Much of the literature on social class and language study in schools argues that for middle-class parents and their children, languages are chosen for their capacity to offer forms of distinction that provide an edge in the global labour market. In this paper, we draw on data collected from interviews with parents and children in middle-class…

In this short commentary piece, the authors stand back from many of the specific details in the seven papers which constitute the special issue, and offer some observations which attempt to identify and assess points of similarity and difference amongst them, under a number of different general headings. To the extent that the "sociolinguistics of…

The effects of high-stakes, standardized testing on the curriculum are discouraging the teaching of multicultural, anti-racist content. Test-influenced educational environments contribute to the reproduction of racial and cultural inequality in education. Using the lens of sociolinguistics, the author asserts that high-stakes, standardized tests…

This paper explores Stanley Cavell's notion of "passionate utterance", which acts as an extension of/departure from (we might read it as both) J. L. Austin's theory of the performative. Cavell argues that Austin having made the revolutionary discovery that truth claims in language are bound up with how words perform, then gets bogged by convention…

In this article, an analysis and critique of one small but pedagogically significant component of classroom discourse (instructors' use of long-familiar questioning routines in whole-group classroom discussion) is used to support the larger argument that analysis of classroom discourse at the college level offers many valuable ways to reflect on,…

In a number of personal communications and now in her article in "Educational Researcher", Mary Juzwik repeatedly observes that some elaborations may be needed for fuller understanding of the notion of "identity-as-narrative", introduced in the article this author co-wrote with Anna Prusak "Telling Identities: In Search of an Analytic Tool for…

As an epilog to a theme issue on morality in discourse, this article examines the various types of morality in dialog, focusing on premorality and proto-morality, sincere authenticity versus reflective ethics, and the moral voices of modernity. Concludes that morality is an intrinsic feature of any dialog, and it is a multidimensional,…

This study describes special questions (SQs) and disjunctive questions (DQs) in English and Polish. Central to the study is the interrogative mood and the illocutionary force of the question; interrogative structures without illocutionary force are excluded. "Speech Act Theory" (SAT) is used as a label for certain tendencies in the…

The functional approach, which views language as a potential for meaning in social situations, seems particularly relevant in analyzing the dynamic interaction between text and context. Function determines structure, and the context, which comes to define the function, determines the kinds of text that will be communicative. As the contextual…

Reviewed are the relevance and limitations of work in sociolinguistics, pragmatics, and conversational analysis with respect to a central issue in the sociological study of social interaction: the taken-for-granted and inferences made therefrom. The hope is to show the arbitrariness of the line dividing microsociological studies and…

Discusses the tradition of argument about what forms of metalinguistic discourse are valid, useful, and significant in the era of modern Western linguistics, with particular reference to the argument between linguistic science and prescriptivism. The article emphasizes that linguistic norms are open to challenge and change about what their nature…

The notion of critical linguistics is examined, and it is argued that the diverse objectives usually given for Language Awareness programs appear to be given desocializing weightings in actual materials. Ways that Critical Language Awareness can be incorporated into a family history writing project are described. (20 references) (Author/LB)

The phenomena of overlapping talk is examined. In numerous types of conversational exchanges, people briefly acknowledge the utterance that overlapped their own and then recycle an overlapped utterance and/or introduce a new topic. Three types of objects are illustrated and discussed: an acknowledgment token, an assessment, and a commentary. (four…

Suggests that variation in spelling, like other levels of language variety, reflects social practices in speech communities. While the social identities and stances encoded in such variation are not simple to interpret, they offer another mode of investigation of language in social space and practice. (Author/VWL)

Presents theory of "audience design" which assumes that speakers design their style of talk for their audience, and examines how speakers do this. Also examines the effects on style shift of nonpersonal factors (such as topic and setting) and of referees (the class of persons with whom the speaker identifies). (SED)