Drama Techniques in Language Learning: A Resource Book of Communication Activities for Language Teachers by Alan Maley and Alan Duff (review)

262Rocky Mountain Review (as Baudelaire certainly believed), he would naturally (or, supernaturally) "slip through" a door without having to open it wide. Again, Lappin remains on the physical level in his rendition. On the positive side, Lappin offers a service to the literal-minded translators as an intermediary between the original and the verse-rhymed versions (some of which are, admittedly, quite literary and distant from the original), it is a question of the literal meaning versus an aesthetic one, and it evolves finally into an individual choice. De gustibus non disputanduml FRANCIS S. HECK University of Wyoming ALAN MALEY and ALAN DUFF. Drama Techniques in Language Learning: A Resource Book of Communication Activities for Language Teachers, new edition. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983. 234 p. This second edition of a very popular book of activities for the foreign language classroom has been greatly expanded to include four new categories of exercises: Introductory exercises to prepare students for dramatic interaction , Creation and Invention activities, Word-play, and Problem-solving. In addition, the section on the use of literary texts, poems, and songs has grown from one page of general recommendations in the first edition to twenty-four pages of detailed suggestions. In all, more than one hundred pages have been added to the book. Even for language teachers familiar with the first edition, it may be difficult to see the relationship between many of the activities, especially the Introductory exercises, and "drama," in that they do not necessarily involve plot, conflict, dialogue, or dramatic action. If we compare them to similar types of exercises that are well known in the United States, they seem to have more in common with Moscowitz's Caring and Sharing activities (1978) than with John Rassias' brand of drama, which is central to the "Dartmouth Model." Some are reminiscent of sensitivity training sessions, designed to encourage awareness of others, trust, and warm human interaction; some do not even involve language, particularly the Introductory (warm-up) activities. The preface to the first edition begins with the explanation that "there is a long tradition in Britain and elsewhere in the use of theatre games to train actors in observation, sensitivity and imagination" (vii). The emphasis throughout the book is on creativity and working together to produce something or solve a problem. It is assumed that language acquisition is one of the desired outcomes of incorporating emotional and physical involvement in language study — and this assumption is supported, ofcourse, by research, as reviewed by Earl Stevick in his Memory, Meaningand Method (1976). In the remarks provided for individual activities, key terms such as "making contact," "developing confidence," "accuracy of observation," and "recreating the world through fantasy" appear repeatedly. Given the current communicative movement in language teaching, one would expect objectives to be stated in terms of functions or aspects of language development, yet these goals seem to be peripheral. For example, exercise 1.35 Handshakes (2) is Book Reviews263 devoted to extending greetings, but the stated purpose is "getting the class mixed up and in some kind of brief physical contact" (64); and at the other end of the book, the purpose for exercise 4.4 Potato figures, which involves students in reaching agreement through a process of rejecting and accepting others' suggestions, is "to give fresh life to familiar objects" (143). A few of the activities are overtly oriented to language development, such as 1.37 Body words (enunciation and pronunciation) and 5.1 Acronymics (word order). The activities described in this handbook are truly intriguing, providing plenty of stimulating ideas for involving students in interaction that should motivate them and hold their attention. While some seem to be based on well known classroom techniques (e.g., the strip story, in the case of 3.8 Jumbled stories), they have been considerably expanded and made more complex. Any instructor who stresses language use and proficiency development will find enough ideas to keep students involved throughout the course, by selecting and altering activities to fit well thought out purposes. Many of the ideas are appropriate for general proficiency development in conversation classes, in that students' utterances are totally unpredictable (e.g., 1.44 What's in a...