Understanding Language Choices is an introductory textbook for anyone studying the motivations behind language use choices. It provides an introduction into the numerous factors, both internal and external, influencing such choices in a speech community: language attitudes, language learning, identity, the mobility of the community, and much more. The book also provides a foundation for the study of linguistic variation within a speech community, as well as an introduction to methods of data collection when studying the outcomes of language use choices. An important aspect of this book is its emphasis on a participatory approach to language choice research that empowers the speech community. The final chapter discusses lifestyle concerns that researchers may encounter when conducting field studies in developing nations. Written with the beginner in mind, this textbook includes numerous examples and case studies from around the world to illustrate the realities of sociolinguistic field research. A companion website keeps users of the book up to date with descriptions of the most current research methodologies. Ken Decker received his M.A. in Linguistics from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1992. He brings to this book over 25 years' experience in field research in the sociology of language and language development. He has conducted sociolinguistic surveys in more than 35 languages in Asia and the Americas and served as consultant on surveys in Africa, Australia, Europe, and the Pacific. Ken is particularly interested in the role of language research in strategic language development. John Grummitt received his M.A. in Applied Linguistics from the University of Leicester in 2002, drawing on his decade's experience as an academic writing tutor and trainer of teachers in ESL programs in Japan and South Korea. His more recent survey work in Papua New Guinea has given him a perspective supplementary to Decker's on sociolinguistic fieldwork and language development.

Understanding Language Choices is an introductory textbook for anyone studying the motivations behind language use choices. It provides an introduction into the numerous factors, both internal and external, influencing such choices in a speech community: language attitudes, language learning, identity, the mobility of the community, and much more. The book also provides a foundation for the study of linguistic variation within a speech community, as well as an introduction to methods of data collection when studying the outcomes of language use choices. An important aspect of this book is its emphasis on a participatory approach to language choice research that empowers the speech community. The final chapter discusses lifestyle concerns that researchers may encounter when conducting field studies in developing nations. Written with the beginner in mind, this textbook includes numerous examples and case studies from around the world to illustrate the realities of sociolinguistic field research. A companion website keeps users of the book up to date with descriptions of the most current research methodologies. Ken Decker received his M.A. in Linguistics from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1992. He brings to this book over 25 years' experience in field research in the sociology of language and language development. He has conducted sociolinguistic surveys in more than 35 languages in Asia and the Americas and served as consultant on surveys in Africa, Australia, Europe, and the Pacific. Ken is particularly interested in the role of language research in strategic language development. John Grummitt received his M.A. in Applied Linguistics from the University of Leicester in 2002, drawing on his decade's experience as an academic writing tutor and trainer of teachers in ESL programs in Japan and South Korea. His more recent survey work in Papua New Guinea has given him a perspective supplementary to Decker's on sociolinguistic fieldwork and language development.

Whether we grow up with one, two, or several languages during our early years of life, many of us will learn a second, foreign, or heritage language in later years. The field of Second language acquisition (SLA, for short) investigates the human capacity to learn additional languages in late childhood, adolescence, or adulthood, after the first language --in the case of monolinguals-- or languages --in the case of bilinguals-- have already been acquired. Understanding Second Language Acquisition offers a wide-encompassing survey of this burgeoning field, its accumulated findings and proposed theories, its developed research paradigms, and its pending questions for the future. The book zooms in and out of universal, individual, and social forces, in each case evaluating the research findings that have been generated across diverse naturalistic and formal contexts for second language acquisition. It assumes no background in SLA and provides helpful chapter-by-chapter summaries and suggestions for further reading. Ideal as a textbook for students of applied linguistics, foreign language education, TESOL, and education, it is also recommended for students of linguistics, developmental psycholinguistics, psychology, and cognitive science. Supporting resources for tutors are available free at www.routledge.com/ortega.

Understanding Language includes major sections on the noun and verb systems of the classical languages.

Students often struggle to understand linguistic concepts through examples of language data provided in class or in texts. Presented with ambiguous information, students frequently respond that they do not 'get it'. The solution is to find an example of humour that relies on the targeted ambiguity. Once they laugh at the joke, they have tacitly understood the concept, and then it is only a matter of explaining why they found it funny. Utilizing cartoons and jokes illustrating linguistic concepts, this book makes it easy to understand these concepts, while keeping the reader's attention and interest. Organized like a course textbook in linguistics, it covers all the major topics in a typical linguistics survey course, including communication systems, phonetics and phonology, morphemes, words, phrases, sentences, language use, discourses, child language acquisition and language variation, while avoiding technical terminology.

With the increasing linguistic and cultural diversity of students in U. S. schools, all teachers, regardless of the content area or grade they teach, need research-based strategies for assisting all students to gain English proficiency. This practical, concise guide shows teachers what they need to know about language, how it is learned, how it is used, and how teaching about it can be incorporated into lessons throughout the curriculum. Understanding Language in Diverse Classrooms offers a model of how learning takes place and describes the critical role of teachers in that model. It includes comparison charts showing how some of the most common heritage languages represented among present-day students compare with English, and it provides examples of hands-on materials including checklists, rating scales, and sample lessons to help teachers prepare to teach all their students in diverse classrooms. Each chapter ends with questions to stimulate discussion and reflection on major chapter points, to enable readers to review and evaluate the information and then integrate it into their own practice.

This volume is about various aspects of the theory and application of language contact and language conflict phenomena seen from an interdisciplinary perspective. The focus is on the linguistic, social, psychological, and educational issues (conditions, constraints, and consequences) involved in the status and use of languages in multilingual settings. The book is divided into four sections dealing with the following areas: Theoretical issues: This section addresses key issues such as the nature of the concepts of language maintenance, language loyalty and language identity, language shift, language loss and language death. It includes the search for models of the often contradictory theoretical issues involved in language contact. Language policy and language planning: This section examines the various language policies carried out by official agencies and focuses on the two basic options available to a multilingual nation: assimilation or pluralism. Attitudes towards languages: The section is geared towards research into determinants of language attitudes, the methods for the measurements of attitudes, as well as the relationship between language policy and attitude change. Codeswitching and language choice: The linguistic, social, psychological, and anthropological implications of using two different codes will be examined from different perspectives. Relevant research topics include: the situational uses of code-switching, linguistic and social constraints on codeswitching, and code-switching vs. borrowing. A further research paradigm deals with the search for relativized constraints, resulting from the interaction of universal principles and aspects particular to each codeswitching situation.