Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 11:04:56 -0400
From: "William A. Kretzschmar, Jr." billk[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]ATLAS.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Textbooks for Sociolinguistics
I have used Wolfram's *Dialects and American English*, and it has worked
well. There are a few places in it that I heavily supplement or orient
in class somewhat differently from the way that Walt writes (as one might
expect), but in general it works well.
I taught both volumes of Fasold one quarter, but the students were about
ready to murder me at the end. There is just too much there. I learned
alot---and that was really my purpose, because I would not have read the
books as closely as I did unless I taught them.
The new Romaine introduction to the field (Oxford, 1994) was
disappointing to me for its coverage of historical stuff and American
English, but it was good at the things that Wolfram doesn't cover
(language planning, pidgins/creoles).
For graduate students I teach mostly from articles (often recent ones
from *Language Variation and Change*).
Regards, Bill
******************************************************************************
Bill Kretzschmar Phone: 706-542-2246
Dept. of English FAX: 706-542-2181
University of Georgia Internet: billk[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]hyde.park.uga.edu
Athens, GA 30602-6205 Bitnet: wakjengl[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]uga