Nicht angegeben.This MA thesis is based on a field study that investigated the language attitudes of informants from the Northern and Southern United States towards Southern American English as spoken in Tennessee. A 'verbal guise' speaker evaluation experiment was conducted in which informants were asked to provide judgments on four speakers (two from the South, two from the North, one male and one female each) who all read the same text in the context of a job interview in sales. Results show that the Southern speakers were rated significantly lower in terms of perceived competence (e.g. education, intelligence), but that the Southern female received the highest ratings for social attractiveness. The study thus provides quantitative and qualitative evidence for common stereotypes regarding Southern American English in the U.S
