Transcript Sociolinguistics - University of Miskolc

A need for variety
My mum, he no like bananas.
She’s just so adorable!
Can I help you duck?
Sociolinguistics
Capturing variety in language as a
multifaceted social phenomenon
Approaches of Theoretical Linguistics:
 carefully controlled circumstances
 idealised competence rather than
observable performance (Chomsky)
 biased data
Problems with the Chomskyan approach
 Language - variable performances of
individuals
 Individual variation in adjusting speech to
context
↓
 “Variable probabilistic knowledge”
(Hymes, 1974)
- systemic potential
- appropriateness
- occurrence
- feasibility
Biber, Conrad & Leech, 2002: A corpusbased approach to linguistic description
35
30
25
20
of-phrases
s-genitives
15
10
5
0
conv
fict
news
acad
The scope of sociolinguistics
 Relation between
language and society,
uses of language and social structures.
 Synchronic and diachronic variation
 Dialectal variation
 Social variation
 Age-related variation
 Gender-based variation
Language and speech community
Speech community:
shared language
values
verbal repertoire
“third floor” (UK) = “fourth floor” (US)
„God bless you” vs. „See you later”
„Pá” vs. „szevasz”
How to measure variety
Central questions:
Who make up a representative sample of
a speech community?
What linguistic items are to be studied?
How to analyse this data?
Requires methods different from those
of TL
Sampling by questionnaires –
demographic data
Involving historians, anthropologists, etc.
to identify target region
MULTI-DISCIPLINARY APPROACH
field research, ethnographic observation
sociolinguistic interview
non-intrusive responses (Labov)
participant research – the observer’s
paradox
Result on map: isogloss of Southern England
cut is [A] (black circles) vs. [U] (crosses)
Expressing 10.15 in German dialects
Dialectal variation
 Language, dialect, accent, vernacular
 Language = nation?
 Different nations, similar language
(Norway, Denmark, Sweden)
 Blends (Spanish-Portugese in Galicia)
Chinese: one nation=one language?
Pidgin and creole
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
Actor Joseph Benjamin
Marriage no dey Again
 The Nollywood Actor and
Television Presenter
himself carry im mouth talk
for one interview for Reel
Radio day before yesterday
say the marriage don
scatter. E say him and im
wife get two pikin together.
The girl don reach ten years
while de boy na seven
years e be. E talk say him
and im wife dem don
arrange how to take handle
the two pikin dem so dat the
wahala no go disturb dem.
Social variation
 -ing/
“Learned” verbs
(criticise, propose)
Place names: –ing
(Cushing, Flushing)
-in’
Informal verbs
(take, chew)
Typical of men
 Labov’s study of New York City department stores
 Problems:
Identifying categories such as social class or levels of
formality
Data collection procedures
quality of linguistic material
Age-dependent variation
 Language development age-graded,
violations cause embarrassment („Pá”, „Oh dear”)
 Child language and motherese
(potty, nappy, kitty, sweetpea)
 Pig Latin, Playing dozens
 Early adolescence:
peer group influence,
slang (rap, house, hip-hop;
szalcsi, telcsi, tali)
Gender differences
Women
Men
 Higher-pitched voice
 More careful speech (-ing)
 More conscious of socially
preferred forms
 More appeal tags (is it? will
you?)
 More tentative (Would you
mind..)
 More questions
 More colour names (beige,
levander, mauve)
 More intensifiers
(She’s so absolutely
adorable!)
 More direct, more
declaratives
 Avoid emotional words
(adorable, heavenly, divine,
etc.)
Gender bias in languages
 „Development of the Uterus in Rats,
Guinea Pigs, and Men" (title of a
research report)
 "The Pap test, which has greatly
reduced mortality from uterine
cancer, is a boon to mankind."
 "As for man, he is no different from
the rest. His back aches, he
ruptures easily, his women have
difficulties in childbirth . . . "
English – a masculine language?
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Mankind and fatherland
“He” as general reference
He is a professional. vs She is a professional.
Master vs. mistress
Diminishing value of female words
(She is out with the girls.)
 Smith, Jones vs. Miss Smith, Mrs Jones or
Mary
 Policeman, doctor, poet
Neutralising language
Chairman – chairperson
Businessman - business executive
Fireman – firefighter
Mailman - mail carrier
Steward and stewardess - flight attendant
Policeman and policewoman - police
officer
Mankind - humanity
Ethnicity
 Pennsylvanian Dutch
 Jewish American
I need it like a hole
in my head.
He asked me for it yet,
Jerk schmerk!
Hungarian Romas (csávó, lácsó, gáré,
bodag)
According to US experiments, people are able
to distinguish between black and white
speakers on the phone in over 80% of cases.
 reduced final consonants: test-tess, mask-mass
 interchangeable then-den, three-tree
 forward shifted stress: Détroit, pólice, hótel
 syntax: I done told him about it.
He (be) waitin’ for me every night.
She don’t/ain’t say nothing.
 rhetoric:
- exaggeration,
- wide intonation range, falsetto voice,
- listener and participant encouragement
(Amen, Right on),
- verbal displays (rapping, playing dozens).
Playing the dozens „Yo mama”
Yo mama's so fat, she doesn't have a doctor, she
has a grounds keeper.
Yo mama's so ugly, her birth certificate was an
apology letter from the condom factory.
Yo mama's so old, when God said "Let there be
light" she was there to flick the switch.
Yo mama's so skinny, she swallowed a meatball and
thought she was pregnant.
Register variety
Different languages offer different sets of
register choice (formality-informality)
Javanese- rich system of register
according to gender, kinship, occupation
wealth, education, religion or family
English „you”
Hungarian „te”, „ön”, „maga”, „néni/bácsi”
Cross-cultural communication problems
Martin Jooz
(1962):
Five styles based on
 interactivity
 amount of
background
knowledge
 formality of
vocabulary
 clarity of articulation
 complexity of syntax
 Frozen
 Formal
 Consultative
 Casual
 Intimate
American informality
 How d’ya do?
 Come and have a
drink, if you have
some time!
 Shops
 Education
 Hi, John! Szia János!
Szia János bácsi!
Areas of sociolinguistic study
 Focus on function
 Competence as personal ability (idiolect)
 Performance: variable, individual- and contextdependent accomplishment
 Language as a social tool
 Speech communities as organisations of ways
of speaking
 Variation according to regional origin, social
class, age and gender