Tokens in the Pocosin: Lumbee English in North Carolina

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Jeutonne P. Brewer; R. W. Reising

American Speech, Vol. 57, No.2. (Summer, 1982), pp. 108-120.

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TOKENS IN THE POCOSIN:

LUMBEE ENGLISH IN NORTH CAROLINA

JEUTONNE P. BREWER University of North Carolina at Greensboro

AND R. W. REISING

Pembroke State University

ONE OF THE LARGEST groups of American Indians east of the Mississippi is the Lumbee Indians. Although some Lumbees live in urban enclaves in High Point and Greensboro, North Carolina, Richmond, Virginia, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Detroit, the homeland of the Lumbees is Robeson County in southeastern North Carolina. This is POCOSIN country, an area often described as marginal land, because it does not easily fit into the geographical characteristics of the coast, the plains, or the mountains. Pocosin, 'an upland swamp, marsh, bog, or dismal of the southeastern coastal plain', is low wooded ground, usually dry in the summer and covered with water in the rainy season (Bartlett 1859; Craigie and Hulbert 1938; Wentworth 1944). English settlers in Virginia borrowed this Algonquin word from the Indians, using it as the name of a river there as early as 1635 (OED; Stewart 1958). More importantly for the Lumbees and their ancestors, the Pocosin, considered undesirable land by white European settlers, provided an isolated haven in which Lumbees could retain a distinctive ethnic identity and consistently define themselves as Indians (in the sense of Williams 1979, p. 20).

Like other cohesive communities, the Lumbees use language as a significant linguistic and cultural marker. Certain words, certain meanings of words, and certain pronunciations signal their ethnic identity and identify outsiders. For example, token, 'supernatural sign of death or evil', is a word frequently used and highly valued by the Lumbees; it functions as a linguistic symbol of their identity. The Lumbees employ token as a TEST ITEM, calling upon non-Lumbees for a definition, an invariable result of which is laughter, much to the puzzlement of the non-Lumbee. Few non-Lumbees can define the word to Lumbee satisfaction. Like token, the words budges and juvimber, and the use of the Tidewater diphthong [:H] for standard English lail, are shibboleths. They function as constant reminders of Lumbee culture and history.

There is a pervasive belief among the Lumbees that they are the descendants of the survivors of Sir Walter Raleigh's lost colony. Although historians are not certain about the origin of the Lumbees, the consensus is that their ancestors were part of the groups of Indians who

108

TOKENS IN THE POCOSIN

109

coalesced into small multitribal communities (Williams 1979, p. 9). English possibly served as a lingua franca for these groups. In any case, when the first white settlers came to southeastern North Carolina in the eighteenth century, they "found located on the waters of the Lumber River a large tribe of Indians, speaking English, tilling the soil, owning slaves, and practicing many of the arts of civilized life .... They held their lands in common, and land titles only became known on the approach of white men" (McMillan 1888, p. 14). Although various labels have been used through the centuries to describe the Lumbees, Hudson's (1976) categories emerge as the most valid and descriptive system. While not among his first category of those southeastern Indians "who have retained parts of their aboriginal culture" (e.g., the Cherokees) nor his third category of those southern "racially mixed peoples who have only a tenuous cultural and genetic Indian background" (e.g., the Haliwas of North Carolina and the mestizos), 1 the Lumbees belong to his second category: those southeastern Indians "who have lost their aboriginal culture but retain strong genetic and social identities as Indians." As such, the Lumbees belong with such undeniably Indian groups as the Catawabas, the Houmas, and the Creeks (Williams 1979, p. 20).

As dialect research shows, geographically and/or socially isolated groups tend to be linguistic conservatives, who retain older forms, usages, meanings, and pronunciations. Although it would be reasonable to assume that the variety of English spoken by the Lumbees has been studied in detail, in reality this is not the case. Beyond McMillan's claim that the Indians spoke "almost pure Anglo-Saxon" (McMillan 1888, p. 20), and his short list of words, including the plural housen for houses, there is no analysis of Lumbee English, in spite of the fact that Indian speech has long been considered distinctive by whites, blacks, and Indians from that area. Differences today appear to be English dialectal differences, not retentions of Indian words. Even Parsons (1919, p. 385) reported that she found almost no evidence of Indian words in her visit to Scotland and Robeson Counties, although Parsons did not discuss dialectal differences. In her study of Lumbee culture, Blu (1980, p. 247, n. 7) summarizes the current situation:

Whether linguists would classify the Indian mode of speech as a separate dialect, I am not qualified to say. There have been no technical studies of the matter, but I can say by the time I left Robeson County, after seventeen months of field work, I could hear differences between most Indians and non-Indian speakers, which helped me to identify Indians. And Indians themselves can often identify the precise area of the county from which another Indian comes simply from his speech.

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Unfortunately, Blu provides no explanation of those differences.

This study will focus on four forms which the Lumbees use as linguistic markers: the use of the three words token, 'supernatural sign of death or evil', budges, 'nervous irritation, fidgetiness', and juvimber, 'slingshot'; and the use of one phonological feature, the Tidewater pronunciation of standard English /ail as [:)1] before both voiced and voiceless consonants, for example, nine and night. The study is based on data from 154 writing samples (WS) from public school students and personnel, a sample from the 83 oral history tapes collected by the Lumbee Regional Development Association (LRDA) in 1978, and personal observations of the authors. We compare our findings with the data in twelve field records of the Linguistic Atlas of the Middle and South Atlantic States (LAMSAS).

Lumbees use token to specify a noise or a sign provided by a spirit to

indicate that death or evil is imminent:

I heard my brother's token [WS 1978].2

Just before my daddy had died, he heard his token [WS 1978].

I used to hear people talk about they could hear things and somebody moving about, and they said that was a token of somebody was gonna die, and maybe after the person had died, they'd say, "Yeah, I had a token of that the other night" [LRDA 4].

Well, uh, in my days of growin' up when someone died you could look out. He's comin' back. You needn' worry, he comin', An' people say, "I seed 'im las' night. I seed 'im." You know that was frightnin' [LRDA 27.1.257].

Animals also provide tokens of death:

Well, if the rooster jump up in the porch an' turn his head out an' crow, said, "look out." Somebody's a-goin' to die right away cause he-he had his head turn out and he's a-crowin' [LRDA 27.1.265].

A related verbal form occurs less frequently. When one is totin' he or she is providing oral evidence that a spirit has visited and/or resides within his or her physical body, and that, as a consequence, death is imminent."

The Lumbees preserve primarily the Biblical meaning of token: 'an act of a miraculous nature serving to demonstrate divine power' (OED), particularly in relation to imminent death. This meaning, which is obsolete or archaic according to the OED, is the significant meaning for the Lumbees, the linguistic test which outsiders typically fail.

Lumbees may also suffer from the budges, 'nervousness, fidgetiness'.

According to Craigie and Hulbert (1938),. the earliest known use of this Americanism (see also Mathews 1951) occurred in 1824:

Madame Neckar ... was not very pleasant in conversation, for she was subject to what in Virginia we call "budge," that is, she was very nervous and fidgety.

TOKENS IN THE POCOSIN

III

[Thomas Jefferson, as quoted in Daniel Webster, Private Correspondence, edited by Fletcher Webster, vol. 1, p. 373. Boston, 1857.]

Their next recorded use is by Ellen Glasgow in her 1904 novel, The Deliverance (p. 102):

Having unfortunately crossed her knees in the parlour, after supper, she suffered untold tortures from "budges" for three mortal hours rather than to be seen to do anything so indelicate as to uncross them.

The Lumbees also use the word occasionally in its seventeenth and eighteenth century British meaning 'solemn, stiff, formal' (OED). The Lumbee meaning 'depression' evidently is derived from this use: I've got the budges (WS 5178).

H. L. Mencken (1945) noted that budges acquired the special meaning 'nervous irritation' or 'fidgetiness' in the nineteenth century in Virginia. The Lumbees share and use this meaning of budges, although how it came to be used in the Lumbee area is unknown.

Problems in the documentation of and use of juoimber, 'slingshot', are even greater. We have been unable to find any reference to jiunmbe» in such standard reference sources as the OED, the Dictionary of American English, Mathews' Dictionary of Americanisms, or various slang dictionaries.

In response to a question from an interviewer, two Lumbees explained the form and use of juvimber:

It was a little weapon you'd make with a rubber--ol' tire--cut your rubber off an 01' tire. Tie it-forked stick and a stone to shoot [LRDA 16.2.203].

Well, that 'us, uh, some thin' or other that they could manufacture an' put a rock in it an' shoot things. Some of 'em got good at it. They could, uh, they could kill birds with 'em an' break out windows an' that was a big thing little boys did. They'd break out a lot of windows, you know. Juvimbers [LRDA 4.2.395].

One point of interest is the use of [uoember in Greensboro: It will take from now to Juvember to complete all that work (from Dawn Lambert, August 1980). [uoember is obviously a blend of June (or July) and November (or December). We have found no evidence that links Lumbee juvimber 'slingshot' with [uuember. In fact, both the stress patterns and the meanings are different. Standard reference sources and our informal observations have uncovered no uses of juvimber 'slingshot' outside the Lumbee communities. F. G. Cassidy reports that the Dictionary of American Regional English has no information in its files about juvimber (personal communication, May 6, 1981). The Lumbee use of juvimber is evidently restricted to the Lumbee-speaking area, where its use is a marker of ethnic identity.

Like token, budges, and juvimber, the Tidewater diphthong-the use of

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centralized [or] instead of Jail-functions as a linguistic marker in the Lumbee communities. This phonological feature has a function as important as identifying outsiders: it is one of the means by which Lumbees identify the community, district, or subregion in the county from which a Lumbee comes.

The use of the Tidewater diphthong has often been the subject of comment and detailed study (Tresidder 1943; Shewmake 1943; Kurath and McDavid 1961; O'Cain 1977). The centralized diphthong actually occurs throughout the coastal South, though it is typically identified with eastern or Tidewater Virginia.

The analysis of the Lumbees' pronunciations of Jail is based on a sample of eleven LRDA oral history tapes, which include speech samples from four males and seven females between the ages of 69 and 80 from three Lumbee communities.

Using the Linguistic Atlas worksheets (Davis, McDavid, and McDavid 1969) as a guide, we selected night, white, and light as words in which Jail occurs before voiceless consonants and five, nine, spider, and piazza as words in which Jail occurs before voiced consonants or in an open syllable. We then transcribed each pronunciation of JaiJ in these environments from the eleven LRDA tapes, including examples like twenty-five and lamplight as well as five and light.

In the eleven LRDA tapes there were fifty-seven voiceless environments in which Jail occurred-thirty-eight in night, fourteen in white, and five in light; there were sixty-three voiced environments-twenty-seven in five, twenty-five in nine, eight in spider, and three in piazza. The Lumbee interviews contain examples of [:)1] in each word in both the voiceless and the voiced environments.

Table 1 shows that the Lumbees use the centralized diphthong before voiceless consonants in night, white, and light. In the oral history interviews the Lumbees used the centralized diphthong more than half the time (thirty of fifty-seven uses, or 52.7%) in the voiceless environment. Furthermore, seven of the eleven Lumbee interviews (LRDA 1,2, 3,9, 13, 27, 66) contain examples of the centralized diphthong.

TABLE 1
Use of Diphthong /ail Before Voiceless Consonant
[oi] [at], [01] [ail
N/% N/% N/% Total
night 25/43.9 10/17.5 3/5.3 38
white 3/5.3 8/14.0 3/5.3 14
light 2/3.5 3/5.3 0/0 5
Total/% 30/52.7 21/36.8 6/10.6 57 TOKENS IN THE POCOSIN

113

Table 2 shows that the Lumbees also use the centralized diphthong more than half the time (thirty-three of sixty-three uses, or 52.4% of the time) before a voiced consonant or in an open syllable in the words five, nine, spider, and piazza. In this case, however, one Lumbee interview (LRDA 1) accounts for two-thirds (twenty-two of thirty-three uses, or 66.7%) of the occurrences of the centralized diphthong in voiced environments. The remaining eleven examples occur in four Lumbee interviews (LRDA 2, 3, 13, 27).

Studies of the use of the centralized diphthong in other communities in Virginia and South Carolina have noted that speakers tend to use the centralized [;)1] before voiceless consonants but not before voiced consonants.' In his examination of Linguistic Atlas records, McDavid (1955) lists the centralized diphthong before voiceless consonants as a characteristic pronunciation in Charleston. Analyzing the data collected from 100 subjects in Charleston, O'Cain (1977) showed that the centralized diphthong occurs before voiceless consonants in Charleston; it is a recessive pronunciation that is being replaced by [a], particularly among younger speakers of all social classes. Earlier, Tresidder (1943) had demonstrated that in eastern Virginia the centralized diphthong occurs before voiceless consonants, the monothong before voiced consonants. However, the Lumbees who use the centralized diphthong tend to use it before voiced consonants as well as before voiceless consonants. The more generalized use of the centralized diphthong thus is a feature of the Lumbee variety of English, but not of other varieties of American English in which the centralized diphthong occurs.

This study includes data from three predominantly Indian communities or subregions, each of which is closely identified with its schools and churches: Prospect, Pembroke, and Magnolia. These communities include both rural districts and towns. For example, Pembroke is the major town in the area with predominantly Indian population. Magnolia is a community near the county seat of Lumberton. Although Prospect, a

TABLE 2

Use of Diphthong /ail Before a Voiced Consonant or in an Open Syllable

[at] [aI], [01] [oil
N/% N/% N/% Total
five 15/23.8 8/12.7 4/6.3 27
ntne 12119.0 7111.1 6/9.5 25
spider 517.9 1/1.6 2/3.2 8
piazza* 1/1.6 2/3.2 0/0 3
Totall% 33/52.4 18/28.6 12/19.0 63 *Uses with [i] as the first vowel are not included in these figures.

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rural district, does not appear on any official map, it is a distinct Indian community, identified by name and thought of in terms of linguistic and cultural characteristics rather than geographical boundaries.

When asked about language today, Lumbees claim that the residents of Prospect have the most unusual, old-fashioned language; that is, it is the most distinct from other Lumbee communities and from standard English. The analysis of the use of the centralized diphthong indicates that there is some linguistic basis for the Lumbees' claim, for a significant factor in the occurrence of the centralized diphthong is subregional differences.

Tables 3 and 4 show the use of the centralized diphthong in relation to the variable of community; our sample of eleven LRDA interviews includes five from Prospect, five from Pembroke, and one from Magnolia. The Lumbees in Prospect used [or] more frequently than Lumbees in either Pembroke or Magnolia, in both voiceless and voiced environments.

Table 3 shows that in the fifty-seven voiceless environments in which JaiJ occurred, the Lumbees in Prospect used [or] twenty-two times (38.6%), [at] or [01] eight times (12.3%), and [0] one time (1.8%); Lumbees in Pembroke used [~I] eight times (14.0%), [ar] or [01] 14 times (24.6%), and [0] two times (3.5%). The one Lumbee from Magnolia used only the monothong Ja! (three times, 5.3%). The same kind of subregional pattern by community prevails in the use of the centralized diphthong before voiced consonants. (See table 4.)

The diphthong [~I] occurred a total of sixty-three times, thirty times in

TABLE 3

Use of Diphthong Jail Before Voiceless Consonants by Community

[:1I] N/%

Prospect Pembroke Magnolia Total/%

22/38.6 8/14.0 0/0 30/52.6

[all, [OI] N/%

7/12.3 14/24.6 0/0 21136.9

[oil N/%

111.8 2/3.5 3/5.3 6/10.6

Total

30 24 3 57

TABLE 4

Use of Diphthong /ail Before Voiced Consonants by Community

[ ;}I] N/%

Prospect Pembroke Magnolia Total/%

27/42.9 6/9.5 0/0 33/52.5

[at], [01] N/%

7/11.1 11/17.5 0/0 18/28.6

[oil N/%

111.6 3/4.8 8/12.7

12/19.0

Total

35 20 8 63

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voiceless environments and thirty-three times in voiced environments. The Lumbees from Prospect account for twenty-two of the thirty uses (73.3%) of the centralized diphthong in voiceless environments and twenty-seven of the thirty-three uses (81.8%) in voiced environments. Lumbees from Pembroke account for eight of the thirty uses (14.0%) of the centralized diphthong in voiceless environments, six of thirty-three uses (18.2%) in voiced environments. In other words, the Lumbees from Prospect account for forty-nine of the total sixty-three uses (77.8%) of the centralized diphthong; Lumbees from Pembroke account for fourteen of the sixty-three uses (22.2%).

Our analysis in relation to the variable sex of the use of the centralized diphthong permits an observation about the use by females and a cautious statement about the use by males. Our samples of eleven interviews includes four by males (LRDA 1,9,11,81) and seven by females (LRDA 2,3, 12, 13, 16,27,66). Table 5 shows the use of the centralized diphthong by males and females in voiceless and voiced environments. Females used the centralized diphthong [~I] thirty-one times, twenty times (64.55% of their uses) in voiceless environments and eleven times (5.5%) in voiced environments. Thus, females will more typically use the centralized diphthong in the expected voiceless environments than in the voiced environments. However, the information for males in table 5 is not equivalent to the information of uses by females. Five of the seven females (LRDA 2, 3, 13, 27,66) used the centralized diphthong. Only one of the females (LRDA 66) used the centralized diphthong only in voiceless environments. In contrast, thirty of the thirty-two (93.8%) uses by males in table 5 occurred in one interview (LRDA 1). Only one other male (LRDA 9) used the centralized diphthong; he used it a total of two times (6.2%). Thus, the data for males is not equivalent to the data for females in this table. We can cautiously note that uses by males occurred more frequently in voiced than in voiceless environments. However, an adequate analysis of the use of the centralized diphthong by males will not be possible until more interviews with males have been analyzed.

TABLE 5

Use of [;}I] by Sex

Males

N/%

Females N/%

Voiceless Voiced Totall%

*8 of 10 uses by LRDA 1 ** All uses by LRDA 1

10/31.3* 22/68.7** 32/100.0

20/64.5 11135.5 311100.0

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When we compare our findings with the data in the LAMSAS records, we find a different pattern of distribution for the diphthong Jail. Two vocabulary items important in regional studies, piazza and spider, illustrate the point.

Piazza was borrowed into English from Italian to refer to a covered gallery, arcade, porch, or veranda. The word is found in English before 1600; it survives in New England and the coastal South with the meaning 'covered porch or veranda' (Craigie and Hulbert 1938, Mathews 1951, Eliason 1956, Perkins 1929, Hibbit 1936). Piazza occurs in each of the eleven LAMSAS interviews, in six of the eleven LRDA taped interviews included in this study.

Taking into account only the first pronunciations given in the LAMSAS interviews, the responses can be divided into two large categories on the basis of the pronunciation of the first vowel in piazza. In the first group of seven LAMSAS interviews, the first vowel is the diphthong JaiJ, with the first element being phonetically either [a] or [0] (NC 24a, NC 28a, NC 28b, NC 29a, NC 29*, NC N36, SC la).5 In the second group, the first vowel in piazza is [i] or [I] (NC 29b, NC 36a, SC 20a, SC 2b). (One LAMSAS subject, NC 36b, did not use the word piazza.)

Of the six LRDA responses, two were definitions with no pronunciations of piazza:

What we used to sit on. Maybe we'd have one on the front and one on the back [LRDA 16.2].

In response to the suggestion [pOIeIZ;;)], a second Lumbee subject responded

Porch? Have your chairs out there and sit down [LRDA 13.2.050].

The other four Lumbees responded with three different pronunciations. Two used [01] (LRDA 11,27); one used the monothong [0] (LRDA 81); the fourth Lumbee used [i] (LRDA 1). However, the second pronunciation used by LRDA 1 is worth noting here, the central vowel [;;)], occurring as the first element in the diphthong. For comparison we can note that the two Lumbees in the LAMSAS interviews used the noncentralized diphthong (NC 29a, NC 29*).

Spider is the well-known dialectal item which occurs in the North and in parts of the coastal South. In ten of the LAMSAS interviews the first vowel is a diphthong, JaiJ, with the first element being either [a] or [0]; another (SC 20a) used the low back vowel [ex]. The incomplete Lumbee interview (NC 29a*) does not include this item. Five Lumbees used three different pronunciations in spider; one Lumbee used the diphthong JaiJ

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(LRDA 11.2); two Lumbees used a monothong [a] (LRDA 12.1.110, LRDA 81.1.325); two Lumbees used a central vowel as the first element in a diphthong [::n] (LRDA 2.1; LRDA 13.1.019). Unfortunately, the Lumbee who used the centralized diphthong in piazza did not use the word spider but rather used skillet in response to the question. However, these limited examples indicate a different pattern of distribution: the Lumbee use of the centralized diphthong instead of JaiJ or Ja! before a voiced consonant or in an open syllable.

There are a total of forty-eight environments for the use of JaiJ by the twelve LAMSAS subjects in four voiced-environment items-five, nine, spider, and piazza. There are no occurrences of a central diphthong in these items. There are thirty-six environments for the use of JaiJ by the twelve LAMSAS subjects in three voiceless-environment items-night, white, and lightwood. Two uses of schwa as the first element in the diphthong occur in the words night and lightwood (NC N36, SC 20a). In other words, a centralized vowel as the first element in the diphthong occurred two out of a possible thirty-six times (5.6%) in the voiceless environments, and not at all in the voiced ones. The difference between the LAMS AS and LRDA groups is apparent when we note that the Lumbees used a central diphthong over half the time in both voiced and voiceless environments.

Our findings in this preliminary study of Lumbee English demonstrate that the centralized diphthong is a significant pronunciation feature of Lumbee English. They also raise the question of why our findings should differ significantly from the findings of the Linguistic Atlas Project. Three possible answers emphasize both the need to take into account the data in the Linguistic Atlas worksheets and to continue detailed study of the Lumbee variety of English.

First, the Linguistic Atlas Project included only one complete record (NC 29a) and one partial record (NC 29*) collected from Lumbees in Pembroke, North Carolina. Like two of the five Lumbees in our study (LRDA 11, 16) the Lumbee in Pembroke interviewed by the Linguistic Atlas Project did not use the centralized diphthong.

Second, the LAMSAS data were not collected in a way conducive to showing variability. Field workers collected data from a small number of selected individuals in each community. However, the study of the variable use of linguistic features requires analysis of data collected from a larger number of subjects in a given community. The LAMSAS data provided the extensive geographical information necessary to study regional dialects but could not provide the intensive sociolinguistic information necessary to study variability.

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Third, it is possible that linguistic change has occurred in the Lumbee communities since the LAMSAS data were collected in the 1930s and 1940s. However, linguistic change seems the least plausible explanation of the difference between the LAMSAS and the LRDA data. The Lumbee communities have been ethnically stable since the 1930s; there has been no major change in the population and no influx of speakers who use a centralized diphthong. Moreover, our study includes only Lumbees between the ages of 69 and 80. A study of linguistic change will require speech samples from younger as well as older members of the community.

As the detailed studies of the Linguistic Atlas Project have shown, the study of vocabulary and the pronunciation of vocabulary items provide important clues to significant regional differences in pronunciation. As sociolinguistic studies have shown, the analysis of variable use of linguistic features within a community reveals how language use differs in relation to social variables.

Our findings in this preliminary study demonstrate the need to analyze the Lumbee variety of English in relation to region, community or subregion, and social variables such as sex differences. This study is but the first step in the too-Iong-delayed process of examining Lumbee English. We hope that it betokens further excursions into this linguistic pocosin.

NOTES

1. The Haliwas are an Indian group in eastern North Carolina. The mestizos or "little races" are groups, many of them in the eastern United States, who are not recognized as "official" Indians; usually they have not retained their ethnic identities in the face of strong pressure from state and local governments. Of course, this situation reflects the view of white society more. than the view of the mestizo group. Historically, state governments in the Southeast have typically used only "white" and "non-white" categories to classify whites, blacks, and nonreservation Indians (Berry 1963; Williams 1979).

2. The letters in the brackets indicate the source of the data: WS indicates examples from the writing samples from the public schools, LRDA the data from the oral history tapes, and LAMSAS the data in the field records of the Linguistic Atlas of the Middle and South Atlantic States. For example, (WS 1978) indicates a writing sample collected in the public schools in 1978. (LRDA 27.1.257) indicates that the example occurs on tape 27, side 1, at counter 257 of the oral history tape collected by the Lumbee Regional Development Association. (NC 29a) indicates LAMSAS record number 29a collected in North Carolina.

LRDA subjects studied here were as follows (tape number, sex, age, and community): 1, M, 74, Prospect; 2, F, 79, Prospect; 3, F, 69, Prospect; 9, M, 70,

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Pembroke; 11, M, 74, Pembroke; 12, F, 76, Magnolia; 13, F, 70, Pembroke; 16, F, 72, Pembroke; 27, F, 71, Pembroke: 66, F, 80, Prospect; and 81, M, 73, Prospect. LAMSAS subjects examined were as follows (Record No., Sex, Age, County, Community, Type): NC 24a, F, 70, Brunswick; Freeland, IA; NC 28a, M, 73, Columbus, Crusoes I., IA; NC 28b, M, 67, Columbus, The Jam, Boardman, IA; NC 29a, M, 78, Robeson, Pembroke, IA; NC 29*, F, c. 60, Robeson, Pembroke, IA; NC 29b, F, 43, Robeson, Lumberton, lIB; NC 36a, M, 76, Scotland, Laurel Hill, IA; NC 36b, M, 43, Scotland, Gibson, IB; NG N36, M, 77, Scotland, Wagram, IA; SC la, F, 81, Horry, Burgess, IA; SC 2b, F, 48, Marion, Pinderboro, lIB; and SC 20a, M, 80, Marlboro, Brownsville, IA. Only NC 29a and NC 29* were Lumbrees; NC 29* is an incomplete record, though it contains responses for four of the seven words used in this study (nine, piazza, night, and white). NC N36 was a Negro.

3. The verbal form with ft! instead of fk/ is apparently unrelated to tote, although participal forms are homophonous.

4. Interestingly, a diphthong with a lower back vowel [01] is used for fail in coastal North Carolina communities. In the Outer Banks of both the northeastern and central North Carolina coast, speakers use [01] before voiced consonants as well as before voiceless consonants (Howren 1962; Jaffe 1973).

REFERENCES

Berry, Brewton. 1963. Almost White. New York: Macmillan.

Blu, Karen. 1980. The Lumbee Problem: The Making of an American Indian People.

Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.

Craigie, Sir William A., and Hulbert, James R. 1938. A Dictionary of American English on Historical Principles. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.

Davis, A. L.; McDavid, Raven I. Jr.; and McDavid, Virginia G. 1969. A Compilation of the Work Sheets of the Linguistic Atlas of the United States and Canada and Associated Projects. 2d ed. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.

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A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME

The physical education department at Rutgers College is called the "Department of Human Kinetics." Its course offerings include a "Crash Course in Social and Disco Dance" and "Scuba Diving."