Four aspects of English pragmatics that are often puzzling to students of English as a Second Language (ESL) are discussed and exemplified: certain mechanics (ellipsis; blended words; a-grammaticality); vague superordinates (generic verbs such as "get,""let,""do,""be,""have"; preposition with metaphoric extension such as "up,""in,""off,""through";…

A study of codeswitching patterns in American speakers of Finnish, primarily at the syntactic level, is presented. Subjects are 21 Finnish-English bilinguals aged 8 to 91 years, whose speech in naturally occurring speech situations was recorded and analyzed for intrasentential codeswitching. The analysis looked at (1) how much codeswitching could…

A discussion of the relationship between national identity and language in Spanish-speaking Latin America focuses on issues concerning indigenous languages, education, and literacy. The sociolinguistic history and configuration Spanish-speaking Latin America are outlined briefly, noting the influences of indigenous populations, non-Spanish…

Indian languages seem to have emerged from a phase of total dependence on English for new input. Several Indian languages have now evolved vocabularies and structural nuances to handle several new registers and styles necessary for modern society. Some of the change has occurred through conscious language policy encouraging multilingualism and the…

This paper attempts to show the relationship between variable rules and more widely used psycholinguistic constructs such as amalgams and schemas, and to point out how variationists' methods can be useful in the study of language acquisition. The traditional rule, the rule for forming the past tense of regular verbs in English, is discussed as it…

A language teacher urges the use of authentic listening materials that do not conform to the strictest standards of spoken usage, as a way of getting to know the language's norms and variations. (MSE)

This paper offers a historical and sociolinguistic interrogation of Taiwanese to demonstrate the significance of language continuum in relation to identity formation. To this end, Taiwanese is discussed as a particular variety of language. Literacy practices in the Japanese colonial period (1895-1945) are contrasted with the precolonial and…

LibQUAL+[TM] data to date have not been subjected to the modern measurement theory called polytomous item response theory (IRT). The data interpreted here were collected from 42,090 participants who completed the "American English" version of the 22 core LibQUAL+[TM] items, and 12,552 participants from Australia and Europe who…

A discussion of the role of sociolinguistics in the treatment of communication disorders focuses on issues related to dialect and language variation. It begins with an examination of linguistic diversity and dynamic description of language, reporting on a study of speech and language pathologists' judgments of sentences in African American…

Findings about black language and speaking behavior may help increase understanding and accommodation of black students in education. While something is known about Black English as a medium of communication, little is known about the language itself. The teacher must learn to recognize basic linguistic and performance features of black English,…

A study of the English of British schoolchildren of South Asian extraction looks at ways of examining the relationship between their English and two ethnic processes, called "interactive" and "reactive". The way in which Network Analysis permits investigation of the interactive process is outlined, and the use of Identity…

An applied research paper on how Canadian English differs from British and American English. Highlights ways for teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) to demonstrate these differences to their students. The notion of Canadian identity is also explored. A 3-item bibliography is included. (Contains 15 footnotes.)

This paper presents a case study of a Web-based English language training program in the field of Aviation. Virtual Languages, Inc., (VL) of Boca Raton, Florida, develops and delivers distance learning courses that teach English as a Second Language (ESL) within an English for Specific Purposes (ESP) framework. This allows learners to improve…

Current and aspiring teachers of college Spanish need an awareness of how and why the language and dialects are used in real-life contexts, and to understand the value of the variations as well as that of standard usage. Training of teaching assistants and language teachers should include basic notions of sociolinguistics, including the functions…

An analysis of the structure of possessive-adjective phrases (e.g., "women's new suitcases, new women's suitcases") in English looks at some data that appear to conflict with the intuitive order of S-structure possessives preceding adjectives. A solution to this apparent anomaly is proposed: it is not the compounding of possessive-noun…