The paper aims to explore word order derivation and agreement in Najran Arabic (henceforth, NA) and examines the interaction between the NA data and Chomsky's (2001, 2005) Agree theory which we adopt in this study. The objective is to investigate how word order occurs in NA and provide a satisfactorily unified account of the derivation of SVO and…

The present study examines the tradeoff between the on-line construction of modifier-noun gender agreement and verb-subject person/number agreement vs. the automatization and entrenchment of agreement, through the study of bilingual speakers of Spanish and the Afro-Colombian creole language Palenquero, whose lexicon is highly cognate with Spanish,…

Recent language attitude research has attended to the processes involved in identifying and evaluating spoken language varieties. This article investigates the ability of second-language learners of English in Spain (N = 71) to identify Received Pronunciation (RP) and General American (GenAm) speech and their perceptions of linguistic variation…

This paper investigates the online presence of Low German, a minority language spoken in northern Germany, as well as several other European regional and minority languages. In particular, this article presents the results of two experiments, one involving "Wikipedia" and one involving "Twitter," that assess whether and to…

This paper contributes to recently expanded interest in documenting variable as well as categorical patterns of endangered languages. It describes approaches, tools and curricular developments that have benefitted from involving students who are heritage language community members, key to expanding variationist focus to a wider range of languages.…

Arabic speaking countries live in diglossic communities. This is where two or more varieties of a language are used by the same speech community. This paper examines students' attitude towards Arabic language varieties. It focuses mainly on Egyptian students' attitude towards the fu??a on one hand and the Egyptian Arabic (EA) variety on the other.…

In this article two dimensions of handshape complexity are analyzed as potential building blocks of phonological contrast-joint complexity and finger group complexity. We ask whether sign language patterns are elaborations of those seen in the gestures produced by hearing people without speech (pantomime) or a more radical reorganization of them.…

English has experienced grave transformations recently in terms of socio-demographic and geographical characteristics. While such transformations have resulted in diverse types of English uses and various English users, the existing ELT materials still fail to represent the global varieties and dynamic uses and users of English. Moving from a…

This article proposes that second language learners can use indirect positive evidence (IPE) to acquire a phonological grammar that is a subset of their L1 grammar. IPE is evidence from errors in the learner's L1 made by native speakers of the learner's L2. It has been assumed that subset grammars may be acquired using direct or indirect negative…

Drawing on data collected via a web-based survey, the study investigates the relationship between preferences for (in)formal language and attitudes toward linguistic variation among a large group of monolingual and multilingual adults (n = 379). Also explored are the links between preferences for (in)formal language and several secondary…

Language on the Internet and social media varies due to time, geography, and social factors. For example, consider an online chat forum where people from different regions across the world interact. In such scenarios, it is important to track and detect regional variation in language. A person from the UK, who is in conversation with someone from…

One of the challenging issues that has gained much attention, and has in fact sparked much debate, within the emergence and acquisition of World Englishes, is the Native- Non-native accent, especially its relationship with teachers' and learners' identity and selection of an appropriate pedagogic model. This paper investigates the attitudes of 260…

The recorded text test (RTT) is commonly used to test dialect intelligibility, often to inform language development decisions. More than 25 papers using the RTT method were published on www.sil.org/silesr from January 2009 to March 2013. As introduced by Casad [1974. "Dialect Intelligibility Testing." Summer Institute of Linguistics…

Given its focus on a definitely endangered language as noted by the UNESCO Atlas of the World Languages in Danger, and also marked as being threatened by the Ethnologue, this study aims to scrutinize whether Laz people do, or do not use their ancestral tongue, to identify factors involved in their language choice, and ultimately, to comment on its…

This paper provides an up-to-date report on the vitality or endangerment status of contact languages around the world, including pidgins, creoles, and mixed languages. By utilizing information featured in the "Endangered Languages Project" and the "Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Languages" online portals, 96 contact languages are…