Summary Details
| Query: |
linguistic autobiographies
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| Author: | Michael Erard | |
| Submitter Email: | click here to access email | |
| Linguistic LingField(s): |
Sociolinguistics
History of Linguistics |
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| Summary: |
I'd like to thank the following people who responded to my inquiry about their use of linguistic autobiographies (Linguist 13.2866) in the classroom: Bethany K. Dumas Mai Kuha Lee Campbell Jean-Marc Dewaele Harold F. Schiffman Dom Watt Leanne Hinton Rebecca Wheeler Bill Kretzschmar Ellen Johnso Aneta Pavlenko Maria Carreira While the linguistic autobiography enjoys a good reputation as a research tool, it is also widely used in the classroom to open discussions about the formal properties of language, the relationship between language and society, language and identity, and language in US history, as well as a diagnostic tool with which teachers can rapidly assess rapidly their students' needs and backgrounds. One interesting question arose: Where does the pedagogical use of the linguistic autobiography come from? At least one of my respondents claimed s/he had invented it de novo; another person suspected it had been invented multiply. While nothing precludes the polygenesis of this assignment, I was surprised to learn of the linguistic autobiography's pedigree. For clearing that up, I would like to thank Virginia McDavid, who wrote that "to the best of my knowledge, my husband invented and developed [the linguistic autobiography]." She said that she began using it herself as early as the late 1950's. "My husband used to say in connection with the assignment that it had connections with what Leonard Bloofield said about people's self-knowledge about language: People don't know what they say or what they think they ought to say." |
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| LL Issue: | 14.78 | |
| Date Posted: | 10-Jan-2003 | |
| Original Query: | Read original query | |
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