THE SOCIAL DISTRIBUTION OF SELECTED VERB FORMS IN THE LINGUISTIC ATLAS OF THE NORTH CENTRAL STATES

Abstract

This chapter discusses the social distribution of selected verb forms in the Linguistic Atlas of the North Central States. The Linguistic Atlas of the North Central States was begun by Albert H. Marckwardt in 1938 as one of the regional atlases into which the originally planned Linguistic Atlas of the United States and Canada was to be divided. The Indiana materials are now being retranscribed from the original tapes with the resultant emergence of much new grammatical material. The chapter presents some changes in the conclusions which are therefore likely after the materials in their final form have been studied. Dialectology and specifically the findings of the linguistic atlases, have real and serious implications for education, especially the study of English usage, which has too long been a record of prejudice rather than of fact.