Aspects of Navajo English are examined to illustrate how Native American English differs from standard English of native speakers. Phonological, morphological, and syntactic characteristics of Navajo English are noted. Navajo English also differs from standard English in its approach to time frameworks and tenses. It is suggested that much of the…

There is little or no argument these days that Black English Vernacular (BEV) is a reality and that it is stigmatized. There is still a need, however, in spite of many studies of spoken varieties of BEV, for teachers to know what governs its occurrence in writing. This study concentrates on the written manifestation of BEV, on explaining which…

Provides examples of ways in which the linguistic environment is constantly changing. (DD)

Reprint of an article published in the March 1937 issue of "The Elementary English Review" dealing with the decline of language. (DD)

In order to gain a better view of the phonological properties of Taiwanese, examines how the rules of three dialects in the Taiwanese secret language operate. Describes the three main types of rules which are required to derive the secret language from the source language. Discusses implications of the study. (SED)

This paper focuses on the relationship between different aspects of the linguistic structure of a given language and the complexity of the computer program, whether existing or prospective, that is to be used for the scoring of essays in that language. The first part of the paper discusses common scales used to assess writing products, then…

Many anglicisms can be found in the Spanish of the Castilla region of Spain. English terms for sports, types of beverages, and miscellaneous items are discussed in terms of how they are used in Spanish. (NCR)

Presents a survey of the French indefinite "tu/vous" in in earlier periods and in a range of varieties. Draws on a corpus of French spoken in Picardy in Northern France to investigate the extent to which this use of second person pronouns helps to avoid ambiguity and co-occurs with another grammatical variable. (Author/VWL)

Explores the outcome of a publicly-funded research project titled "Redesign of the British Sign Language (BSL) Notation System with a New Font for Use in ICT." The aim of the project was to redesign the British Sign Language variant of Stokoe notation for practical use in information technology systems and software, such as lexical…

Discusses a corpus-based study that focuses on word epenthesis.Provides quantitative evidence that vowel epenthesis applies categorically in some environments and variably in others. Probabilistic analysis demonstrates that the variable pattern is constrained by a complex interplay of linguistic factors. Interprets such grammatical conditioning as…

Responds to a previous article criticizing the variation models of second-language acquisition (SLA), and argues that the variation models can and do explain (SLA) and that any adequate model of SLA should take interlanguage into account. (Author/VWL)

Reports on a study of variation of the perfective in Inner-Sydney (Australia) English. The study is based on the speech of 40 inner-city infromants who were long-term residents of the area. (Contains 19 references.) (JL)

Offers a preliminary examination of several sign language varieties in use in Costa Rica and attempts to explain the relationship among these varieties. Based on comparative lexical data, it is postulated that at least four distinct sign languages exist in Costa Rica. Implications for future research are also discussed. (eight references) (JL)

Employs the matched guise technique to compare attitudes in Kentucky about Appalachian English and Standard American English held by speakers of both language varieties. The study suggests that speakers of Appalachian English partially accept low status evaluation of their dialect, but reject other negative stereotypes about their community…

Focuses on gender-related variation in the ellipsis of the nominative particle "ga" and the topic market "wa" in Japanese. (Author/VWL)