Ralf Thiede

Areas of Interest
Linguistics (syntax, history, cognition and linguistics, language acquisition and learning, evolution of language, English grammar); the language of children’s literature; language and power; English Medieval Language and Literature.

ISNI: 0000 0004 7590 8347
ORCID ID: 0000-0001-8557-1379
Google Scholar page
Web of Science ID: B-1901-2019

Current Project
At work on a book on psychological and philosophical schools of thought shaping American children’s books in the early 20th century. The question ‘What is a child?’ feeds invariably into the next question: ‘What language does a child need?’ Those two questions have generated substantially different kinds of children’s literature.  I am looking specifically at the Bureau of Educational Experiments (BEE, founded 1916 in NYC).  It answered the first question with: ‘Children have innate skills: a poetic sensibility for language, whole-body sensorimotor learning, and exceptional observational acuity. If those skills are preserved rather than suppressed (read: in traditional school settings), those children will grow up to be future writers, artists, and scientists.’ That answer generated a very interesting response to the second question: ‘Children need language specifically designed for their skill levels at successive maturational periods (infancy through 7 years).’ Interdisciplinary scientific testing and experimenting with stories and manuscripts led, over the following 30 years, to the development of age-appropriate children’s literature, with a trajectory of best-selling authors leading from Lucy Sprague Mitchell to Margaret Wise Brown and Dorothy Meserve Kunhardt. Authors like Gertrude Stein and Theodor Seuss Geisel–whether they acknowledged it or not–also profited from the paths broken at BEE, as can be established from the novel linguistic profiles of their children’s books.

Publications 

Thiede, Ralf. 1983. A Black English/Standard English interim grammar in college composition: A case study. Transactions of the Missouri Academy of Science 17:171-80. online

Thiede, Ralf. 1992. Lexical Transformations and the Mapping of English Ditransitives. The National Kaohsiung Normal University Journal of English Literature and Language 1 (December): 104-18.

Thiede, Ralf. 1993. Review of Neurolinguistics: Historical and theoretical perspectives, by Charles Pierre Bouton. Language 69:409-10. DOI: 10.2307/416555  JSTOR

Thiede, Ralf. 1994. Friedens- und Konfliktforschung: Aktuelle Fachtermini in Deutsch und Englisch. Lebende Sprachen 1994.4:156-57. online

Davis, Boyd, and Ralf Thiede. 2000. Writing into Change: Style Shifting in Asynchronous Electronic Discourse. Ch. 5 of Network-Based Language Teaching: Concepts and Practice, ed. Mark Warschauer and Richard Kern. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139524735.007  Google Books preview

Thiede, Ralf. 2006. Lexical Classification and Pragmatic Licensing of Mandarin B.A..Southern Journal of Linguistics 27.1/2 (2003): 1-38.

Thiede, Ralf. 2007. MERGE and Information Management. Human Sciences 55 (2007): 57-70. online

Thiede, Ralf. 2009. Stylistics and Syntax: Exploitation of Mixed Systems in English.Southern Journal of Linguistics 33.2:72-91. NC Docks Open Access

Thiede, Ralf. 2012. Linguistics and children’s literature. Southern Journal of Linguistics 36.2: 1-9.

Thiede, Ralf, 2012. Special issue: ‘Linguistics and Child Literature,’ Southern Journal of Linguistics. With articles by Theofil Husar, Brittany A. Stone, Elizabeth Tingley, and Julie Wright.

Davis, Boyd, Ralf Thiede, and Mary K. Smith. 2013. Cross-cultural socialization into a common profession: Exploring how nursing students in Taiwan and in the U.S. narrate professional Identity. Crossroads (University of Bialystok) 1:6-23. DOI: 10.15290/cr.2013.01.01 online

Thiede, Ralf. 2015. Review of Entranced by Story: Brain, Tale and Teller, from Infancy to Old Age by Hugh Crago. Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 40.1:85-88.  DOI: 10.1353/chq.2015.0001  link

Thiede, Ralf. 2018. Review of Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century by Maryanne Wolf. Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 43.4:487-91. DOI: 10.1353/chq.2018.0055  link

Thiede, Ralf. 2019. Children’s Books, Brain Development, and Language Acquisition. New York: Routledge, 250 pp. link  (UNCC access only) Reviewed by Hugh Crago, Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 44.4 (Winter): 451-53. DOI: 10.4324/9781351113991

Thiede, Ralf. 2019. Synesthetic entrainment in interactive reading sessions of children’s books. Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 44.4 (Winter): 381-400. link (UNCC access only)

Thiede, Ralf, and Daniel Boisvert. 2020. Language, Mind, and Power: Why we Need Linguistic Equality. London: Routledge. link (UNCC access only) DOI: 10.4324/9780429274879

Thiede, Ralf. forthcoming Fall 2022. Reanalyzed vs. Fossilized how come: The Michael Montgomery Collection. Southern Journal of Linguistics. (manuscript)

Conference access copy:

“Gertrude Stein as a Children’s Book Author.” Children’s Literature Association 2021. access copy

Courses Taught:

Undergraduate

• ENGL 2161 Grammar for Writing
• ENGL 3050 Topics: ‘Computers and Language,’ ‘Psycholinguistics’
• ENGL 3132 Introduction to Contemporary American English
• ENGL 3211 Medieval Literature
• ENGL 4050 Topics: ‘Medieval British Literature,’ ‘Children’s Books as Language Nutrition’
• ENGL 4075 English Honors Seminar
• ENGL 4161 Modern English Grammar
• ENGL 4166 Comparative Language Studies for Teachers (no longer offered)
• ENGL 4167 The Mind and Language
• ENGL 4211 Medieval Literature / Chaucer
• ENGL 4260 History of Global Englishes
• ENGL 4263 Linguistics and Language Learning
• ENGL 4759 Honors Seminar ‘Language, Mind, and Power’
• various independent studies

Graduate

• ENGL 5167 The Mind and Language
• ENGL 5260 History of Global Englishes
• ENGL 6070 Topics: ‘Grammar and Etymology’, ‘Grammar for Teachers,’ ‘Linguistics and Language Learning’, ‘Linguistics and Children’s Literature’
• ENGL 6160 Introduction to the English Language
• ENGL 6161 Introduction to Linguistics
• ENGL 6163 Language Acquisition
• EDCI 8020 Topics in English Education
• various directed readings

Charlotte Teacher Institute

• ‘Grammar for the Real World’ 2013 [description] [published curriculum units]

Professional Appointments

Faculty Appointments:

• UNC Charlotte since 1990
• National Kaohsiung Normal University, Taiwan (1992-93)
• Occasional appointments at the University of Ludwigsburg, Germany

Editorial Appointments:

• Editor of the Southern Journal of Linguistics 1999-2006; guest editor Spring 2012

Administrative Appointments:

• Director of Undergraduate Advising, Dept. of English (2005-2012)
• Dept. Parliamentarian (2010 – present)
• Coordinator, Applied Linguistics Program / Linguistics Minor (2013 – present)
• Director, Applied Linguistics Graduate Certificate (2013 – present)

Professional Service

• President, SouthEastern Conference on Linguistics [SECOL] (2017-2021)
• manuscript and book proposal reviewer for Routledge, Oxford UP

Community Service

• President, Temple Or Olam, Concord (2008-2009)

Safe Zone ally