English in the Southern United States

by Stephen J. Nagle (Editor), Sara L. Sanders (Editor)

Overview

The English of the Southern United States is possibly the most studied of any regional variety of any language. However, most, if not all, books about Southern American English have been directed almost exclusively toward scholars already working in the field. Written by a team of experts, many of them internationally known, this volume provides a broad overview of the foundations of, and current research on, language variation in the Southern United States.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521822640
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	01/09/2003
Series:	Studies in English Language
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	260
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.33(h) x 0.94(d)

About the Author

Stephen J. Nagle is Professor of English at Coastal Carolina University. He is author of Inferential Change and Syntactic Modality in English (1989), is editor of a monograph on political changes in eastern Europe (1992), and is author or co-author of articles on English historical syntax, auxiliary verbs in southern English, and teaching English as a second language.

Sara L. Sanders is Professor of English at Coastal Carolina University. She is the author or co-author of articles related to language use, language learning and language diversity. She was compositor of the Linguistic Atlas of the Middle and South Atlantic States (LAMSAS) for three years.

Table of Contents

Introduction; 1. The origins of southern American English John Algeo; 2. Shakespeare in the coves and hollows? Toward a history of southern English Edgar Schneider; 3. Eight grammatical features of southern US speech present in early modern London prison narratives Laura Wright; 4. The shared ancestry of African-American and American white southern Englishes: some speculations dictated by history Salikoko Mufwene; 5. The complex grammatical history of African-American and white vernaculars in the South Patricia Cukor-Avila; 6. Grammatical features of southern speech: yall, might could, and fixin to Cynthia Bernstein; 7. Sounding southern: a look at the phonology of English in the South George Dorrill; 8. Vowel shifting in the southern states Crawford Feagin; 9. Enclave dialect communities in the South Walt Wolfram; 10. Urbanization and the evolution of southern American English Jan Tillery and Guy Bailey; 11. The Englishes of southern Louisiana Connie Eble; 12. Features and uses of southern style Barbara Johnstone.

Editorial Reviews

"The book is highly recommended." GEOLINGUISTICS Vol. 30, Leonard R. N. Ashley

From the Publisher