A widely-observed postcolonial phenomenon is the indigenization of English by communities into which it was formerly involuntarily introduced. When this takes place, the community which has appropriated English to serve its own purposes regards the language as their own. The question of the ownership of English has been extensively discussed by…

This study assessed the attitudinal responses of 48 Japanese university students towards 10 accented English speech samples across nine evaluative criteria. Of the 10 samples, one was a Japanese-English speech sample (the intracultural familiar), seven were non-native-English samples originating from a variety of Asian countries (intercultural…

This paper outlines the ways that Navajo poetry was framed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, as "unsophisticated" and non-literary by the introductory materials written by non-Native Americans for collections of Native American poetry. At issue was a view that saw the use of Navajo English, a distinctive vernacular dialect, as a deficient form of…

Presents an analysis of the two passive (or passive-like) constructions in Singapore English which exhibit substrate influence from Malay and Chinese. The paper shows that while substrate languages contribute to the grammar of Singapore English, the continued prestige of standard English exerts normative pressure and mitigates the effect of…

When readers fail to relate to the cultural context of writers, gross misunderstanding results. When professional readers whose first language is English fail to enter the discourse of professional literary writers or authors who are bi- or multi-lingual and use English for literary creativity, blame is laid on the writers' 'poor' linguistic…

Discusses the assertion that allophonic variations are not only important for the purposes of social acceptability. It is argued that the question of social acceptability and the concern for nativelike standards has been primarily viewed from the perspective of monolingual societies, and that social acceptability is not a linguistic issue, rather…

Describes forms of semantic reinvestment of occupational lexis items in Nigerian English. Three categories and two subcategories of reinvestment are identified: shift, generalization, narrowing, reassignment, and analogy. These types of semantic reinvestment are considered within a sociocultural and linguistic setting of Nigeria as a developing…

Considers the frequently indefinable distinctions between descriptive and prescriptive English grammars, using examples of standard English and dialects to illustrate the uses of each. (Author/CB)

An examination of linguists' attempts to characterize the variety of English used in various articles and novels found that, although they used different criteria for classification, the linguists almost equally (about 30 percent of the time each) either could not identify, correctly identified, or incorrectly identified the variety. (14…

Examined the effect of familiarity with different English accents, investigating Japanese college students' intelligibility and comprehensibility judgements of familiar and unfamiliar English (American and Irish English). Results indicated that familiarity and exposure contributed to higher perceived comprehensibility, but not necessarily to…

Examined the attitudes of 169 Japanese university students toward varieties of spoken English. Results found that the students with more instrumental motivation were more positive toward nonnative English accents than those with less instrumental motivation, and that the students' familiarity with accents had an influence on their acceptance of…

Examines oral-questionnaire data to assess the tenability of the hypothesis that Africa's language-endangerment situation is characterized by replacement of minority vernaculars with indigenous majority languages. Questionnaire items attended to evaluation accorded minority vernacular as well as language choice in home and non-home settings.…

Examines the use of local English-language newspapers as pedagogical aids in the English-language teaching classroom in Pakistan, pointing out the advantages and disadvantages of such learning activities and calling for more linguistic tolerance and acceptance of local varieties of English. (Author/CB)

Presents issues related to power and politics of the English language specifically in relation to the unprecedented global spread of the language. Several linguistic and nonlinguistic perspectives used to conceptualize the relationship between language and power are considered. (Author/CB)

A paradigm gap has prevented research on second language acquisition theory and indigenized varieties of English from making substantive contributions to each other. The varieties of English represent several significant sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic variables, the investigation of which will put second language acquisition theory on firmer…