A study examined a vowel alternation occurring in Philadelphia English and some dialects of New York State. The alternation is of [E] and [ae], and the study investigated the application of the [ae] Tensing Rule, more specifically in the interaction of [ae] Tensing with several principles of syllabification and grammatical organization. Issues…

This study presents a formal device which can be used to display interlanguage variability while revealing its overall systematicity. Two types of variability are recognized: (1) production of a number of variant structures for a single target language structure at one point in time; and (2) variation over time that is attributable to the…

The purpose of this paper is to present systematically some facts regarding interdialectal constant and varying features of the semantics of English kinship terminology. The data present some problems for current views of grammar and of linguistic variation. Regarding the former, it is not clear what sort of "rule," what place in…

Paradoxically, linguists' speculations about sex differences in language use are highly plausible and yet have received little empirical support from well controlled studies. An experiment was designed to correct a flaw in earlier methodologies by sampling precisely the kinds of situations in which predicted differences (e.g., swearing,…

This paper presents the results of a quantitative analysis of the historical present tense (HP) in English. The tokens of HP in narrative clauses, such as "he's smiling, an' he picks up the card," are referentially equivalent to their past tense alternants in the phrases, "he was smiling an' he picked up the card." Previous…

The English spoken by Spanish-surnamed Americans of the southwestern United States often has a Spanish flavor, even though the speakers may have no competence in Spanish. This Chicano English is discussed in a series of descriptions based on a number of previous studies of regional variations. Each description covers pronunciation, intonation,…

Both spoken and written Polish have undergone profound changes during the past twenty-eight years. The increasing urbanization of Polish culture and the forced change in Polish society are the main factors influencing the change in the language. Indirect evidence of changes which have occurred in the vocabulary and idioms of spoken Polish in the…

This is a report on the different types of studies of the regional varieties of French that have been carried out in Belgium from 1945 to the present. The majority of the studies have been done by Belgians, and have to do with regional varieties of French spoken in Belgium. Some, however, examine African or American varieties. Chapter 1 deals with…

The purpose of the study reported in this document was to examine the oral language and some of the influences on oral language of students from five to nine years old. Six students in each of 13 classes were selected randomly and were taped in three different situations: a monologue by the student when alone in the room, a dialogue with another…

A situation of linguistic contact often produces various degrees of change in at least one of the languages involved. It is shown that the syntactic, as well as the phonological and the lexical, components are the locus of interference from one language on the other. Features of interference are described as part of a systematic pattern build on a…

The concept of a speech community is investigated within the theoretical frameworks of sociology and linguistics, and it is concluded that the collective competence models of Ferdinand de Saussure and Noam Chomsky are inadequate. They fail in that they are limited as linguistic models which have consistently overlooked the sociological importance…

This article outlines the history and development of the substratum theory concerning Spanish in the Americas, the basic tenet of the theory being the role of indigenous languages in phonological changes in Spanish. (CLK)

Discusses and compares the syntactic features of free relative clauses found in Castilian and Aragonese dialects of Old Spanish. The role of clitics (nontonic pronominals) and the lexical innovations of the wh-question compound-type clauses are highlighted. (TR)

This project was initiated in response to the science and mathematics language needs of Sea Island students who speak African-American dialects. Research has indicated that there appears to be a relationship between dialect diversity and academic success. In response, the program's goals were to identify students who exhibited dialect/language…

A study demonstrated that court interpreter failure to preserve pragmatic features in the interpreted version of courtroom testimony can potentially distort both the lawyer's question and the witness' response. Pragmatic features are defined as those aspects of an utterance that signal how the speaker intends the message to be taken. While some of…