LINGUIST List 26.3466

Mon Aug 03 2015

Books: Letter Writing and Language Change: Auer, Schreier, Watts (eds.)

Editor for this issue: Sara Couture <saralinguistlist.org>

Date: 03-Aug-2015
From: Katie Laker <klakercambridge.org>
Subject: Letter Writing and Language Change: Auer, Schreier, Watts (eds.)
E-mail this message to a friend

Title: Letter Writing and Language Change
Published: 2015
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
                http://cambridge.org

Book URL: http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/languages-linguistics/history-english-language/letter-writing-and-language-change?format=HB

Editor: Anita Auer
Editor: Daniel Schreier
Editor: Richard J. Watts
Hardback: ISBN: 9781107018648 Pages: Price: U.S. $ 99.00
Hardback: ISBN: 9781107018648 Pages: Price: U.K. £ 65.00
Abstract:

Letter Writing and Language Change outlines the historical sociolinguistic value of letter analysis, both in theory and practice. The chapters in this volume make use of insights from all three 'Waves of Variation Studies', and many of them, either implicitly or explicitly, look at specific aspects of the language of the letter writers in an effort to discover how those writers position themselves and how they attempt, consciously or unconsciously, to construct social identities. The letters are largely from people in the lower strata of social structure, either to addressees of the same social status or of a higher status. In this sense the question of the use of 'standard' and/or 'nonstandard' varieties of English is in the forefront of the contributors' interest. Ultimately, the studies challenge the assumption that there is only one 'legitimate' and homogenous form of English or of any other language.

1. Setting the scene, letters, standards and historical sociolinguistics - Richard J. Watts; 2. Assessing variability and change in early English letters - Juan Manuel Hernández-Campoy and Juan Camilo Conde-Silvestre; 3. Private letters as a source for an alternative history of Middle New High German - Stephan Elspaß; 4. Language in print and handwriting - Tony Fairman; 5. Heterogeneity vs homogeneity - Marianne Hundt; 6. Emerging standards in the colonies, variation and the Canadian letter writer - Stefan Dollinger; 7. Linguistic fingerprints of authors and scribes - Alexander Bergs; 8. Stylistic variation - Anita Auer; 9. English aristocratic letters - Susan Fitzmaurice; 10. Early nineteenth-century pauper letters - Mikko Laitinen; 11. A non-standard standard? Exploring the evidence from nineteenth-century vernacular letters and diaries - Barbara Allen; 12. Archaism and dialect in Irish emigrant letters - Lukas Pietsch; 13. Assessing heterogeneity - Lucia Siebers; 14. Hypercorrection and the persistence of local dialect features in writing - Daniel Schreier; 15. Epilogue: where next? - Anita Auer, Daniel Schreier and Richard J. Watts; References; Index.

Linguistic Field(s): Historical Linguistics
                            Sociolinguistics

Subject Language(s): English (eng)
                            German, Middle High (gmh)

Written In: English (eng)

See this book announcement on our website:
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/books/get-book.cfm?BookID=88433


---------------------------------- Publishing Partner ----------------------------------
Cambridge University Press http://us.cambridge.org

----------------------------- Major Supporting Publishers -----------------------------
Akademie Verlag GmbH http://www.oldenbourg-verlag.de/akademie-verlag
Bloomsbury Linguistics (formerly Continuum Linguistics) http://www.bloomsbury.com
Brill http://www.brill.nl
Cambridge Scholars Publishing http://www.c-s-p.org
Cascadilla Press http://www.cascadilla.com/
Classiques Garnier http://www.classiques-garnier.com/
De Gruyter Mouton http://www.degruyter.com/
Edinburgh University Press http://www.euppublishing.com
Elsevier Ltd http://www.elsevier.com/
Equinox Publishing Ltd http://www.equinoxpub.com/
European Language Resources Association (ELRA) http://www.elra.info/
Georgetown University Press http://www.press.georgetown.edu/
John Benjamins http://www.benjamins.com/
Lincom GmbH http://www.lincom-shop.eu/
MIT Press http://mitpress.mit.edu/
Multilingual Matters http://www.multilingual-matters.com/
Narr Francke Attempto Verlag GmbH + Co. KG http://www.narr.de/
Oxford University Press http://www.oup.com/us
Palgrave Macmillan http://www.palgrave.com/
Peter Lang AG http://www.peterlang.com/
Rodopi http://www.rodopi.nl/
Routledge (Taylor and Francis) http://www.routledge.com/
Springer http://www.springer.com/
University of Toronto Press http://www.utpjournals.com/
Wiley-Blackwell http://www.wiley.com/

--------------------------- Other Supporting Publishers ---------------------------
Association of Editors of the Journal of Portuguese Linguistics http://www.fl.ul.pt/revistas/JPL/JPLweb.htm
International Pragmatics Assoc. http://ipra.ua.ac.be/
Linguistic Association of Finland http://www.ling.helsinki.fi/sky/
Morgan & Claypool Publishers http://www.morganclaypool.com/
Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics / Landelijke (LOT) http://www.lotpublications.nl/
Seoul National University http://j-cs.org/index/index.php
SIL International Publications http://www.sil.org/resources/publications
Universitat Jaume I http://www.uji.es/CA/publ/
University of Nebraska Press http://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/
Utrecht institute of Linguistics http://www-uilots.let.uu.nl/

Page Updated: 03-Aug-2015