Fwd: Re: dialect judgment and language development assessment

[Carol Anne Miller]

Just an additional vote for "Do you speak American?" and a note that there 
is a website associated with the program that is chock-full of useful 
teaching materials.  You can find it by going to
http://www.pbs.org/ then clicking on "Programs A-Z".

Carol Miller


>Date: Fri, 16 Sep 2005 12:40:48 -0500
>Subject: Re: dialect judgment and language development assessment
>Cc: info-childes at mail.talkbank.org
>To: Pam Norton <pcnorton at yahoo.com>
>From: Amy Sheldon <asheldon at umn.edu>
>
>Dennis Preson's work is what you want.
>He describes folklinguistic assessments of dialects.
>For example, he has studies of  rather consistent lay responses to the 
>questions:"where is the most and least correct (or pleasant) English 
>spoken in the US?".
>
>In addition, I've found a better, more up-to-date video than American 
>Tongues. I am troubled with the perspective from which African-American 
>English is treated, in AT.  Jim MacNeil has updated AT with a DVD (or VHS) 
>called "Do you speak American?". I've only seen parts of it -- it's 180 
>min. long. There's a section with Preston doing mini-interviews to show 
>his work on dialect attitudes. Other linguists are featured too. 
>Visually,  the DVD is beautiful. The underlying attitude of the producers 
>is better. And the scope of dialect variation featured and discussed is 
>updated. It's a good training tool.
>
>Amy Sheldon
>University of Minnesota
>
>On Friday, September 16, 2005, at 11:45  AM, Pam Norton wrote:
>
>>
>>Hi all,
>>     Can anyone direct me to literature that discusses
>>laymen's or professionals' reactions to dialects other
>>than their own?  I am doing background writing for my
>>doctoral thesis on speech/language therapists'
>>understanding of dialects and their reactions to
>>dialects other than their own while conducting
>>language assessments.  It would be helpful to read the
>>literature on first impressions, what "other
>>dialectness" means to people, and how people judge
>>others according to whether they speak their own
>>dialect or not.  I am a big fan of the documentary
>>American Tongues but I would like to read some
>>literature on the subject.  Of course, if there's
>>anything about the impact of dialect on assessment
>>outcome, that would be icing on the cake.  I'm happy
>>to compile any references and send them back to the
>>group.
>>
>>Thanks in advance,
>>
>>Pam Norton,
>>Doctoral Candidate
>>UC Berkeley/San Francisco State
>>Joint Doctoral Program in Special Education
>
>



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Carol A. Miller
Assistant Professor of Communication Sciences and Disorders
Penn State University
Office:  115B Moore Building
Phone:  (814) 865-6213
Fax:    (814) 863-3759
Email:  cam47 at psu.edu
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