‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody
Abstract In many Native American and Canadian First Nations communities, indigenous languages are important for the linguistic construction of ethnic identity. But because many younger speakers have limited access to their heritage languages, English may have an even more important role in identity...
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Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0047404516000592 https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0047404516000592 |
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crcambridgeupr:10.1017/s0047404516000592 2024-09-30T14:35:06+00:00 ‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody Newmark, Kalina Walker, Nacole Stanford, James 2016 http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0047404516000592 https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0047404516000592 en eng Cambridge University Press (CUP) https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms Language in Society volume 45, issue 5, page 633-664 ISSN 0047-4045 1469-8013 journal-article 2016 crcambridgeupr https://doi.org/10.1017/s0047404516000592 2024-09-04T04:03:18Z Abstract In many Native American and Canadian First Nations communities, indigenous languages are important for the linguistic construction of ethnic identity. But because many younger speakers have limited access to their heritage languages, English may have an even more important role in identity construction than Native languages do. Prior literature shows distinctive local English features in particular tribes. Our study builds on this knowledge but takes a wider perspective: We hypothesize that certain features are shared across much larger distances, particularly prosody. Native cultural insiders (the first two co-authors) had a central role in this project. Our recordings of seventy-five speakers in three deliberately diverse locations (Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, North/South Dakota; Northwest Territories, Canada; and diverse tribes represented at Dartmouth College) show that speakers are heteroglossically performing prosodic features to index Native ethnic identity. They have taken a ‘foreign’ language (English) and enregistered these prosodic features, creatively producing and reproducing a shared ethnic identity across great distances. (Native Americans, prosody, ethnicity, ethnic identity, English, dialects)* Article in Journal/Newspaper First Nations Northwest Territories Cambridge University Press Canada Northwest Territories Language in Society 45 5 633 664 |
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Cambridge University Press |
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English |
description |
Abstract In many Native American and Canadian First Nations communities, indigenous languages are important for the linguistic construction of ethnic identity. But because many younger speakers have limited access to their heritage languages, English may have an even more important role in identity construction than Native languages do. Prior literature shows distinctive local English features in particular tribes. Our study builds on this knowledge but takes a wider perspective: We hypothesize that certain features are shared across much larger distances, particularly prosody. Native cultural insiders (the first two co-authors) had a central role in this project. Our recordings of seventy-five speakers in three deliberately diverse locations (Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, North/South Dakota; Northwest Territories, Canada; and diverse tribes represented at Dartmouth College) show that speakers are heteroglossically performing prosodic features to index Native ethnic identity. They have taken a ‘foreign’ language (English) and enregistered these prosodic features, creatively producing and reproducing a shared ethnic identity across great distances. (Native Americans, prosody, ethnicity, ethnic identity, English, dialects)* |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Newmark, Kalina Walker, Nacole Stanford, James |
spellingShingle |
Newmark, Kalina Walker, Nacole Stanford, James ‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody |
author_facet |
Newmark, Kalina Walker, Nacole Stanford, James |
author_sort |
Newmark, Kalina |
title |
‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody |
title_short |
‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody |
title_full |
‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody |
title_fullStr |
‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody |
title_full_unstemmed |
‘The rez accent knows no borders’: Native American ethnic identity expressed through English prosody |
title_sort |
‘the rez accent knows no borders’: native american ethnic identity expressed through english prosody |
publisher |
Cambridge University Press (CUP) |
publishDate |
2016 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0047404516000592 https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0047404516000592 |
geographic |
Canada Northwest Territories |
geographic_facet |
Canada Northwest Territories |
genre |
First Nations Northwest Territories |
genre_facet |
First Nations Northwest Territories |
op_source |
Language in Society volume 45, issue 5, page 633-664 ISSN 0047-4045 1469-8013 |
op_rights |
https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1017/s0047404516000592 |
container_title |
Language in Society |
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45 |
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5 |
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633 |
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664 |
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1811638478577860608 |