Abstract-Power relations are discursively constructed, de/reconstructed, and negotiated through discourse. CDA in its commitment to accounting for the underlying elements and dimensions of power can typically concentrate on syllabuses as tokens of power in the institutionalized discourse of education. Employing the notion of 'social practice', the present study focused on 'Four Corners' series as conversational English books in Iranian EFL situation. This study usedInclusion/Exclusion and Role Allocation binary notion from among many dichotomous notions in van Leeuwen's social actor network (2008). Additionally, a 20-item questionnaire was designed and made reliable (Cronbach's alpha = 0.79) for female and male teachers' reaction. Results indicated that the 'Four Corners' series did not treat male and female characters differently regarding Inclusion/Exclusion; however, with Role Allocation the differences were significant. The series allocated a more active role for men than for women. The information from the questionnaire indicated different response patterns from male and female teachers in descriptive terms which might account for a various classroom discourse around gender enacted depending on the gender of the teacher. Implications of the study are discussed.

Given the crucial role philosophical thinking can serve in enhancing the cultivation of mind, it seems urgent that prior to nurturing such thinking its status be investigated within individuals in various educational contexts. Moreover, since philosophy is characteristically a question-raising discipline, one way one’s philosophic-mindedness can be investigated is to see if s/he is capable to cast a philosophical look at a text and in turn pose philosophical questions on it.  Hence, the present paper aims at a) exploring the participants’ ability in making philosophical questions and b) finding out factors leading to producing and not-producing such questions. To this end, through accessible sampling, a group of 50 BA sophomore and junior students in an EFL context attended this study. The participants were asked to read two simple short passages and make any type of question(s) (text-based, beyond the text, etc.) that would occur to their mind in essay-type format. Then, using purposeful sampling, 17 out of 50 were selected for an open interview. Based on Cam’s (2006) question framework, the findings revealed that the majority of the participants were not able to produce philosophical questions and the factors leading to generating non-philosophical questions were memorization-based system, teacher-centered curriculum, non-liberal atmosphere of classes, unsuitable family environment, weak performance of mass media, irrational social customs, etc. On the contrary, the factors giving rise to producing philosophical questions were innate disposition towards thinking, introversion, appropriate family environment, proper nurturing conditions, adequate method of teaching, etc. Furthermore, the technique of question-making and question-analysis together with a question framework are introduced to be employed for realizing philosophic-mindedness. Finally, Philosophy-based Language Teaching is suggested as an approach for removing the obstacles to philosophical thinking.

The major goal of education, according to the educationalist Matthew Lipman (2003), is to culture students to become thoughtful by attaining excellent thinking power; i.e., critical, creative, and caring thinking ability. The purpose of this study was to examine the current status of excellent thinking among EFL students. Using accessible sampling, 41 EFL students at Shiraz University, Iran read two passages of various types and were asked to make a number of essay-type questions on each one. The results indicated that the majority of the questions were trivial reading comprehension ones with no sign of excellent thinking. The findings may imply that despite the significance of cultivating excellent thinking within students, no/scant attention is paid to this issue and EFL students have not still gained the necessary skills of excellent thinking.