This paper examines the variable weakening and deletion of /s/ in the Languedocian variety of Modern Occitan, with particular attention to how it has affected the system of plural marking in noun phrases. Using data from linguistic atlases, I demonstrate that /s/-lenition in this variety involves a stage of vocalization to [j]. I find that, where /s/ on the definite article has vocalized to [j], the immediately-preceding vowel of the definite article has undergone concomitant raising to [e]. This raising appears to preserve the difference between singular and plural despite the plural’s weakening /s/. I argue that these results support Labov’s (1994) hypothesis that the meaning of a weakening element may be transferred to a stable, co-occurrent one.

Perceptual dialectology investigates nonlinguists’ beliefs about their own and other varieties. This paper fills a gap in longitudinal research in this area with a restudy of the perceptions of Miami Cubans carried out twelve years after the first study. Perceptions are examined in relation to social and demographic changes with a sample of 84 participants of Cuban origin who responded to a questionnaire about the correctness of regional varieties of Spanish. The results showed that perceptions of non-Cuban varieties remained relatively stable over time, continuing to correlate with race and poverty. Perceptions toward the Cuban Spanish of the Miami community were also stable and, as in the earlier study, were highly positive, reflecting strong beliefs in its correctness-status. In contrast, perceptions of Cuban Spanish on the island were significantly more negative; it was ranked the least correct of the regional varieties evaluated. Factors underlying perceptions are examined in relation to demographic changes, political ideology, and beliefs about race and poverty. This paper highlights the contribution of the longitudinal study of dialect perceptions to the understanding of language attitudes, intergroup relations, and language change.

This paper demonstrates how the tools of dialect geography may fruitfully lend a new perspective to historical data in order to address the lingering questions left by previous analyses. A geographic examination of Survey of English Dialects data provides evidence in favor of a push-chain analysis of the Great Vowel Shift, in which the Middle English high-mid long vowels raised before the high long vowels were diphthongized. It is also demonstrated that the so-called “irregular” dialect outcomes, which have previously been cited as evidence for a lack of unity of the Great Vowel Shift, are no longer problematic when viewed in the light of a theory of dialect contact, and can in fact refine our understanding of the chronology and geographic extent of the shift itself.