English has a class of "semiweak" verbs, which in the past tense have root-vowel ablaut as well as reflexes of the apical stop suffix, for example, kept, told. This study traces the development of this class in a sample of speakers aged 4-65. The evidence is derived from the variable rates of occurrence of the final -t,d in these words in the speech of individuals of different ages. The rate of -t,d absence in semiweak verbs systematically declines with increasing age. We identify three ontogenetic stages in the development of the class. In children's speech, these segments rarely appear, suggesting they are underlyingly absent. In young adults they appear but undergo the variable -t,d deletion process of English at the same high rate as noninflectional -t,d in words like west, old, implying that such speakers do not treat them as affixes. Finally, some adult speakers show a lowered deletion rate, suggesting that they accord the final stops separate morphemic status. The age distribution of this pattern implies that speakers only arrive at this analysis in adult life, after the age when acquisition is often assumed to be complete.One problem that must be confronted in studying child language development is that of describing a system that is rapidly changing but that retains structure and systematicity in the midst of the change. This is similar to the problem that has arisen in studies of language change in society. In the sociolinguistic arena, two basic concepts that have facilitated successful approaches to the study of changing structure are orderly heterogeneity

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Previous studies of language contact in multilingual urban neighborhoods in Europe claim the emergence of new varieties spoken by immigrant-background youth. This paper examines the sociolinguistic conditioning of variation in allophones of Swedish /ε:/ of young people of immigrant and nonimmigrant background in Stockholm and Gothenburg. Although speaker background and sex condition the variation, their effects differ in each city. In Stockholm there are no significant social differences and the allophonic difference appears to have been neutralized. Gothenburg speakers are divided into three groups, based on speaker origin and sex, each of which orients toward different norms. Our conclusions appeal to dialectal diffusion and the desire to mark ethnic identity in a diverse sociolinguistic context. These results demonstrate that not only language contact but also dialect change should be considered together when investigating language variation in modern-day cities.