LINGUIST List 8.591

Fri Apr 25 1997

Qs: Internet courses, Socioling, Whistling

Editor for this issue: T. Daniel Seely <seelylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. jlevinso, Internet Courses
2. Andrej A. Kibrik, Sociolinguistic questionnaire
3. Peter R. Burton, French Whistling Communication

 
Does anyone know of any linguistic courses or studies on the WEB or via
other Internet resources? I'm interested in hearing about such courses as,
e.g., Intro to Language, Intro to Linguistics, Linguistic Approaches to
Grammar, Linguistics for Second-Language Teachers, History of English, and
so on. Many thanks.
 

Joan Levinson, SUNY-ESC
jlevinsosescva.esc.edu

Dear Colleagues,

I am currently doing linguistic fieldwork on one of Athabaskan languages of
Interior Alaska. I have an idea of making a sociolinguistic survey here, in
addition to linguistic research as such. The language is in decline and has
not been acquired by children for a few decades. The uniqueness of the
situation is that the language is spoken by less than one hundred persons
(the number of speakers was probably never much higher than now), and the
vast majority of speakers reside in one village. Therefore, one can fairly
easily conduct not just a representative sociolinguistic survey, but have a
nearly complete coverage of potential speakers.

The sorts of questions I have in mind include those on bilingualism, degrees
of fluency, situations of language use, attitudes toward language
maintenance, and reasons for language obsolescence.

I am not sufficiently versed in this kind of research, and I am sure that
the way you pose questions may dramatically affect your results. I would be
very grateful if someone could give me some advice on the set of most
crucial question and their formulations, or perhaps send me samples of
similar questionnaires.

Please contact me directly at

ffaakaurora.alaska.edu

Thanks a lot in advance,

Andrej A. Kibrik

I am attempting to gather some material in English or French about the
French whistling communication used by some farmers, but now falling
out of use.

What books or journal articles are recommended? Are there recordings
available? For those who are familiar with this type of
communication, what language status do you assign to it?

I would be grateful for any suggestions or comments.

Peter Burton
burto009maroon.tc.umn.edu