In this article, we examine various strategies used to express cardinal numbers in Yucatec Maya Sign Languages (YMSLs) from three historically unrelated communities in Yucatán, Mexico: Chicán, Nohkop, and Cepeda Peraza. Our findings describe some numeral strategies, which remained unattested in previous accounts, and demonstrate that YMSL numerals…

This dissertation explores the phenomenon of "ways of speaking" in the Nanti speech community of Montetoni, in southeastern Peruvian Amazonia, between 1999 and 2009. In the context of this study, a way of speaking is a socially meaningful, conventionalized sound pattern, manifest at the level of the utterance, that expresses the…

What are the chances of a dyad of Spanish-speaking strangers using informal address in casual, initial interactions in Buenos Aires, Argentina, today? To discover the pattern(s) of contemporary address, the Principal Investigator (PI) conducted a sociolinguistic experiment focusing on strangers' initial interactions to minimize the influence of…

This volume collects empirical studies applying Conversation Analysis to situations where second, third and other additional languages are used. A number of different aspects are considered, including how linguistic systems develop over time through social interaction, how participants 'do' language learning and teaching in classroom and everyday…

Addresses issues of verbal communication around the world, explores the power of various linguistic means of expressing politeness, and defines negative and positive politeness. Beneath the surface differences, cultures around the world display amazing similarities in the linguistic means of expressing politeness. (27 references) (Author/CK)

Presents a variety of social contexts for verbal interaction between adult and child and between children. Discusses the variations in interaction caused by different contexts, as well as features that are consistent across contexts. (HTH)

Discusses a quantitative study of the use of Australian Questioning Intonation (AQI) in Sydney, which reveals that it has the social distribution characteristic of a language change in progress. The social motivations of AQI are examined in terms of local identity and the entry of new ethnic groups into the community. (Author/SED)

Following the study of Gilman and Ford on address terms, an increasing number of studies have been conducted in several sociocultural settings. In line with this trend, the present study attempts to describe and explain address terms among the Akans of postcolonial Ghana. Using observation as the main research tool corroborated by interview and…

A study investigated the variety of ways in which managers use language in sociolinguistically sensitive ways to get things done at work. Drawing on a database of over 300 interactions in a range of New Zealand workplaces, aspects of power (how things are accomplished), politeness (the importance of small talk), and solidarity (the difference…

The practice of "chismeando" (gossiping, in Spanish) is examined as it is defined and engaged in by a group of women from the Dominican Republic. It is argued that the stories told in chismeando are repositories of sociocultural knowledge. Women's participation in the practice provides the women with a framework for understanding and…

This report describes a "culturally contexted" conversation analysis approach to the study of naturally occurring speech in supervisory conferences. The supervisors and teachers were participants in a graduate program for beginning teachers, and the conference's purpose was supervisory evaluation of teachers' classroom performances. Ethnographic…

Examines how the instructional conversation can be an effective method to raise the low academic achievement of various Native American students. Considers cultural differences in conversational styles, the relative emphasis on verbal or visual symbolic thinking in schools, student motivation, and the social organization of classrooms and schools.…

This volume contains working papers on a variety of topics in linguistics. They include: "A View of Phonology from a Cognitive and Functional Perspective" (Joan Bybee); "The Geography of Language Shift: Distance from the Mexican Border and Spanish Language Claiming in the Southwestern United States" (Garland D. Bills, Eduardo…

This study analyzed doctor-patient communication from a sociolinguistic perspective, focusing on two issues: (1) why patients are not more effective in asserting themselves in talking with doctors, and (2) why doctors don't talk more like normal people (i.e., patients). Research on communication in health care contexts is reviewed, looking at such…

This study analyzed verbal responses of status unequals in situations where a linguistic mistake occurred. Subjects were 80 native Turkish-speaking university students (28 males, 52 females) who participated in role-playing exercises using such situations. Two aspects of the responses were investigated: the semantic and syntactic formulas that…