Sociolinguistics 3 Classification: social groups, languages and dialects
Mar 28, 2015
Sociolinguistics 3
Classification: social groups, languages and dialects
The story so far
• General knowledge includes knowledge of language (‘I-language’) as well as of society (‘I-society’). (I = internal)
• General knowledge is an inheritance network so we store general ‘prototypes’ for people and for language.– E.g. American, Student, Woman– English, London English, Casual English
Language and knowledge
• Our knowledge is influenced by:– ‘external’ reality, including ‘E-language’ and ‘E-
society’– Our language.
• Language can distort reality, e.g. it is ‘digital’, so doesn’t always fit the ‘analog’ world. E.g:– Shingle or pebbles?– Drizzle or rain?– Classical music or jazz or pop?
What about languages and dialects?
• We all think about language (mass) in terms of languages (count) and dialects.
• How accurate are these concepts?– Are they based on fact or on the terms language and dialect?
• Can we use them in sociolinguistics for saying who uses what kind of language?
Some terminology for language varieties
• A variety is a distinct language system, with grammar, vocabulary, etc.
• A language is a variety which is incomprehensible to speakers of other languages.
• A language may include sub-varieties.
Sub-varieties of a language
• A dialect is a sub-variety based on social groups, e.g. geography, social class.– An accent is a way of pronouncing a dialect
e.g. RP.
• A register is a sub-variety based on social situations, e.g. chat, essay, prayer
• A standard dialect/register is a sub-variety with high social status.
Varieties of language variety
l ang uag e var i e ty
l ang uag e d i al e c t r e g i s te r
ac c e nt s tandar d
par tpar t
What are varieties good for?
• Crude explicit comment about the social distribution of language items.
• Language variety X is used by social type Y.– English is spoken by Brits, Americans, …– Londoners speak Cockney.– The language of Egypt is Arabic, not
Egyptian.
• Better than nothing …
The social distribution of languages.
L ang uag e c ou n t
E ng l i s h F r e nc h .....
B r i t Am e r i c an F r e nc h-pe r s o n ...
P e r s o n
s pe ake r s pe ake r
What language is this?
…and this …
… and this …
So what? (1)
• We organise our knowledge about language (mass) in terms of languages.
• But is that how the world organises them?
Now what language is this?
Transcription
• And so couldn’t gather their own supper and another of the fairies said er ??? supper ???
…and this …
• Holide Karent Affairs:Thursday January 15, 2004
• = Holiday current affairs
continued
• long despela program....I luk olsem Papua New Guinea bai mari mari long ol "illegal immigrants" -- pipal bilong narapela kantri husat i bin burukim loa na go stap long PNG
• = About this programme …It shows that PNG will ?? because of … people of another country who have broken the law to live in PNG …
…and this?
• Wæs dis ealond geo gewurƿad mid ƿam æƿelestrum ceastrum, twega wana ƿrittigum, ƿa ƿe wæron
• Was this island once made-splendid with the noblest castles, two less-than thirty, that there were.
So what? (2)
• Intelligibility is a matter of degree.
• Intelligibility depends on prior experience.
• Varieties can vary continuously in– Space– Time
• New varieties such as pidgins and creoles are especially hard to classify.
• So languages are fictions, not fact.
Are dialects any more real?
• We think and talk about divisions within a language in terms of dialects and registers.– E.g. London dialect– Standard English– Academic English
• But are dialect boundaries fact or fiction?
Which dialect is this …
…and this?
So what? (3)
• All native speakers of a language recognise some dialects.
• But these are learned from experience, so we recognise different dialects.
• The more experience we have, the more distinctions we make.
• So how do these mental distinctions compare with reality?
Dialect geography
• Dialectologists traditionally recorded the words and pronunciations of elderly speakers in remote villages.
• They showed their findings on maps, with a different map for each feature.
• They drew lines separating different areas of use: isoglosses.
ARM = [ɑ:m] or [ɑ:rm]?
SUN = [sʊn] or [sʌn]?
LAST = [last], [la:st] or [lɑ:st]?
HOUSE = [haus] or [aus]?
So what? (4)
• Every isogloss follows a different path.
• Every variable linguistic feature has a different social distribution.
• Dialect boundaries can’t be defined by bundles of isoglosses.
• Dialects are fictions, not facts.
• But they have some value in thinking and talking about language variation.
And standard dialect?
• This is at least as real as any other variety.
• Standard English is defined by publishers.– It’s the language of education – especially at
university level.
• In some countries the standard variety is a register, used only in public.– Called ‘diglossia’, e.g. German Switzerland
And registers?
• Folk sociolinguistics recognises some registers by name:– Slang– Baby-talk– Chatting, lecturing, preaching, etc.
• But individual linguistic features are related to individual situation features.
So what?
• Folk sociolinguistics recognises global categories as related to each other:– varieties of language – social categories (people, situations)
• But these are fictions rather than facts.
• The facts show much more complex relations between linguistic items and social characteristics.
Coming shortly
• Week 4: How we look after each other’s faces.
• Week 5: Power and solidarity.