Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six: Validation of Language Skills in the Jamaican Context

The Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS) is one of a few validated outcome measures related to children’s communicative participation. Additional validation of the FOCUS measure could address the paucity of validated outcomes-based measures available for assessing preschool-age children, particularly for those who are multilingual. The data collected for this study, with a representative sample of Jamaican Creole-English speaking children, extend the applicability of the FOCUS to a broader range of preschoolers and expand psychometric evidence for the FOCUS to a multilingual and understudied context.

Root infinitives in Jamaican Creole

This paper addresses the question of the existence and manifestation of Root Infinitives (RI) in the acquisition of a creole language, Jamaican Creole (JC). It examines JC children’s omission of progressive and prospective aspectual markers in the clausal map in order to determine if early JC includes a root infinitive stage. It shows that non-target-consistent bare verb structures in child JC have distributional properties which have been claimed to be hallmarks of RI: in particular, they occur in declaratives (and in yes-no questions), but not in wh-questions, and they typically co-occur with null subjects, whereas subjects are typically overt in clauses with fully specified aspectual markers. It shows that these properties are expected under a truncation approach (Rizzi, 1993/4; De Lisser et al., 2016), and briefly compares truncation and other approaches to RI. Additionally, the paper compares the properties of truncation and the “growing trees” approach introduced in Friedmann, Belletti and Rizzi (this volume), according to which learners’ productions start with minimal structures in a bottom up fashion, and then higher zones get added on top of the structure as development proceeds, following the hierarchical organization uncovered by cartographic work. Finally, the paper discusses the similarities and differences between the two ideas, and argues that they are compatible, and possibly reflect different stages in language development.

Language variation, socialization and attitudes: a sociolinguistic investigation of school-aged bidialectal English speakers

The original purpose of this investigation was to determine the relationships between dialect, cultural identity, and literacy for Jamaican-Canadian Creole speakers (JCS), but was expanded to focus more broadly on language socialization due to low recruitment. Fourteen participants (5 children, aged 5-6 and 9 adults) from JCS families within the Toronto area were recruited for this study. Language attitudes and use measures: questionnaire, interview, and Matched-Guise Test. Language and literacy measures: Diagnostic Evaluation of Language Variation and Assessment of Literacy and Language. Child results showed that language dominance was Standard English for both use and exposure, and to date, language and literacy results are only described due to small sample size. In relation to identity and Creole use, interpretation of qualitative measures revealed that language attitudes were not always reflected in language use. However, findings provide initial insights regarding the relationship between language, identity, and literacy that warrant deeper investigation. Keywords: sociolinguistics, dialect, Jamaican Creole, bidialectal, cultural identity, Jamaican-Canadian, language, literacy

Language variation, socialization and attitudes: a sociolinguistic investigation of school-aged bidialectal English speakers

The original purpose of this investigation was to determine the relationships between dialect, cultural identity, and literacy for Jamaican-Canadian Creole speakers (JCS), but was expanded to focus more broadly on language socialization due to low recruitment. Fourteen participants (5 children, aged 5-6 and 9 adults) from JCS families within the Toronto area were recruited for this study. Language attitudes and use measures: questionnaire, interview, and Matched-Guise Test. Language and literacy measures: Diagnostic Evaluation of Language Variation and Assessment of Literacy and Language. Child results showed that language dominance was Standard English for both use and exposure, and to date, language and literacy results are only described due to small sample size. In relation to identity and Creole use, interpretation of qualitative measures revealed that language attitudes were not always reflected in language use. However, findings provide initial insights regarding the relationship between language, identity, and literacy that warrant deeper investigation. Keywords: sociolinguistics, dialect, Jamaican Creole, bidialectal, cultural identity, Jamaican-Canadian, language, literacy

A Linguistic and Sociolinguistic Appraisal of the Novel White Teeth by Zadie Smith

The multicultural novels of Zadie Smith, though fiction, invite linguists’ attention because of the efforts she makes to achieve dialectal and social accuracy. While Smith’s On Beauty (2005) is celebrated for its use of American Black English Vernacular; White Teeth: A Novel (2001) is acclaimed for its use of Cockney, Jamaican Creole, and youth language in London. In this linguistic review of White Teeth, specific features of the characters’ dialects are compared with standard versions of English. The impact of these speech patterns on the larger narrative is discussed. This study focuses especially on verbal inflections in the variety of dialects appropriated in the novel. It reviews the relevant research in the field of linguistic inflections and partial derivations with a view to comparing and contrasting their significance. This paper also debates the efficacy of existing sociolinguistic tools vis-à-vis a linguistically challenging work like White Teeth. The study aims at facilitating a better understanding of the linguistic features in Zadie Smith’s White Teeth and their literary use.