query: course in African Diaspora Englishes

P L Patrick patrickp at essex.ac.uk
Fri Mar 16 18:53:26 UTC 2001


this is a practical query-- sorry for cross-postings...
I am planning to teach a course next year which is currently drafted
under the title "Pidgins, Creoles and African Diaspora Englishes". Some
folks in our dept have suggested to me the title is less than optimal
for appealing to British undergrads. I would be happy if anyone has
taught a similar course and could make helpful suggestions.
	The structure of the course is that we will spend 4 weeks on
language contact frameworks initially, followed by 6-8 weeks on two
varieties of ADEs (US AAVE, with a little Canadian thrown in; then the
London Jamaican /British Black English phenomenon-- another name
problem in itself!); then 8-10 weeks on Pidgins and Creoles more
generally with however a focus on the Atlantic area (but not just
English ones). I plan to use books by Rickford, Mufwene et al,
Thomason/Kaufman and Sebba in the first half, and the usual motley
selection in the P/Cs part. (Is Don Winford's book out yet?)
	Obviously 'African American Englishes' doesn't get the first
half as there's nothing american enough about the LJ/BBE part. And for
reasons probably clear to these lists (if not all my dept) "Black
Englishes" is not good either. Has anyone combined coverage like this
before?
	"What's wrong with the Diaspora title?" you may ask. Nothing,
by me. I suppose it just isn't transparent or sounds scary or
something. It's my hope to especially attract students of Caribbean
and/or African background.
	thanks for any help,
		--peter p.

Prof. Peter L. Patrick
Dept. of Language & Linguistics
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park
COLCHESTER CO4 3SQ
U.K.

Tel: (from within UK) 01206.87.2088
    (from outside UK) +44.1206.87.2088
Fax: (as above)           1206.87.2198
Email: patrickp at essex.ac.uk
Web: http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~patrickp



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