This book will be of special interest to the general reader concerned with the issue of
language in the United States as well as the language specialist and sociolinguist. It has
been written to inform those wishing to learn more about the role that languages other than
English have had and continue to have in the life of the most important United States city
New York. At the same time this volume makes an important contribution to the scholarly
literature on urban multilingualism and the sociology of language. The book contains chapters
on languages of ethnolinguistic groups who arrived early in New York and which have been
somewhat silenced (Irish German Yiddish) the languages of groups who made early
contributions and continue to be heard in the city (Italian Greek Spanish Hebrew) and
languages which are acquiring an important voice in the city today (Chinese Indian languages
English creoles Haitian Creole).
