Imagine that you have been assigned the following essay topic:
Written language is often ascribed a higher 'status' than spoken language. It is often seen as more 'grammatical', more coherent and more complex, while spoken language may be seen as disorganised, unpredictable, as less complex and often as 'ungrammatical'. Discuss this view in the context of exploring whether there is a linguistic basis to the broad distinction between written spoken language.
Your task is to draw up a bibliography (presented in the format set out above) of at least six titles, two of which must be journal articles, which you believe might be useful in researching the topic. Please note, you are definitely NOT being asked to research or write the essay, just to find possible references. Also, you are definitely not being asked to read the books and articles, just to determine by their titles whether they may be of use. You may like to scan chapter headings or to skim a few pages if you can find the titles in the library, but please don't borrow them, since we want everyone to have a chance to sight the books. We will be doing a project on spoken and written language later in the course, but not for a month or so.
Please include your formatted bibliography in an e-mail and send it to me at p.r.white@bham.ac.uk. Make sure you include ID details.
