here - Linguistic Society of America

Saturday, 5 JanuaryPanelevidence-based model for increasing racial and ethnic diversity among linguistics researchers. All presentations highlight thejournal’s natural overlap with interests of both the LSA and the MLA. Presenters also represent different types of universitieswith diverse regional, ethnic, cultural, religious, and linguistic perspectives. Anne Charity Hudley and Kazuko Hiramatsu,associate editors of Language with responsibilities for the Language: Teaching Linguistics articles will serve as the paneldiscussants, thereby allowing panelists and the audience to participate in the creation of questions and themes for future issues.After the presentations, a discussion session will allow audience members to discuss ideas with individual panelists in addition totwo other research groups who will present posters on their work infusing linguistics into postsecondary general education andhigh school curricula.AbstractsWilliam G. Eggington (Brigham Young University)Toward the Development of an Epistemology of Linguistics for Pedagogical PurposesThis presentation begins by assuming that linguistic ways of knowing, analyzing and sharing lead to similar, but unique, positiveoutcomes. Students trained in linguistic epistemologies, or ways of knowing and thinking develop valuable abilities that greatlyenhance essential life-skills and opportunities for career, personal and interpersonal success. I will review the research related tothe development of science and mathematics epistemologies for pedagogical purposes in an effort to develop a model that couldbe applied to linguistic epistemologies. This will be followed by a critique of the previous, decidedly sparse, work conducted indeveloping an epistemology of linguistics for pedagogical purposes. I will compare and contrast this work with the proposedmodel and conclude by suggesting a developmental agenda for linguistic pedagogical practice based upon not only what we wantour students to know about language, but also how we would like them to think about how language functions.David Bowie (University of Alaska Anchorage)The effect of linguistics instruction on undergraduates’ linguistic attitudesThis study investigates the linguistic attitudes of students in three different types of undergraduate linguistics courses: anintroductory survey of the discipline, an introductory course in syntax and usage directed toward aspiring secondary Englishteachers, and an upper-division course in the history of the English language. Students were surveyed on their attitudes aboutlanguage at the beginning and end of each course. By the end of all of the courses, students’ attitudes overall had shiftedsignificantly on only a few measures, but the shifts that occurred involved moves in the direction toward those generally assumedby linguists. Linguists generally make a number of assumptions about language and its use that are not widely held by nonlinguists.The results for each course, however, suggest that the best way to transmit attitudes toward language as held by linguistsis to model them, rather than either ignoring them or explicitly discussing them.Gaillynn Clements (Cambridge University/University of North Carolina)Teaching linguistics in a general education literature courseHow do we introduce linguistics to students who are business, science, and English majors? As linguists, we know how usefullanguage study is to a variety to majors and interactions in life. But this knowledge seems to be a closely guarded secret. We caneffectively reach many students by integrating linguistics into the general educational or core requirements. At High PointUniversity and University of North Carolina-School of the Arts, I have incorporated language study into composition (to a lesserextent) and literature classes allowing the students to systematically study how others speak and write as well as how they speakand write. Perform close readings using linguistic devices opens up texts and engages the students in critical readings and newdiscoveries of a text’s characters and authors, and, at times, themselves or the world. The integration of literature and linguisticsinto a single course brings linguistics to a large audience and shows psychology, sociology, anthropology, English, education, andeven business majors that there is academic, social, and economic value in studying linguistics.Anne H. Charity Hudley (College of William & Mary)Attracting underrepresented students to research in linguisticsI present methods and programs that have been successful in attracting underrepresented students to research in linguistics usingevidence based methods of broadening participation in linguistics as established by the National Science Foundation and otherorganizations that sponsor programs to support research by those from underrepresented groups. Initiatives include establishingmentoring early on for both undergraduate and graduate students who are interested in linguistics, particularly in programs wheresuch student may be experiencing solo status within their class, cohort, or program.104