The article reviews some of the controversial issues regarding macro- and micro-ethnographic approaches and their implications for validity of ethnographic description, discusses the notion of context and its application to various research settings, and gives an account of the various problems encountered by researchers working in bilingual…

Presents model using elements of status, social group or speech community, and values for treating literacy as a sociolinguistic phenomenon and in support of bilingual education. Uses Navajo and medieval Jewish languages as examples. (BK)

Presents a case for eliminating "whom" from standard English usage, with examples of why the use of "whom" brings not only needless worry but overzealousness in its applications. (RL)

This review of "The Language of Teaching" (Edwards and Furlong, 1978) suggests that its most valuable contribution is to the further development of sociolinguistic research in classrooms and to the advancement of sociological analysis of education. The book reports the author's investigation of patterns of classroom communication and language…

Investigates the reactions of Germans to the "English-sounding" brand names of various German products, and also those of English-speakers to the same names. Finds that both groups perceive the names as un-English, phony, or outdated. (IFS/WGA)

Discusses the relationship between the brain, language, and communication in the following sections: (1) combining words, (2) language as a system, (3) language as a function of the brain, (4) the science of communication, and (5) language as a social institution. (NCR)

An interview with Michael Stubbs, lecturer in linguistics at the University of Nottingham, regarding the sociolinguistics of the classroom. (DD)

Sketches the history of the Scots language and the political and social history of Scotland, following with a description of the dialect, including its differences from standard English in phonology and vocabulary, and in the area of sociolinguistics. Some thoughts about the possible future of the dialect are added. (IFS/WGA)

Insights regarding speech acts and pragmatic presuppositions are related to a philosophy of science. (AM)

The address systems in Raymond Barrio's "The Plum Plum Pickers" imply sociolinguistic differences between the Chicano and the Anglo characters. The kinds of sociolinguistic situations, the number of dyadic patterns, and the quantity of the dyadic patterns strongly suggest the differences. (Author)

In New Zealand, interest in the local variety of English is increasing. Reasons for this are given. A brief survey is made of: semantic changes, the role of Maori words, neologisms and phonetic changes. Parallels are shown with the history of British English. (IFS/WGA)

Discusses the nature of the difference between dialectology and sociolinguistics and suggests that the findings of dialectology are relevant for use by sociolinguists. (30 references) (CK)

Analyzes recordings made of Maori born in the 1860s to 1870s to examine whether there were effects of language contact and language shift in New Zealand historically and whether earlier forms of Maori New Zealand English were characterized by contact-induced adaptation processes. (Author/VWL)

Uses Foucault's work on knowledge and power to show that the politics of language and of researching it are closely related. A study of Cajun French argues that language loss is a social as well as a discursive process and that academic knowledge and discourse both play a significant role in language politics. Advocates the use of local knowledge…

Examines the syntactic, semantic, and sociolinguistic features of a corpus of 183 apologies in New Zealand English, within the context of an interaction model with 2 intersecting dimensions, affective and referential meaning, attempting to relate the relative "weightiness" of the offense to features of the apology. (53 references)…