ABSTRACT
Nonstandard US English (NUSE) has a threefold identity. First, there are linguistic forms which never or rarely occur in the speech or writing of educated, middle-to upper-status speakers.1 Such forms are traditionally the ones regarded as nonstandard by linguists. This, however, suggests a classor status-based etiology for Standard US English (SUSE), a characterization which the democratic-populist ideology of the country would seem to deny.
