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Language Diversity and Linguistic Identity: Spanish in the United States


Course Description

Issues of language diversity and linguistic identity, with a special focus on the emergence of Spanish in the United States. This course explores the history and structure of varieties of Spanish spoken in the United States, adopting current techniques in sociolinguistics and dialectology. Taught in Spanish.


Athena Title

Spanish in the United States


Equivalent Courses

Not open to students with credit in ROML 2150


Prerequisite

SPAN 2002 or SPAN 2002E or SPAN 2120H or permission of department


Grading System

A - F (Traditional)


Course Objectives

The primary objective of the course is to expose students to issues related to language diversity and its role in the daily lives of Spanish speakers in the United States. This class will offer students the opportunity to learn about both the social and linguistic dimensions of Spanish in the United States, covering topics such as language and migration, bilingualism, language attrition, heritage speakers, language mixing, and “Spanglish." The course will provide students with the opportunity to apply current approaches and techniques to the study of language variation, including interviews with native speakers and language surveys. Moreover, students will observe speakers' attitudes about language use, focusing on populations of Spanish speakers in the United States and the perceived status of Spanish in American society. The final topic of the course will involve a discussion of the varieties of Spanish spoken in the Southeastern United States, with a focus on Spanish speakers in the state of Georgia. The centerpiece of the course will be a linguistic "fieldwork" project in which students conduct interviews with Spanish speakers in the local community and then use these interviews as data for an analysis of patterns of language use.


Topical Outline

The following is a sample topical outline of the course: 1. The linguistic "facts of life": What is language and how do we use it? 2. Language use and language variation in the United States 3. Hispanics/Latinos and Spanish in the United States: A social and demographic profile 4. Bilingualism and language contact 5. Code switching and code mixing 6. Spanish speakers by country of origin: Mexican, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Dominican, Salvadoran, Nicaraguan, Guatemalan, Honduran 7. Spanish in New Mexico and Louisiana 8. Spanish in the Southeast: New voices in the Old South 9. Language subordination and linguistic profiling 10. Language diversity in the modern classroom


General Education Core

CORE IV: Humanities and the Arts