Several studies have demonstrated that children's gender and parental education exert a significant, but not equal, effect on toddler language development at different ages. This study determined the effect of children's gender and parental education on the verbal competence of toddlers between 16 and 30 months. The sample included 953 Slovenian…

Using written language of early adolescents at a California middle school, this study investigated seventh grade students' perspectives on the frequency of hearing and using homophobic name-calling, reasons such language gets used, and reactions to hearing others use it. Students reported widespread use of homophobic name-calling but disagreed…

This article examines the extent to which ESL learners studying in Canada acquire Canadianisms. Two instruments were used to assess the effect of posited variables on this acquisition: a lexical survey administered to 103 ESL learners in Kingston, Ontario; and a questionnaire about resources, teaching methods, and attitudes administered to their…

Although the language teaching profession has long emphasized the use of the target language in the classroom, student teachers face various challenges in their efforts to conduct class in their target language. This case study focused on 10 student teachers with respect to (1) their initial attitudes and beliefs about using the target language,…

This work addresses the politics of speech and language communication with respect to Africans in the Diaspora in Jamaica and in the United States of America. Language hegemony is an expression of the power and control sustained by means of institutions such as schools. Depending on their linguistic choices or situational language use, post…

Graffiti constitutes a medium through which the youth express opposition to authorities, as well as desires, dreams, and hopes. Graffiti shows many of the linguistic characteristics of youth language, including playfulness and, first and foremost, polylingual languaging. Graffiti in almost every city, at least in Europe, uses English and one or…

Linguistically, political discourses have generally been discussed within qualitative approaches (e.g., Blackledge, 2005; Chilton, 2004; Chomsky, 2004; van Dijk, 2005; Wodak, 2002). This paper presents tools to design a quantitative research relating political speech with sociolinguistic variables. Notions such as Accommodation Theory (Giles &…

How do we become the people we are? Humanist common sense proposes that people are born with a rational "self." But poststructural theory proposes a subjectivity formed in interaction with cultural discourses. Poststructural theory offers teachers fresh ways to teach critical literacy and thinking and provides students with ways to resist ideas…

Everyday parent-child conversations may support children's scientific understanding. The types and frequency of parent-child science talk may vary with the cultural and schooling background of the participants, and yet most research in the USA focuses on highly schooled European-American families. This study investigated 40 Mexican-descent…

Although the significance of foreign languages is eagerly publicized within the European Union (EU), the implementation of supranational educational policies is frequently incompatible with the national "context of situation" (Kachru, 1992). A case in point is the German education system, in which the necessary reforms are caught between…

This paper investigates the Irish-language adscape through an analysis of the profile of two Irish-language newspapers, "Foinse," published in the Republic of Ireland, and "La," published in Northern Ireland. The advertising in both papers is analysed in terms of products and services advertised, advertisers represented and…

Previous studies have shown that a subset of gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) and heterosexual adults produce distinctive patterns of phonetic variation that allow listeners to detect their sexual orientation from audio-only samples of read speech. The current investigation examined the extent to which judgments of sexual orientation from speech…

This study examined the effects of counselor language switching and counselor ethnicity on bilingual Mexican American participants' emotional self-disclosure. Counselor language (English only and Spanish with English) was crossed with counselor ethnicity (Mexican American and European American) to produce 4 treatment conditions. Judges'…

This article considers the current debate in Australia into the learning of literacy and foreign languages. It examines not only the literacy levels attained by Australian students in their national language (English) in comparison to these in other countries, as well as between Australian states, but also theories involved in school learning and…

Student development theory has been used to make sense of attitudes, behaviors, norms, and outcomes among college students since the late 1970s. In addition, educators, administrators, and researchers rely on theories of retention and student success, organizational development, learning, and campus environments in their efforts to understand…