When Creoles and Spanish Collide: Language and Culture in the Caribbean presents a contemporary look on how Creole English communities in Central America grapple with evolving Creole identity and representation, language contact with Spanish, language endangerment, discrimination, and linguistic creativity.

Kessler and McDonald's WHEN WORDS COLLIDE is praised by students and professors alike for its straightforward and clear-almost conversational-presentation of grammar. This versatile grammar and usage handbook works for both beginning and continuing media writers, providing concise, clear explanations and examples, as well as quick and accurate answers to grammar or usage questions. The unique 'from writer to writer' perspective engages students and guides them firsthand through the writing process. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text may not be available in the ebook version.

Suleiman's book considers national identity in relation to language, the way in which language can be manipulated to signal political, cultural or historical difference. As a language with a long-recorded heritage and one spoken by the majority of those in the Middle East in various dialects, Arabic is a particularly appropriate vehicle for such an investigation. It is also a penetrating device for exploring the conflicts of the Middle East.'This is a well-crafted, well organized, and eloquent book. 'Karin Ryding, Georgetown University

This book challenges the predominance of mainstream sociolinguistic theories by focusing on lesser known sociolinguistic systems, from regions of Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, South America, the European Mediterranean, and Slavic regions as well as specific speech communities such as those speaking Nivkh, Jamaican Creole, North Saami, and Central Yup’ik. In nineteen chapters, the specialist authors look at key sociolinguistic aspects of each region or speech community, such as gender, politeness strategies, speech patterns and the effects of social hierarchy on language, concentrating on the differences from mainstream models. The volume, introduced by Miriam Meyerhoff, has been written by the leading expert of each specific region or community and includes contributions by Rajend Mesthrie, Marc Greenberg and Daming Xu. This publication draws together connections across regions/communities and considers how mainstream sociolinguistics is incomplete or lacking. It reveals how lesser-known cultures can play an important role in the building of theory in sociolinguistics. Globalising Sociolinguistics is essential reading for any researcher in sociolinguistics and language variation and will be a key reference for advanced sociolinguistics courses.

The Voices project of the British Broadcasting Corporation, a recent high-profile media investigation, gathered contemporary English dialect samples from all over the UK and invited contributions from the public to a dedicated website. This book explores both issues of ideology and representation behind the media project and uses to which the emerging data can be put in the study of language variation and change. Two lead-in chapters, written from the complementary perspectives of a broadcast media specialist, Simon Elmes, and an academic linguist, David Crystal, set the project in the BBC’s historical, social, and linguistic contexts. Following these, authorities in a range of specialisms concerned with uses and representations of language varieties address various aspects of the project’s potential, in three broad sections: Linguistic explorations of the representations of language and the debates on language evoked by the data. The linguistic product of the project, including lexical, phonological, and grammatical investigations. Technical aspects of creating maps from the large electronic Voices database. An interactive companion website provides the means to access, explore, and make use of raw linguistic data, along with interpretive maps created from it, all accompanied by full explanations. Analysing 21st Century British English brings together key research and is essential reading for advanced undergraduate students, postgraduate students and researchers working in the areas of language variation, dialect and sociolinguistics. Contributors: David Crystal, Bethan Davies, Susie Dent, Simon Elmes, Holly Gilbert, Jon Herring, John Holliday, Alexandra Jaffe, Tommaso Milani, Rob Penhallurick, Jonnie Robinson, Mooniq Shaikjee, Ann Thompson, Will Turner, Clive Upton, Martijn Wieling.

The endangered languages crisis is widely acknowledged among scholars who deal with languages and indigenous peoples as one of the most pressing problems facing humanity, posing moral, practical, and scientific issues of enormous proportions. Simply put, no area of the world is immune from language endangerment. The Oxford Handbook of Endangered Languages, in 39 chapters, provides a comprehensive overview of the efforts that are being undertaken to deal with this crisis. A comprehensive reference reflecting the breadth of the field, the Handbook presents in detail both the range of thinking about language endangerment and the variety of responses to it, and broadens understanding of language endangerment, language documentation, and language revitalization, encouraging further research. The Handbook is organized into five parts. Part 1, Endangered Languages, addresses the fundamental issues that are essential to understanding the nature of the endangered languages crisis. Part 2, Language Documentation, provides an overview of the issues and activities of concern to linguists and others in their efforts to record and document endangered languages. Part 3, Language Revitalization, includes approaches, practices, and strategies for revitalizing endangered and sleeping ("dormant") languages. Part 4, Endangered Languages and Biocultural Diversity, extends the discussion of language endangerment beyond its conventional boundaries to consider the interrelationship of language, culture, and environment, and the common forces that now threaten the sustainability of their diversity. Part 5, Looking to the Future, addresses a variety of topics that are certain to be of consequence in future efforts to document and revitalize endangered languages.