Research Areas


Jeutonne P. Brewer

(Comments with Selected Publications)


Email: Jeutonne Brewer (jpbrewer@hamlet.uncg.edu)




Sociolinguistics

Sociolinguistics is the study of language use, drawing upon and contributing to both the theoretical and applied areas through the study of language variation. The analysis of variation in "real-world" language use tests the adequacy of language theories and contributes insights and data-based information important to the development of language theories.All languages change, and as William Labov has noted, language variation is the mechanism through which language change takes place. Examples of language studied include conversations, texts, interviews, or collections of examples. The purpose of studying the examples is to explain the linguistic characteristics of the language used.


Research Areas

 
WPA ex-slave narratives Recorded interviews with ex-slaves
Computer literacy and names of computer products Electronic discourse
Approaches to teaching language variation The discourse of elderly adults
Anthony Burgess Lumbee English
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WPA Ex-Slave Narratives

The ex-slave narratives were autobiographical statements provided by elderly adults who related their experiences during the time of slavery to interviewers who worked for the Federal Writers' Project of the Works Projects Administration (WPA). These narratives were collected in the late 1930s.

The Federal Writers' Project conducted many related projects, for example, the state guides which included essays about culture and history, ex-slave narratives, and life stories of

immigrants, granite workers in Vermont, and textile workers in North Carolina.

  1. The Federal Writers' Project: A Bibliography. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1994.
  2. "Telling Her Story: John Henry Faulk and Laura Smalley."In Dimensions of Language, edited by Boyd H. Davis, 286-290. New York, NY: Macmillan, 1993.
  3. "Durative Marker or Hypercorrection? The Case of -s in the WPA Ex-Slave Narratives." In Language Variety in the South: Perspectives in Black and White, edited by Michael Montgomery and Guy H. Bailey Jr., 121-138. University, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1986.

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Recorded Interviews with Ex-Slaves

In these interviews you can hear the voices of the ex-slaves as they told the interviewers about their experiences during slavery. These interviews, collected in the late 1930s and early 1940s, were recorded on acetate discs. The Archive of Folk Song in the Library of Congress sponsored this project. In my interviews with him, John Henry Faulk told me about his experiences when as a young man when he interviewed elderly ex-slaves.

  1. "Songs, Sermons, and Life-Stories: The Legacy of the Ex-Slave Narratives." In The Emergence of Black English: Text and Commentary, edited by Guy Bailey, Natalie Maynor, and Patricia Cukor-Avila, 155-171. Creole Language Library, No. 8. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 1991.
  2. "Challenges and Problems of Recorded Interviews." In Language Variety in the South, edited by Cynthia Bernstein, Thomas Nunnally, and Robin Sabino, 59-75. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1997.

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Lumbee English in Robeson County, North Carolina

  1. Brewer, Jeutonne P., and R. W. Reising. "Tokens in the Pocosin: Lumbee English in North Carolina." American Speech 47 (1982): 108-120.

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Computer Literacy and Naming Processes of Microcomputer Products

During the 1980s, the rapidly developing microcomputer industry provided an unusual opportunity to study the linguistic characteristics of product names created by "kitchen table" companies as well as large companies. The "telescoped" history of this field provided an unusual opportunity to study the changes and development of language use in a particular domain.

  1. "Computer Literacy for Faculty: The Key to Computers in a Liberal Education." In Sixth International Conference on Computers and the Humanities, edited by Sarah K. Burton and Douglas D. Short, 31-38. Rockville, MD: Computer Science Press, 1983.
  2. "The PROMISE! of What's Best: Personal Computer Names and the Search for Shared Reference." Journal of the North Central Names Society (1990): 12-23.

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The Discourse of Elderly Adults

 

  1. "Affirming the Past and Confirming Humanness: Repetition in the Discourse of the Elderly." In Repetition in Discourse: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, edited by Barbara Johnstone, 230-239. Advances in Discourse Processes Series, edited by Roy O. Freedle, 47. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corporation, 1994.

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Electronic Discourse

 

  1. Edwards, Barbara, Boyd H. Davis, and Jeutonne P. Brewer. "Soft Prompts in a Fluid Medium." Telecommunications in Education News 5 (1993): 17-20.
  2. Davis, Boyd H. and Jeutonne P. Brewer. "The Individual Identity in Electronic Discourse: A Portfolio of Voices." In The Rhetoric of Cyberspace, edited by Beth Baldwin and Timothy Flood. In press.
  3. Electronic Discourse: Linguistic Individuals in Virtual Space In press. To be published in 1997 by the State University of New York Press for the Series in Computer-Mediated Communication in Education, Work, and Society. (Co-author with Boyd H. Davis University of North Carolina at Charlotte)
In 1989, we created a computer conference on the Sit-Ins of the 1960s for our classes in linguistics and language, which were situated on two different university campuses. During the next six semesters, we replicated the conferences and expanded the linkages between the two real-world settings. This book looks at what student writers do, and how they do it, when they participate in electronic conferences. It seeks to ground discussions of how to assess electronic discourse and the effect of technology on communication with a description and analysis of what we can reasonably expect people to do in and with the medium. We find that individual writers use their own idiolects to influence the form and nature of electronic discourse, adapting their own tacit knowledge of conversational strategies and written discourse to the new medium, to create a real, if temporary, community.

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Approaches to Teaching Language Variation

We can offer our students the chance to participate with us in learning about language and how it is used, as we teach them analytical techniques and writing processes. Projects provide a way for our students to write shorter papers while trying to learn analytical procedures. Our students benefit from the experience of working with "real" problems, "real" data, and if we are fortunate, from sharing our enthusiasm for the project. We benefit by stating a problem in a clear, organized form for our students, and sometimes by gaining new perspectives about language and language research.

  1. "Dusty Books and Dense Contracts: Exercises that Involve Students in Language Research Projects." In Language Variation in North America: Research and Teaching, edited by A. Wayne Glowka and Donald M. Lance, 346-352. New York, NY: Modern Language Association, 1993.

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Anthony Burgess

Anthony Burgess was a lecturer in linguistics before he became a famous English novelist and a writer of reviews, essays, and books about language. To understand the nature of the "language play" in Burgess' novels, the critic must understand language and Burgess' views of language. Burgess began and ended his writing career with books about language--Language Made Plain(1964) and A Mouthful of Air (1993). He published fifty novels and more than 20 non-fiction works, as well as translations and scripts for stage, screen, and television. Burgess created languages for his novels A Clockwork Orangeand Nothing Like the Sun and for his film and television scripts, A.D., Jesus of Nazareth. and Quest for Fire.

  1. Anthony Burgess: A Bibliography. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1980.

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Send email to Jeutonne Brewer (jpbrewer@hamlet.uncg.edu)