This 3-year research project sought to determine whether language differences between Gullah-influenced and English speaking students in Charleston County (South Carolina) influenced test performance and subsequent interpretation of test results. A sample population of 503 educable mentally handicapped, learning disabled, and regular students…

Because an instructor's attitude toward students' language is a crucial factor in determining whether students will be active participants in the educational process, it is important for teachers to be aware of dialect differences. Labelled by many as "nonstandard," Black English is a dialect derived from Gullah, a creole based on…

Whether black students should be required to use standard English in school is a controversial issue that has fostered contradictory opinions, studies, and data. This annotated bibliography of more than 100 items provides a wide range of material dealing with the following aspects of this topic: the historical backgrounds of black English, the…

The study described in this paper was designed to compare the composing processes of three black adolescent females--a low, a moderate, and a high user of nonstandard dialect. After explaining the procedures used in selecting the subjects on the basis of their degree of usage of nonstandard dialect features, the paper describes the research…

This 11th-grade language unit focuses on dialectology, the regional variations of American English, and the causes for the differences and similarities in language usage in the United States. Issues surveyed in the unit are (1) the historical basis for dialect differences from the time of the early colonists, (2) current speech characteristics of…

The purpose of this study is to describe the speech of Negro high school students in Memphis, Tennessee. The study deals with the phonology and grammar of the students' speech. The phonological analysis is limited to a description of the segmental phonemes, their allophones, and their incidence. The grammatical analysis is limited to a description…

Nonstandard English can assist rather than hinder the inner-city teacher. Once he is convinced that nonstandard English has a legitimate place in his classroom, he is on his own to devise various creative ways to employ the expressive and highly verbal language of his students. A method whereby nonstandard English can be employed to assist in the…

This paper reviews some recent research on the relationship of group processes and cultural milieux to choice of linguistic form and Its implications for problem solving in small (minority) groups. Basic to the discussion is the concept that language usage conveys important social information and is therefore not a matter of choice but must be…

The purpose of this paper is to formulate objectives pertaining to knowledge, thinking, attitudes, and skills for a methods course for prospective teachers of English in desegregated high schools, to discuss the selection and organization of course content, to illustrate the principle that prospective teachers learn to teach by performing and…

Sociolinguistic studies of spoken Arabic show at least three varieties at different levels of prestige: (1) Modern Standard Arabic (MSA); (2) regional standard with local prestige; and (3) vernacular varieties. The social function of the local prestigious nonstandard features can override the influence of the prestige of MSA. (Author/LMO)

Bernstein's theory of the relationships among social class, language "codes," family/school social structures, and school success is discussed, as is Labov's rejection of the "verbal deficit" concept. A relevant experiment is described. (Available in microfiche from: Carfax Publishing Company, Haddon House,…

Classroom interactions by two Black female second-grade teachers were observed to determine whether these teachers differed in their responses to students who showed Strong (high) versus Weak (low) Black and Nonstandard English usage. The teachers' level of knowledge of Black English was reflected in the success of their interactions. (TJH)

Uses Weinreich's (1953) partition of bilingualism to describe the effects of a small typological distance on the organization of the bilingual lexicon. Using standard Dutch and the dialect of Maastricht, subjects performed an auditory lexical decision task. (30 references) (Author/CK)

This paper recalls the issues that led in the late 1960s to the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) resolution and statement on the Students' Right to Their Own Language. The paper describes some of the main events in the production of the resolution, and then discusses the response to the resolution of the National Council…

The correlation between individual level tones and vowel duration in Standard Thai was investigated. The study was prompted by the discrepancy between Gandour's 1977 claim that the pitch value of the three relatively level tones in Thai is negatively correlated with vowel duration and Roberson's 1982 disagreement with this hypothesis. The result…