Fine in the World: Lumbee Language in Time and Place

Stripped of their ancestral languages generations ago, the Lumbee Indians of Robeson Count, North Carolina, carved out a unique dialect of English to maintain their linguistic identity. The story of Lumbee English is one of the most remarkable narratives of linguistic adaptability and cultural perseverance ever documented in the history of American English dialects.

Walt Wolfram is William C. Friday Distinguished Professor of English at North Carolina State University. His books include Hoi Toide on the Outer Banks: The Story of the Ocracoke Brogue and Talkin’ Tar Heel: How Our Voices Tell the Story of North Carolina.

Clare Dannenberg is an Associate Professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage. She is the author of Sociolinguistic Constructs of Ethnic Identity: The Syntactic Delineation of a Native American English Variety.

Stanley Knick is the former Director of the Museum of the Southeast American Indian at UNC Pembroke. His publications include Along the Trail: A Reader About Native Americans and The Lumbee in Context: Toward an Understanding.

Linda E. Oxendine (Lumbee) is Professor Emeritus at UNC Pembroke. She has published articles on Lumbee culture and history and is co-author of Hail to UNCP!: A 125-Year History of the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.