ABSTRACT
This case study of language shift among turn-of-the-century Dutch Protestant immigrants highlights how language operates to create and reinforce social systems of meaning. The author describes how gender variations in language acquisition relate to social and economic positions of the migrants and their age at arrival. At the individual, familial, and ethnic group level, language acquisition was gendered. Men and women had different reasons for learning or preserving their language, with women occupying the extremes of both innovation and retention. Using sociolinguists’ interviews, immigrant letters, literary works, and a variety of other sources, the author argues that the relative absence of gender and class distinctions in English grammar reinforced a particular vision of America that also included freedom from these elements.
