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Examines colloquial uses of "like" as a discourse marker with the goal of specifying its discourse functions, including semantic, pragmatic, and sociopragmatic aspects of meaning. Data presented come from nine interviews. (Author/VWL)

Investigates the construction of the grammatical frame in code switching in terms of the roles played by the two languages in contact, referred to as the Matrix Language (ML) and the Embedded Language (EL). Data is presented from German-English code switching on gender assignment and article in noun phrases. (Author/VWL)

Examines the roles that morphemes of different types play in contact-induced change. The data examined are taken from interviews with seven speakers of Pennsylvania German. Argues that a turnover of the Matrix language is in process in PG. (Author/VWL)

Seeks to establish connections between two different language contact phenomena, interlanguage, and code switching. Data for the study come from an interlanguage corpus that has English as the target language, but also contains material from the speaker's two first languages, Spanish and German; and a German-English code switching corpus containing data from 20 relatively balanced bilinguals. (Author/VWL)

The use of the female title Ms. by students, faculty, and staff at a Midwestern university in the United States is examined using data generated with the written survey used by Donna Lillian in a similar study in Canada. The findings show that faculty are fairly consistent in their understanding of Ms. as a neutral title to be used for all women and are more likely to choose this title than students and staff.

This research examines the use of terms for social groups in Germany, specifically Personen mit Migrationshintergrund 'people with migration background', Türken 'Turks', and Biodeutscher 'ethnic German(s)' in online discussions about the integration of immigrants into German society. These terms construct essentialist social categories that focus on ethnic background as inherent in cultural behavior, which makes integration for members of these groups impossible. Further, in some cases naming stigmatized groups is no longer necessary, as the discourses about members of these groups are so strong that the mere mention of particular cultural practices is enough to indicate who the unwanted members of society are. However, competing discourses, which challenge the use of these terms and the discourses of alterity, are also part of the discussion of national belonging exemplified in these data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]