Since its initial publication, English with an Accent has provoked debate and controversy within classrooms through its in-depth scrutiny of American attitudes towards language. Rosina Lippi-Green discusses the ways in which discrimination based on accent functions to support and perpetuate social structures and unequal power relations.
This second edition has been reorganized and revised to include:
• new dedicated chapters on Latino English and Asian American English
• discussion questions, further reading, and suggested classroom exercises,
• updated examples from the classroom, the judicial system, the media, and corporate culture
• a discussion of the long-term implications of the Ebonics debate
• a brand-new companion website with a glossary of key terms and links to audio, video, and images relevant to the each chapter's content.
English with an Accent is essential reading for students with interests in attitudes and discrimination towards language.
Author(s): Rosina Lippi-Green
Edition: Second Edition
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2012
Language: English
Pages: 354
Front Cover
English with an Accent
Copyright Page
Contents
List of figures
List of tables
Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction: language ideology or science fiction?
1. The linguistic facts of life
All spoken language changes
All spoken languages are equal in linguistic terms
Grammaticality does not equal communicative effectiveness
Written language and spoken language are historically, structurally, and functionally fundamentally different creatures
Variation is intrinsic to all spoken language at every level
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
2. Language in motion
Changes in progress
r-less in Manhattan
The Northern Cities Chain Shift (NCCS)
Lexical variation
Variation in verb morphology: strong and weak verbs
Structured variation: the hidden life of language
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
3. The myth of non-accent
You’ve got one too
Perspective
The Sound House
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
4. The standard language myth
Standard (American) English
Words about words
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
5. Language subordination
A model of the language subordination process
Rejecting the gift: the individual’s role in the communicative process
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
6. The educational system: fixing the message in stone
The setting of goals
Appropriacy arguments
The results of appropriacy argumentation
Good enough English
Teacher talk
Summary
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
7. Teaching children how to discriminate: (what we learn from the Big Bad Wolf)
Storytellers, Inc.
The ubiquitous mouse
The wolf’s backstory
Talking the talk
Time and place
Disney feature films
Original study methodology
Getting the hang of Technicolor
Lovers and mothers
In short
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
8. The information industry
The voice of authority
Opinion, spin, propaganda
Bad is stronger than good
The 2008 presidential election
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
9. Real people with a real language: the workplace and the judicial system
The nutshell
The Civil Rights Act
The legal process
Discrimination in the workplace
Selected court cases
Appendix: the U.S. civil court structure
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
10. The real trouble with Black language
Grammar: resistance is futile
Style, authenticity, and race
Defying the definition
Anglo attitudes toward AAVE
African American attitudes toward AAVE
Where we at
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
11. Hillbillies, hicks, and Southern belles: the language rebels
Defining the South
The Southern Trough
Sounds like home to me
The map in the mind
Hostility with a smile
The seduction of accent reduction
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
12. Defying paradise: Hawai’i
Hawai’ians talk
Hawai’ians at school
Talk story: “Without Pidgin, I would cease to be whole”
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
13. The other in the mirror
The price of admission
Who has a foreign accent?
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
14. ¡Ya basta!
Counting in Spanish
Diversity over space
The Spanish universe
The changing colors of Mexico
We’re not going anywhere: performing race
The everyday language of white racism
A sampling of discriminatory language-focused practices against Latinos/as
The most vulnerable
The workplace
Education in the Southwest
Hypothetically speaking
Summary
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
15. The unassimilable races: what it means to be Asian
Institutionalized aggression
Half the world
Stereotypes
Mockery
The transmission and rationalization of racism
I’m sorry, I just refuse to apologize
In the classroom
False speakers of language
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
16. Case study 1: moral panic in Oakland
How to build a moral panic
Portrait of a folk devil
African American English in context
The setting
The triggering event
The panic cycle in Oakland
Postscript: institutionalized mockery
Speaking up
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
17. Case study 2: linguistic profiling and fair housing
Tyranny of the Californian majority
Heard but not seen
I had you at hello
A human failing
Housing discrimination toward Muslims
Summary
Discussion questions and exercises
Notes
Suggested further reading
18. Conclusion: civil (dis)obedience and the shadow of language
Shortened bibliography
Index
