J. K. Chambers is Professor of Linguistics at the University of Toronto. He is the author of Sociolinguistic Theory: Language Variation and Its Social Significance (second edition, Blackwell 2003), and co-author with Peter Trudgill of Dialectology (second edition, 1998), as well as other books and scores of articles. Peter Trudgill is Chair of English Linguistics at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland. He is author of Sociolinguistics: An Introduction to Language and Society (1996), and Dialects of England (second edition, Blackwell 1999), and co-editor with Laurie Bauer of Language Myths (1999). He is editor of Blackwell?s Language in Society series. Natalie Schilling-Estes is Assistant Professor of Linguistics at Georgetown University. She is co-author of Hoi Toide on the Outer Banks: The Story of the Ocracoke Brogue (1997) and American English (Blackwell 1998), both with Walt Wolfram.