Contemporary English in the USA

Indigenous and immigrant speakers from a variety of linguistic and sociocultural backgrounds have in different ways contributed to the development of present day American English, as have the geographical and social dimensions of the country. This paper provides a survey of contemporary usage of American English by describing and illustrating linguistic features documented for social and regional groups in the United States. The focus on variation in pronunciation, grammar, and meaning in American English highlights the diversity of dialects and styles in the U.S. as well as the centrality of sociocultural identities to language use. We group examples of variation according to the social and geographical factors that these features have been associated with in the literature: region, age, ethnicity, and gender. We note though that patterns of linguistic usage differ both within and across communities, with particular features used by different social groups for shifting purposes. The examples here provide a snapshot of the kinds of variation observed in contemporary American English as we move into the 21st century

Contemporary English in the USA

Indigenous and immigrant speakers from a variety of linguistic and sociocultural backgrounds have in diff erent ways contributed to the development of presentday American English, as have the geographical and social dimensions of thecountry. This paper provides a survey of contemporary usage of American English by describing and illustrating linguistic features documented for social and regional groups in the United States. The focus on variation in pronunciation, grammar, and meaning in American English highlights the diversity of dialects and styles in the U.S. as well as the centrality of sociocultural identities to language use. We group examples of variation according to the social and geographical factors that these features have been associated with in the literature: region, age, ethnicity, and gender. We note though that patterns of linguistic usage differ both within and across communities, with particular features used by diff erent social groups for shifting purposes. The examples here provide a snapshot of the kinds of variation observed in contemporary American English as we move into the 21st century

Contemporary English in the USA

Indigenous and immigrant speakers from a variety of linguistic and sociocultural backgrounds have in diff erent ways contributed to the development of presentday American English, as have the geographical and social dimensions of thecountry. This paper provides a survey of contemporary usage of American English by describing and illustrating linguistic features documented for social and regional groups in the United States. The focus on variation in pronunciation, grammar, and meaning in American English highlights the diversity of dialects and styles in the U.S. as well as the centrality of sociocultural identities to language use. We group examples of variation according to the social and geographical factors that these features have been associated with in the literature: region, age, ethnicity, and gender. We note though that patterns of linguistic usage differ both within and across communities, with particular features used by diff erent social groups for shifting purposes. The examples here provide a snapshot of the kinds of variation observed in contemporary American English as we move into the 21st century

The Effect of Usage on Degrees of Constituency: The Reduction of Don\u27t in English

In this paper we take the position that there are many degrees of constituency and that these derive in a direct manner from the frequency with which elements are used together: elements that are frequently found next to each other show a tighter constituent structure than those that collocate less frequently. We use both phonological and functional evidence from conversation to argue that repetition conditions chunking (Haiman 1994), sometimes overriding the syntactic and semantic logic of the organization of utterances. Our study examines the reduction of don\u27t in American English conversation. We find that don\u27t is reduced the most in the contexts in which it occurs the most, that is, after I and before certain verbs, such as know. While a generalized constituent structure may be an emergent property arising from many analogous utterances, specific combinations that are frequently used may diverge from the general pattern because frequency conditions autonomy in storage and renders internal analysis unnecessary. This phenomenon reveals the essential role of repetition in the creation of constituent structure: while semantic and pragmatic factors determine what occurs together in discourse, the actual repetition of stretches of talk triggers the chunking mechanism that binds them into constituents