Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the linguistic circumstances and contexts under which the adjective, “little” can have a “descriptive” meaning in nonstandard English such as African-American English, the American Southern dialect and American Southern dialect-like English. According to descriptions in most dictionaries and usage studies, both “little” and “small” have “small in size” as their first meaning. And, one of the main differences described is that “little” is “emotional, ” while “small” is “descriptive.” However, this description seems to be mainly for standard English. In The Color Purple and Forrest Gump, which are both written almost entirely in nonstandard English, the frequency of “little” is conspicuously higher than that of “small.” Therefore, it can be hypothesized that in nonstandard English “little” is also “descriptive” which most dictionaries and usage studies refer to as a characteristic of “small” in standard English. This paper also shows that in these novels the frequency of “big” is correspondingly much higher than that of “large, ” which is further evidence that “little” is the opposite of “big” and “small” is the opposite of “large.”