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I Emerging Hispanic English in the Southeast US Emerging Hispanic English in the Southeast U.S.: Grammatical Variation in a Triethnic Community by Erin Elizabeth Callahan-Price Department of English Duke University Date: _______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Walt Wolfram, Supervisor ___________________________ Erik Thomas ___________________________ Robin Dodsworth ___________________________ Dominika Baran ___________________________ Julie Tetel Andresen ___________________________ Edna Andrews Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of English in the Graduate School of Duke University 2013 i v ABSTRACT Emerging Hispanic English in the Southeast US: Grammatical variation in a triethnic community by Erin Elizabeth Callahan-Price Department of English Duke University Date: _______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Walt Wolfram, Supervisor ___________________________ Erik Thomas ___________________________ Robin Dodsworth ___________________________ Dominika Baran ___________________________ Julie Tetel Andresen ___________________________ Edna Andrews An abstract of a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of English in the Graduate School of Duke University 2013 Copyright by Erin Elizabeth Callahan-Price 2013 Abstract This study investigates variable past tense marking patterns in an emerging variety of N.C. Hispanic English (n=44) spoken by language learners at three Length of Residency (LOR) groups in three schools in Durham, NC in terms of 1. lexical semantics (Andersen & Shirai 1996, Bayley 1999), 2. frequency (Guy & Erker 2012) 3. discourse structure (Kumpf 1984, Bardovi-Harlig 1998) and 4. verb class and phonological environment (Wolfram 1985, Bayley 1994). Statistical results show significant effects of verb class, lexical aspect, and frequency and interacting effects of verb class and frequency (specifically, suppletives like copula are simultaneously highly frequent and highly phonetically salient). A subsample coded for the discourse factor shows some evidence for the correlation of copula and backgrounding function. An analysis of consonant cluster reduction patterns (CCR) demonstrates dialect acquisition of variable constraints (e.g. in terms of N.C. AAVE), namely phonological environment (_P > _C > _V) and morphemic status (monomorpheme > bimorpheme), though the significant result for morphemic status is ultimately shown to be due to collinearity with phonological environment (i.e. bimorphemic cluster/regular past tense –ed verbs occur in prevocalic contexts) in both N.C. HE and AAVE. Pedagogical applications are discussed, including accurately identifying English Language Learners (ELLs) in the context of local/regional accommodation. iv Dedication Dedicated to my wife, Alissa Jo Callahan-Price, who leaves me speechless. v Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................ iv List of Tables ..................................................................................................................... x List of Figures .................................................................................................................. xi Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................... xiii 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Overview of the Study: The language of ‘Marcos’ ....................................... 1 1.2 Study design: Past tense unmarking as a sociolinguistic variable ............. 3 2. Review of Literature ............................................................................................. 7 2.1 Why study interlanguage? Implications for variationism & SLA .............. 7 2.2 Tense unmarking: The variationist rubric ................................................... 19 2.2.1 Wolfram et al.’s Vietnamese English studies (1980s) ............................ 19 2.2.2 The Chinese English studies (1990s) ....................................................... 22 2.3 Tense unmarking studies: The discourse rubric ......................................... 26 2.3.1 Foreground vs. background ..................................................................... 26 2.3.2 Function of the historical present in narratives ..................................... 28 2.4 Tense unmarking studies: The role of (two kinds of) aspect .................... 29 2.4.1 Semantic/lexical constraints: Akionsart .................................................. 30 vi 2.4.2 Grammatical constraints: Point-of-View aspect .................................... 31 2.5 Next steps ......................................................................................................... 36 3. Traditions in variationist sociolinguistics ........................................................ 39 3.1 The sociolinguistic variable ........................................................................... 39 3.2 Case study 1: Copula deletion in early AAE ............................................... 41 3.3 Case Study 2: CCR across English varieties ................................................ 45 3.4 CCR as a roadmap for evolving variationist methodology ...................... 49 3.4.1 Classical variable rules .............................................................................. 49 3.4.2 VARBRUL ................................................................................................... 51 3.4.3 Quantitative analysis Post-VARBRUL .................................................... 52 3.5 The speech community: Intersections and innovations ............................ 55 3.5.1 Ethnolects .................................................................................................... 56 3.5.2 Conclusions ................................................................................................. 60 4. Site, Speakers and Methods ............................................................................... 62 4.1 Durham speech community: demographics and trends ........................... 62 4.2 Ethnographic evidence ................................................................................... 65 4.3 Speakers ............................................................................................................ 67 4.4 Data and coding procedures ......................................................................... 69 vii 4.4.1 Overview of coding methods for unmarked tense variable ................ 69 4.4.2 Variationist factors ..................................................................................... 70 4.4.3 Lexical/inherent aspect .............................................................................. 72 4.4.4 Discourse structure .................................................................................... 73 4.4.5 Other exclusions ......................................................................................... 78 4.4.6 Statistical methods ..................................................................................... 78 5. Results ................................................................................................................... 81 5.1 Introduction ..................................................................................................... 81 5.2 Overall distribution of tokens ....................................................................... 82 5.3 Results by linguistic factor group ................................................................. 83 5.3.1 Interpretation of logistic regression statistics ........................................ 84 5.3.2 Phonological environment ........................................................................ 87 5.3.3 Lexical Aspect ............................................................................................. 89 5.3.4 Verb class ..................................................................................................... 92 5.3.5 Frequency .................................................................................................... 98 5.4 Results by discourse factor group............................................................... 103 5.5 Results by social factor group ..................................................................... 107 5.6 Summary of results ....................................................................................... 110 viii 6. HE in the community context.......................................................................... 112 6.1 HE and AAE in contact ................................................................................ 113 6.1.1 AAE contact features ............................................................................... 113 6.1.2 CCR in HE and AAE................................................................................ 116 7. Conclusions and Applications ........................................................................ 127 7.1 Review of general findings .......................................................................... 127 7.2 Institutional practice: Identifying English Language Learners .............. 128 7.3 Future directions ........................................................................................... 133 References ....................................................................................................................
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