Linguist Rosina Lippi-Green concludes in her book, "English with an Accent: Language, Ideology, and Discrimination in the United States," "Accent discrimination can be found everywhere in our daily lives. In fact, such behavior is so commonly accepted, so widely perceived as appropriate, that it must be seen as the last back door to…

Examines the concept and practice of returning linguistic favors to host research communities, the so-called "linguistic gratuity principle" (Wolfram,1993). Uses a case study format as the basis for scrutinizing researcher-community relationships. Presents research from the post-insular dialect community of Ocracoke Island in North…

Examines certain surface differences between Black English and Standard English and concludes that, with some minor exceptions, the underlying correspondences are identical. (FB)

Comparison of the moribund dialects of Ocracoke Island, North Carolina, and Smith Island, Maryland, demonstrates that valuable insight into the patterning of variation and change in language death can be obtained by investigating moribund varieties of healthy languages. Discusses comparative investigation of two kinds of linguistic decay:…

The relativistic viewpoint of the sociolinguist emphasizes the fully systematic but different nature of nonstandard dialects. In this paper, the author takes issue with various views that currently enjoy popularity in a number of disciplines but which violate basic linguistic and sociolinguistic premises about the nature of language. These views…

One of the most significant problems that linguists face in their attempts to describe Vernacular Black English (VBE) is the matter of fluctuating forms. It is consistently observed that speakers appear to fluctuate between a socially stigmatized variant and its presumed nonstigmatized counterpart. Fluctuations in VBE have often been viewed as a…

Discusses the applicability of the notion of structured variability in language to contrastive analysis. (Author/AM)

Reviews the rationale for and programmatic structure of two experimental language awareness programs and discusses some of the ethical issues requiring consideration in the implementation of such programs. These ethical considerations include the ethics of persuasion and need, the ethics of representation, the ethics of socio-educational change,…

Using the case of a vernacular variety spoken on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, this article demonstrates how linguistic-systemic principles such as remorphologization, psycholinguistic principles of perceptual saliency, and sociolinguistic processes of symbolic identity converge to account for the development of leveling in this community.…

Examines the nature of language diversity in the small, isolated community of Ocracoke Island, North Carolina, where a lone African American family has resided for over 130 years. (57 references) (Author/CK)

Most educational programs focusing on dialect differences are constructed to move speakers toward the standard variety of English. However, dialect study as language study in its own right introduces dialects as resources for learning about language and culture, with potential for language arts education. Systematic introduction of dialect…

In the past, social lectologists have not considered their work as contrastive linguistics. One reason is that sociolects of a language differ quantitatively; differences lie in the frequency patterns with which certain forms occur in each lect. Contrastive linguistics deals with standard or idealized languages, while sociolects are often…

There are two positions on the relationship of the speech of Blacks and whites, and they are quite opposed to one another. One position observes virtually no differences in the speech of Southern whites and Blacks and therefore assumes that the historical development can be traced to a British dialect. The other sees many significant differences…