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Suggests that a director who remembers what it was like to be a beginner is better equipped to help students separate craft from impulse than one who has not been on stage. Discusses starting on time, playing games, teaching focus, giving notes honestly, and using resistance. (RS)

Examined how Asian American actors coped with the constraints of being minorities in an industry where physical appearance is crucial to success. Respondents' narratives reflected such coping strategies as not confronting issues of race, rationalizing that things are much better now for Asian American actors than in previous years, and believing that there is less competition for Asian roles. (SM)

Discusses automatic indexing methods and describes the development of a prototype computerized abstractor's assistant. Highlights include the text network management system, TEXNET; phrase selection that follows indexing; phrase display, including Boolean capabilities; results of preliminary testing; and availability of TEXNET software. (LRW)

Identifies mutual conceptual and theoretical frameworks from the fields of acting and teaching, linking them to various practices in teacher preparation and development which might exploit the benefits and practical applications of these mutual conceptions. The paper notes the depth of possibilities this offers, identifying the many forms acting as epistemology might take in contributing to teacher education and development. (SM)

Questions how Western theatre's gender bias is extended and perpetuated by higher education institutions. Examines pedagogical alternatives to teaching beginning acting classes other than with monologue books. Suggests that by focusing on character rather than story, the culture of monologue books does not encourage students to look for aesthetic choices. Concludes that the American undergraduate theatrical experience can be harmful, particularly to young women. (PM)

Notes that in the past decade, interactive media technologies have been producing an artistic and cultural revolution of great proportions. Examines the interaction between performers and the media and the ways theatrical productions can define this interaction. Provides examples of productions from the University of Georgia's Interactive Performance Laboratory. Concludes that incorporating interactive media technology into theatre opens dynamic possibilities for theatre artists. (PM)

Describes the importance of annotation to reading and writing practices and reviews new technologies that complicate the ways annotation can be used to support and enhance traditional reading, writing, and collaboration processes. Emphasizes issues and methods that will be productive for enhancing theories of workplace and classroom communication as well as implications for the optimal design of annotation technologies. (RS)

Uses notions from the field Psychology of Consciousness, including an explanation of how psychologists define and investigate Altered States of Consciousness (ASCs). Argues that actors routinely enter an ASC. Establishes acting as a way to enter an ASC and discusses why theater artists, educators, and advocates need to be aware of both the dangers and benefits of experiencing altered states. (SG)

Contends that the aim of professional actor training is to reveal and develop an actor's individuality. Proposes that the responsibility of drama teachers is to lead training in such away that students feel accepted, understood, and respected. Proposes that psychodrama is the most appropriate method for student and professional actors' personal development. (PM)

Using Nel Noddings ethic of Care, contends that this model of empathy has elements in common with the type of empathy method actors employ. Discusses the agreements between Caring's empathy and dramatic empathy focusing on three skills method actors use and the three differences that possess moral implications. (CMK)

Presents five articles on using creative dramatics in early childhood education: (1) "Drama: A Rehearsal for Life" (Julia Gabriel); (2) "Fairy Tales Enhance Imagination and Creative Thinking" (Olga Sidlovskaya); (3) "Starting with a Story" (Ruth Stotter); (4) "Using Creative Dramatics to Include All Children" (Kirsten Haugen); and (5) "Helping Teachers Become Comfortable with Creative Dramatics" (Naomi Leithold). (SD)

Describes the design and implementation of a system for creating highlight abstracts to select relevant online magazine articles. Explains parsing texts based on text grammar and extracting sentences and statements that are relevant for inclusion in the abstract; and discusses knowledge representation and the importance of discourse structures in text summarization. (Author/LRW)

Offers an account of what makes a good acting teacher, based on the author's own observations and experiences as a student, actor, and teacher. Discusses knowledge, training, and experience; the importance of understanding and teaching craft; and of having a game plan for instruction. Offers a profile of the qualities, motivations, and activities of a good teacher. (SR)

Describes an experiment that evaluated features of TEXNET abstracting software, compared the use of keywords and phrases that were automatically extracted, tested hypotheses about relations between abstractors' backgrounds and their reactions to abstracting assistance software, and obtained ideas for further features to be developed in TEXNET. (LRW)

Discussion of the use of creative dramatics with gifted students considers the value of creative dramatics; components of creative dramatics (structure, open-endedness, a safe environment, and feedback); the actor's elements (voice, body, character or imagination, and group work). Specific exercises to develop the actor's elements are described. (Contains references.) (DB)

Lists the top ten acting ailments often encountered in student actors, and offers advice to cure these ailments: the split personality, the beauty queen and the leading man, the comedian, the director in training, the moody one, the character-clueless, the loner, the mimic, the stage-frightened, and the opening night artist. (SR)

Presents a sequence of exercises that address the importance of using words effectively, and considers the insensitivity so many young actors today have regarding the words they have been given by playwrights to say. Intends to help students better connect and deepen the meaning of the words they use as actors with the objectives they choose to play. (SC)

Explains the Viewpoints, a technique used to focus actors' awareness on different elements of performance such as tempo, duration, gesture, and spatial relationships. Notes that this former avant-garde technique is now taught by mainstream directors. Proposes that Viewpoints is a valuable tool for the rediscovery of a production. (PM)

Explains L. Kuleshov's body-oriented theory of acting. Describes how actors begin their Kuleshov training with short etudes that are confined to a linear matrix. Proposes that these etudes help students understand how their bodies fit into a planimetric composition, to remain in control of their bodies when confronted with complex floor patterns, and to become comfortable with juxtaposing text against movement. (PM)

Discusses metaphorical languages of acting commonly to be found passing as "psychological" perspectives. Contends there is a need for greater scientific rigor in the use of such languages. Explains the issue of operationalisation of acting for research purposes. (PM)

Explores how beginning graduate counseling students can gain valuable in vivo counseling experience by working with actors who are trained to serve as clients. The method reduces risk, eliminates many ethical concerns and provides realistic training experiences. Provides useful information to students as they refine counseling techniques and conceptualization skills and learn to manage transference and countertransference issues. (Author/JDM)

Presents various levels of criteria for judging the quality of abstracts and abstracting. Requirements for abstracts to be read by humans are compared with requirements for those to be searched by computer. Concludes that the wide availability of complete text in electronic form does not reduce the value of abstracts for information retrieval. Contains 43 references. (Author/MES)

The SALOMON project automatically summarizes Belgian criminal cases to improve access to existing and future court decisions. This article gives background information about the texts of the cases and describes the output, design models, and architecture of the SALOMON system. Evaluation of 700 criminal cases demonstrates that the algorithms have an application potential for automatic indexing, abstracting, and text linking. (Author/AEF)

Introduces a hybrid method for abstracting Chinese text that integrates the statistical approach with language understandings, incorporating some linguistics heuristics and segmentation into the abstracting process. Initial responses from application to Chinese newspaper articles show that the method contributes much to the flexibility and accuracy of the automatic Chinese abstracting system. (Author/AEF)

Discussion of abstracting systems focuses on the paradigm concept and identifies and explains four paradigms: communicational, or information theory; physical, including information retrieval; cognitive, including information processing and artificial intelligence; and systemic, including quality management. Emphasizes multidimensionality and interdependence, and the need to consider all four paradigms as a totality. (Contains 77 references.) (LRW)

Discussion of text summarization in information-retrieval systems focuses on summarizing the similarities and differences in information content among documents. Highlights a tool for analyzing document collections such as multiple news stories about an event or sequence of events. Contains 58 references. (Author/LRW)