships, in work, in education and in leisure. The approach is applied in text-based teaching and in the critical analysis of public discourses.

In accordance with major shifts in emphasis in both general and applied linguistics, this text about intonation has two main goals. Firstly to show the practical importance of intonation, particularly discourse intonation, which is acknowledged in theoretical linguistics as an indispensable component of language and communication and which thus ought to be taught to L2 learners. Secondly to integrate theory and practice in order to render intonation accessible to teachers and pedagogues, and to suggest a pedagogical approach to the teaching of discourse-based phonology and intonation in L2 instruction.

This book offers several insights into cross-cultural and multilingual learning, drawing upon recent research within two main areas: Language Studies and Multilingual Language Learning/Teaching. It places particular emphasis on the Polish learning environment and Poles abroad.

The edited volume Motifs in Language and Text is the first collection of original research in the area of the quantitative analysis of motifs. It hosts a collection of contributions that give insight to linguistic motifs theoretically across different languages, text genres, and structural levels, such as lexical, syntactic, semantic etc., and also to the tentative efforts upon the practical applications of the linguistic motifs.

To what extent can Cognitive Linguistics benefit from the systematic study of a creative phenomenon like humor? Although the authors in this volume approach this question from different perspectives, they share the profound belief that humorous data may provide a unique insight into the complex interplay of quantitative and qualitative aspects of meaning construction.