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Convergence with Divergence: A Sound Change in Vernacular Black English.
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Denning, Keith – Language Variation and Change, 1989
Quantitative evidence is presented for a change in vernacular Black English (VBE) that appears to involve increasing similarities between VBE and other varieties. It is suggested that, although Black varieties and White varieties of English remain distinct and undergo certain changes separately, this need not be regarded as absolute divergence.…
Descriptors: Articulation (Speech), Black Dialects, Diachronic Linguistics, English
Using the Past To Explain the Present: Tense and Temporal Reference in Early African American English.
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Walker, James A. – Language Variation and Change, 2001
Reconstructs the present temporal reference system of Early African American English by investigating the aspectual conditioning of a morphosyntactic construction within the domain of present temporal reference in three representative varieties. (Author/VWL)
Descriptors: Black Dialects, Diachronic Linguistics, Language Variation, Morphology (Languages)
Negation and the History of African American English.
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Howe, Darin M. – Language Variation and Change, 1997
Describes the use of negation in three corpora representative of early to mid-19th-century African American English. The study examines the negative form "ain't," negative concord to indefinites and verbs, negative inversion and negative postposing. Findings reveal that the negation system of early African American English derived…
Descriptors: Black Dialects, Diachronic Linguistics, Dialect Studies, Negative Forms (Language)
A Peak at Death: Assessing Continuity and Change in an Underdocumented Language.
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Sabino, Robin – Language Variation and Change, 1996
Assesses phonological continuity and change in the last stage of the moribund dialect called "Negerhollands" in the Danish West Indies (DWI). The article contrasts earlier and current views of this dialect, sketches language contact in the DWI, examines the last speaker's language history and vowel systems, and assesses variation in a…
Descriptors: Black Dialects, Creoles, Diachronic Linguistics, Dialect Studies
Back to the Past: The BEV/Creole Connection Revisited.
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Winford, Donald – Language Variation and Change, 1992
The marking of past temporal reference in Black English Vernacular (BEV) and Trinidadian English is compared. Similarities in the patterns of variation according to verb type and phonological conditioning suggest that past marking in contemporary BEV preserves traces of an earlier shift from a creole pattern to one approximating the Standard…
Descriptors: Black Dialects, Contrastive Linguistics, Creoles, English
There's No Tense Like the Present: Verbal -s Inflection in Early Black English.
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Poplack, Shana; Tagliamonte, Sali – Language Variation and Change, 1989
An analysis of the linguistic and social contexts of the occurrence of verbal "-s" marking in early Black English, within a historical and comparative perspective, shows that both third person singular and nonconcord "-s" are subject to regular, parallel environmental conditioning. (68 references) (Author/CB)
Descriptors: Articulation (Speech), Black Dialects, Consonants, Diachronic Linguistics
"The Black Men Has Wives and Sweet Harts and Third Person Plural -s Jest Like the White Men": Evidence for Verbal -s from Written Documents on 19th-Century African American Speech.
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Montgomery, Michael; And Others – Language Variation and Change, 1993
An analysis of letters written by 19th-century African Americans shows constraints on verbal "-s" marking that parallel those found in the writing of Scotch-Irish immigrants in the same time period and region, specifically a subject type constraint and a proximity to subject constraint. (MDM)
Descriptors: Black Dialects, Blacks, Comparative Analysis, Contrastive Linguistics
Relativization Strategies in Earlier African American Vernacular English.
Peer reviewed Peer reviewed
Tottie, Gunnel; Rey, Michel – Language Variation and Change, 1997
Examines the system of relative markers in early African American English as documented in the Ex-Slave Recordings. Found a higher incidence of zero marking in adverbial than in nonadverbial relatives. The lack of "wh"-relatives found, as well as this frequency of zero subject relatives, is interpreted as evidence that African American…
Descriptors: Adverbs, Black Dialects, Data Analysis, Diachronic Linguistics