Salikoko Mufwene

UTSA hosts Feb. 6 talk on Black English origins

(Feb. 3, 2004)--The UTSA College of Liberal and Fine Arts (COLFA) Lecture Series presents Salikoko Mufwene, professor and chair of the University of Chicago Department of Linguistics, speaking on "Sociohistorical Linguistics: A Population Genetics Perspective" at 2 p.m., Friday, Feb. 6 in Business Building Room 1.01.14 on the 1604 Campus.

Mufwene will discuss the complex origins of African-American vernacular English, or Black English, and the controversial theories that describe its development.

He has written extensively on the development of creole languages, genetic linguistics, language endangerment and the role of African languages and historical English dialects in shaping African-American English. Creole languages are combinations of French, Spanish and Black English found in the U.S. Gulf and Caribbean areas.

According to Robert Chaudenson of the Universite d'Aix-en-Provence, "Over the last 10 years, Salikoko has established himself not only as one of the most prominent creolists, but… especially as one of our most prominent general linguists. The quality of his research and his prodigious productivity cannot but astonish most of us…."

Before the University of Chicago, Mufwene taught at the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica; the National University of Singapore; Harvard University; and the University of Georgia, Athens.

The COLFA Lecture Series is sponsored by the Department of English, Classics and Philosophy, the Division of Bicultural-Bilingual Studies and the UTSA Language and Culture Working Group.

For more information, contact Bridget Drinka, associate professor of English, classics and philosophy, at 210-458-7720.

--Tim Brownlee