In view of the fact that the teaching of Standard English has high educational priority in American schools, and that its use as the medium of instruction makes it a vital skill for nonstandard speakers, the present paper reports on an investigation of the Standard English performance of young children from minority groups in which Standard…

This annotated bibliography provides information concerning audiovisual aids available for use in teaching and teacher training in language variation. A variety of topics are covered, including regional dialect studies, language change, language acquisition, social dialects, and language in education. Each entry includes the name of the product,…

A three-year study of the linguistic and metalinguistic performance of forty Mexican-American children ranging in age from three to eleven years shows that it is useful to characterize the competence of the bilingual in terms of a unified system of rules, at least at one level of analysis. This paper explores some aspects of the grammatical…

The Pacific area is generally acknowledged to manifest great linguistic diversity. Such diversity is generally assumed to be dysfunctional, an obstacle to efficient functioning of society. Such diversity must, however, have its functions at least in the circumstances in which it arose. It is also generally assumed that such diversity is the result…

This study is concerned with the acquisition of social awareness of language differences in preschool children, particularly their awareness of the differences between black and standard English (BE and SE). Awareness is defined as a type of sociolinguistic perception involving three related abilities: (1) discrimination (the ability to…

This is an annotated bibliography of basic tools of access for the study of the uncommonly taught European languages which are not national languages. It is one of eight fascicles which constitute a revision of "A Provisional Survey of Materials for the Study of the Neglected Languages" (CAL 1969). The focus is on materials for the…

Both teachers and learners assume that to know a language, an individual need only learn its vocabulary and grammar. The correct use of common collocations, formulas, and idioms is the skill that makes language fluent, natural, and comprehensible. These formulaically constructed phrases that are not assembled by rule but recalled from memory are…

A study examined the roles of language and school in the lives of a group of five Indochinese friends, aged 10-12, in the same sixth-grade class. Two were born in the United States; three were born in Thai refugee camps. The ways in which the subjects defined themselves in relation to other students, particularly other Asian students, and to each…

This collection of 29 original articles provides an informative overview of current linguistic research on Spanish in the United States. Many of the chapters focus on regional aspects, ranging from sociolinguistic issues among Dominicans in New York and Cubans in Miami to the adoption and adaptation of forms from Nahuatal and English in the…

Utilizes Uwe Poerksen's concept of "plastic words" to examine and criticize the preeminence given to research in art education. "Plastic words" refers to vague technical jargon that suggests meaning without actually providing it (e.g., development, process, goal-setting). Argues that this usage inherently corrupts and diverts any productive…

Examines the English vowel productions of native speakers of Italian who immigrated to Canada between 2 and 23 years of age and of native English speakers from the same community. Findings reveal an increase in perceived accentedness on every vowel as a function of increasing age of arrival as well as high intelligibility scores for English vowels…

Discusses a court case in which cultural and linguistic differences obstructed the presentation of Aboriginal evidence. The article argues that a cross-cultural understanding of the assumptions and practices inherent in the interview process are essential prerequisites for any lawyer representing an Aboriginal client. (20 references) (Author/CK)

Outlines an application of theoretical understandings of institutionalized or nativized varieties of English to the practical concern of English-as-a-Second-Language programs, including testing, placement, and pedagogy. (29 references) (Author/OD)

Interviews with 30 Chicano adolescents in 2 Austin barrios examined the varieties of English and Spanish used by respondents and their Anglo and African American peers, functions of the language varieties, maintenance of Spanish, language shift toward English, Spanish-accented English, and ethnic and social identity. Contains 43 references.…

This study examines the linguistic norm ideals of the German minority in Denmark, which include the Sonderjysk Danish dialect, standard Danish, and standard German. The linguistic realities, as observed in a longitudinal study of minority children, point to a functional bilingualism in Sonderjysk and nonstandard German. (MDM)