Course Description
Discussion and analysis of the phonological, morphological, lexical, discourse, and syntactic structures of African American English and their interaction as the grammatical system of language use in the African American community.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Research project proposal and paper; weekly commentary papers;
class presentations; additional readings
Athena Title
STRUCTURE OF AAE
Prerequisite
LING 2100
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
Students will learn to describe the grammar of AAE based on current research and their own data from the corpus the class will build on African American English. Students will be able to articulate their knowledge about the lexical, phonological/ phonetic, syntactic, morphological, discursive, and syntactic system of African American English and learn how to apply that knowledge for social, educational, legal, linguistic, and other relevant applications that benefit speakers of African American English and those who interact with those speakers.
Topical Outline
I. Overview of Language Use in the African American Community A. Theories of History and Origin B. Sociocultural and Historical Contexts of African American English C. Divergence Controversy II. Phonological Structure of African American English III. Morphological Structure of African American English IV. Lexicon of African American English V. Semantics and Discourse of African American English VI. African American English in Literature VII. African American English in Hip Hop VIII. Language Variation in African American English A. Class, Status, SES B. Age or Generation C. Sex or Gender D. Region E. Education F. Social network IX. Building an African American English Corpus X. Applying our Knowledge about the Structure of African American English A. Education/In the Classroom B. Linguistic Profiling C. U.S. Language Policy D. Diversity and Business, Employment E. Language Attitudes and Variation