This paper deals with the relationship between neoliberalism and communicative language teaching in language-in-education policy. Neoliberalism, or the deregulation of state based on meritocracy, or equal competition, gives rise to paradoxical discourses. On the one hand, sociolinguistic superdiversity shows us the unprecedented mixing and…

Language revival often retains founding overt beliefs rooted in an ideological commitment to a specific language because of its role as the authentic, legitimate cultural vehicle of a distinct people. Revival is thus the reinstatement of cultural distinctiveness based on traditional language. Revivalists have afforded traditional language…

Traditionally, Basque has three voiceless affricates that are different in their place of articulation. More precisely, affricates can have a lamino-alveolar, apico-alveolar, and prepalatal place of articulation and the graphemes used to represent them are respectively. Likewise, Basque has been described as having three fricatives with the same…

Weiner (1988. "On Editing a Usage Guide." In "Words for Robert Burchfield's Sixty-Fifth Birthday," edited by E. G. Stanley, and T. F. Hoad, 171-183. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 173) describes usage guides as being 'as broad as the English language, covering spelling, punctuation, phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexis, and…

Within a language, there is considerable variation in the pronunciations of words owing to social factors like age, gender, nationality, and race. In the present study, we investigate whether toddlers link social and linguistic variation during word learning. In Experiment 1, 24- to 26-month-old toddlers were exposed to two talkers whose front…

"Changing English" is a new feature in "ELT Journal" which aims to illustrate the diversity of English in the world today and to ask whether, and how, ELT practitioners might accommodate such variation. Focusing on a particular language issue in each article, the series will explore how English varies between places and spaces,…

The study investigated the non-intellective correlates affecting the sociolinguistic competence of teacher education students, with a focus on the analysis of their contexts relative to social experiences, language attitude, and use of linguistic forms in different situations. It also determined the common difficulties they experience in the use…

Does language development drive language change? A common account of language change attributes the regularity of certain patterns to children's learning biases. The present study examines these predictions for change-in-progress in the use of "must" in Toronto English. Historically, modal verbs like "must" start with root…

This article discusses a sociocultural usage-based perspective on the development of sociolinguistic competence. Previous research has focused on learners' acquisition and use of alternative ways of 'saying the same thing' (i.e. native-like variation) in relation to study abroad, contact with native speakers, and pedagogy. Missing from the…

Language and accent strongly influence the formation of social groups. By five years of age, children already show strong social preferences for peers who speak their native language with a familiar accent (Kinzler, Shutts, DeJesus, & Spelke, 2009). However, little is known about the factors that modulate the strength and direction of…

In the introduction to the special issue 'Elite Multilingualism: Discourses, practices, and debates', we focus on 'elite multilingualism' as a means to provide a window into the complex layers and nuances of today's multilingual, mobile and global society. Our aims here are to provide an empirical and conceptual discussion of a growing…

In rural Valdres, Norway, the traditional regional dialect, called Valdresmål, has become an important resource for popular style and local development projects. Stigmatized through much of the twentieth century for its association with poor, rural, "backward" farmers and culture, Valdresmål has been thoroughly revalorized, with…

This study investigated the developmental trajectories of three perceptual domains related to regional dialect competence: the linguistic domain, tested through an intelligibility in noise task; the objective indexical domain, tested through locality judgments and a free classification task; and the subjective indexical domain, tested through…

Although writing scholars have increasingly emphasized the need for more equitable approaches to language (difference) in the composition classroom, specific examples of teaching praxis remain sorely needed. In this article, we offer three sets of activities that we have used in our own classes designed for multilingual students. In formulating…

The present and future situation of the Celtic languages is intrinsically interesting. Two are moribund, while the other four possess varying degrees of strength and institutional support. From the weakest to the strongest, however, there are pressing concerns about stability and maintenance, to say nothing of possible revitalisation. All are…