In communicating, conversationalists constantly make decisions about their interlocutors' state of knowledge and on the basis of these decisions make lexical, grammatical, and intonational choices about how to manage the "flow" of information. This paper focuses on how such decision making affects choices in relative clause constructions…

The study examines how learner biases toward a particular national type of English affect interlanguage pragmatics. Specifically, this study assesses the degree to which Korean ESL (English as a second language) students' preferences for North American English influence their willingness to use Australian-English routines while studying in…

The structure of natural conversations in first-grade classrooms is the focus of this inquiry. Analyses of a particular type of discourse, namely, connected conversations initiated and sustained by questioning, suggest that the probability that a conversation will be continued may be expressed as a simple exponential function. (Author/RM)

A set of data collected by researchers at the University of California at Riverside and presented to the Southwest Regional Laboratory (SWRL) is described in this document. The data consist of 14 hours of recorded interviews of 60 Mexican-American children in Riverside in grades 1-3. Comments are directed at the linguistic characteristics of the…

In a comparative study of American English speakers and British English speakers, it was examined whether segmental effects can be used in speech production as cues to syntactic structure. American speakers could use the segmental cues in syntax perception, while British speakers could not. Speakers of British English who were long-term residents…

Addresses the need for replication studies in the field of second-language acquisition and discusses the problems surrounding standards of reporting research. Notes a lack of uniform standards in reporting second-language learners' proficiency levels and proposes ways to achieve more thorough reporting of research that will allow others to engage…

Summarizes the main points presented in the 1989 book, "The Death of Black English" by R.R. Butlers (1989). Butler's book presents most important research of last 20 years and subjects the results to variation analysis. It is concluded that the history of linguistic assimilation points to the eventual disappearance of Black English in…

Based on a model developed by Brown and Levinson (1978), this thesis examines one feature underlying appropriate language use--politeness--as it affects the discourse of native English speakers in three situations. The three situations and speakers involved are: (1) British speakers in a British public library, (2) American speakers in an American…

THE PURPOSE OF THIS RESEARCH WAS TO EXPLORE SOME OF THE VARIABLES THAT INFLUENCE INTRAINDIVIDUAL PHONETIC VARIATION IN CERTAIN ASPECTS OF AMERICAN ENGLISH SPEECH. FORTY COLLEGE STUDENTS PARTICIPATED IN THE EXPERIMENT. EACH PERFORMED TWO TASKS--(1) READING ALOUD WORDS (16 IN EACH OF FIVE CATEGORIES) FROM FLASHCARDS AS PART OF AN OSTENSIBLE LEARNING…

To understand decisions made concerning language usage in "Webster's Third New International Dictionary," it is necessary to realize what standard usage is and how it changes. The definition of standard usage, given in 1932, as that language used by well-educated persons remains valid and depends more and more on professional writers for guidance.…

This study, an outgrowth of the "Linguistic Atlas of the United States and Canada," based on atlas field records covering the entire Eastern United States, enables the author to trace the geographical spread and also the social distribution of the linguistic features that are treated. Research demonstrates how early culture centers and…

In the absence of a comprehensive theory of the spoken language, the exploration of dynamic phonotactics--of actual running speech--can contribute to the understanding of oral language properties. Information based on spoken language data may also have fundamental implications for second-language learning. (24 references) (Author/VWL)

Current work in American dialectology is summarized and commented on. (Available from: See FL 508 214.) (RM)

Answers to three of the questions used in gathering material for the Dictionary of American Regional English (DARE) are analyzed in this paper. The data was collected state by state, and the number studied in each state was based on the 1960 population figures and known patterns of settlements and migrations. In the first question, the informants…

The variety of syntactic forms for expression of directives is commented on. Data has been collected investigating the empirical distribution of formal variants across social features and predictability of the form of a directive if social features of its context are known. (Author/RM)