January 30, 2008
Professor Dennis Preston (Michigan State University)
Talk Title: Mexican American English Vowels in the Upper North
Abstract:
A great deal of SLA work and even work on lingering (substrate) influences of immigrant, heritage languages among third generation speakers (who often have little or no facility in that language) is amazingly dialect or variety blind, and we speak of the acquisition of, say, "English" as if such a unified thing existed outside ideological and/or political definitions. This study will focus on the development of the Mexican American vowel system in Michigan in two areas - Lansing, MI, an area where the Northern Cities Chain Shift is well advanced, and Benton Harbor, MI, an area where the shift is less well advanced in the European American population and not well advanced at all among African Americans, who make up more than 90% of the community. The paper will attempt to account for the influence of local norms, 1st language background, and linguistic universals as they play a role in the development of a new system.
(Presentation coming soon)