This study of Gullah, written in 1926 by the late Reed Smith of the University of South Carolina, relies heavily on the work of earlier researchers, notably A.E. Gonzales, then editor of "The State" and author of the Black Border stories. The first two chapters presents a historical and literary background of Gullah speakers (American…

Simplification in structure and confluence between the local-language structure and the prestige-language structure are usually predicted in language death as in pidginization. For a dying Scottish Gaelic dialect, speakers were tested in the two most excessively complex morphological structures the dialect offers. (Author/NCR)

This analysis encompasses graphemic, phonological, lexical and syntactic variations of Chicano Spanish from standard Spanish and the functions of the vernacular within the speech community. (RM)

In a comparative study of American English speakers and British English speakers, it was examined whether segmental effects can be used in speech production as cues to syntactic structure. American speakers could use the segmental cues in syntax perception, while British speakers could not. Speakers of British English who were long-term residents…

Special issue on French dialects. (RL)

Examines the resemblances - morphological, syntactic, lexical and phonological - among North American French dialects today in order to determine the extent to which these represent a common source. (PMP)

The syntax of the relative clause in the Saraswat Brahmin dialect of Konkani, an Indo-Aryan language, has been Dravidianized because of the impact of the Dravidian Kannada language, operating through bilingual speakers. The Konkani-Kannada bilingual situation is described and an explanatory account of the syntactic change is given. (Author/CLK)

Examines and evaluates 20th-century studies in Zhunyanese linguistics, particularly work accomplished since 1955. Discussion focuses on how the studies were developed, what their current state is, and where problems are. A bibliography follows, covering only those works mentioned in the main text. (Author/KM)

Describes a study which addressed three questions: (1) Do Hawaiian-English children have the same general ability to understand connected discourse as their standard English-speaking peers? (2) Do they have more difficulty understanding standard English than their own dialect? and (3) Can they more easily understand standard English by making…

Kashubian, which is considered a dialect of Polish by some linguists and a separate Slavic language by others, is spoken in a small area along the Baltic coast of northern Poland. The present study, an attempt to help fill the gap in the investigation of Slavic languages in the United States, deals primarily with the speech of a Minnesota-born…

After delineating phonological and syntactic characteristics of black English, the authors present a review of comparative studies and conclude that a dialect exists among lower-class black children. That no standardized tests have been developed for use with speakers of the dialect poses a problem for educators. The authors conclude that the use…

This paper considers some aspects of sentence construction characteristic of the variety of English spoken at Isleta pueblo, an Indian community located fifteen miles south of Albuquerque, New Mexico. (CK)

This study investigates the relationship between social class membership and certain syntactic variables within a generative-transformational linguistic framework. Fourteen syntactic items are considered. Linguistic performance is more variable and complex within the higher ranking groups. (TL)