Determination of. cap alpha. /sub s/ from energy-energy correlations in e/sup +/e/sup -/ annihilation at 29 GeV

We have studied the energy-energy correlation in e/sup +/e/sup -/ annihilation into hadrons at ..sqrt..s = 29 GeV using the Mark II detector at the SLAC storage ring PEP. We find to O(..cap alpha../sub s//sup 2/) that ..cap alpha../sub s/ = 0.158 +- 0.003 +- 0.008 if hadronization is described by string fragmentation. Independent fragmentation schemes give ..cap alpha../sub s/ = 0.10--0.14, and give poor agreement with the data. A leading-log shower fragmentation model is found to describe the data well.