ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book aims to break fresh ground and in particular to examine verbal deficit theories within a much broader context than has been attempted in earlier critiques. Although verbal deficit theories are often regarded as a branch of sociolinguistics they are in fact attempts to account, largely on the basis of linguistic or supposedly linguistic criteria, for the uneven distribution of educational attainment in society. Despite their linguistic emphasis they ultimately belong to the sociology of education; in this critique they are examined in this context, as well as from a linguistic point of view. In turn, an understanding of the function of a theory often provides valuable clues to any unstated premisses which it may incorporate. Outside linguistics and sociology, the most popular rival to verbal deficit theories is not the linguistic variability hypothesis but still the psychometric intelligence theory.
