Authority in Language

James Milroy is Emeritus Professor of Linguistics, University of Sheffield, and Fellow of the Faculty of Linguistics and Philology, University of Oxford. He is author of Language Variation and Change.  Lesley Milroy is currently Professor Emerita, University of Michigan and a Fellow of the Faculty of Linguistics and Philology, University of Oxford. She is co-author of Sociolinguistics: Method and Interpretation.

‘The Milroys’ Authority in Language is the most significant textual milestone in researching the ideological construction of Standard English. An absolute must for both historical linguists and sociolinguists.’ Richard J. Watts, Emeritus Professor, University of Bern, Switzerland‘No book on the market does a better job of explaining the issues surrounding standardization and linguistic authority in a way which is both scholarly and accessible to students.’Deborah Cameron, University of Oxford, UK

• 1. Prescription and Standardisation. 2.Standard English and the Complaint Tradition. 3. Spoken and Written Norms. 4.Grammar and Speech. 5. Linguistic Prescription and the Speech Community. 6. Linguistic Repertoires and Communicative Competence. 7. "Planned" and "Unplanned" Speech Events. 8. Some Practical Implications of Prescriptivism: Educational Issues and Language Assessment Procedures. 9.Two Nations Divided by the Same Language? The Standard Language Ideology in Britain and the United States.