Sociolinguistics (Language Variation)

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Sociolinguistics (Language Variation)

• Ling 400

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Sociolinguistics Goals

• identify aspects of socioeconomic factors in
  language variation
• identify aspects of gender and ethnicity as
  factors in language variation
• describe how shifts in speech contexts cause
  changes in speaking styles
• list the reasons why standard national dialects
  are problematic propositions

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What is sociolinguistics?

• Sociolinguistics The study of the
  interrelationships between language and social
  structure centrally concerned with how language
  varies (at a single point in time) and changes
  (over time) according to how people in society
  use it.

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Overview

• Language vs. dialect
• Language variation
• variation in different subareas (phonology,
  syntax, etc.)
• variation conditioned by different
  factors(region, socioeconomics, gender, age,
  etc.)
• Language and cultural identity, attitudes about
  language

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Linguistic community

• Language
• Dialect 1 Dialect 2 Dialect 3
• Idiolect 1 Idiolect 2 Idiolect 3, etc.

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Dialects (linguists definition)

• Mutually intelligible varieties e.g. English
  spoken in Seattle, English spoken in London, UK
• Not dialects of same language W. Germanic
  (English) spoken in Seattle and W. Germanic
  (Dutch) spoken in Amsterdam

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Sources of confusion re dialect

• Politically distinct ? linguistically distinct.
  200 countries vs. 6000 languages
• Chinese languages spoken in same country,
  mislabeled dialects
• Spoken in different countries, mislabeled
  languages
• (Czech, Slovak), (Serbian, Croatian),
  (Norwegian, Swedish, Danish)

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Difficulties with mutualintelligibility
definition

• 1. There are degrees of mutual intelligibility
  what is criterion 100? 90? 50
• Birmingham, UK vs. Seattle, WA
• 2. Asymmetries in intelligibility Danish
  speakers find it easier to understand Swedish
  than vice versa.

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Different types of dialects

• "Standard" dialect usually that used by
  political leaders, media, higher socioeconomic
  classes
• Standard vs. prescriptively correct
• Some standard dialects of English
• Standard American English (SAE)
• Received Pronunciation (RP) (UK)

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Standard vs. non-standardvarieties of
American English

• Deletion of voiced stops after nasals
• standard non-standard
• comb ko?m ko?m
• sing s?? s??
• land lænd læn

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Language variation

• Factors contributing to variation
• Geography
• Socioeconomics
• Gender
• Age

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Labovs study (1972)

• Post-vocalic ? (e.g. floor) in NYC
• File 10.4
• casual speech careful
  speech
• Saks 63 64
• Macys 44 61
• S. Klein 8 18

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Case study (Japanese)

• There are some interesting socio-semantic facts
  that should be of interest to you. I will discuss
  some of them.

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Sociolinguistics and Semantics

• Pronouns and address terms
• Japanese has many first and second pronouns, but
  when they are used (esp. 2nd person pronouns),
  you have to be very careful. You usually avoid
  them. (It is hard not to be rude.)
• 1st gender neutral watakushi, watashi
• male boku, ore, oira, washi (obsolete)
• female atashi, uchi (Kyoto dialect?)
• 2nd an(a)ta, omae, kimi, kisama, NAME-san,
  NAME-kun, NAME-tyan, kisama (archaic and rude)
• kisama honorable person can only be used when
  you are ready to fight.

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Sociolinguistics and Semantics

• Pronouns and address terms
• 3rd kare he, kanozyo she, ano-hito that
  person, ano-ko that child that girl
• kare he and kanozyo she were introduced only
  recently
• Name-san can be used in sentences (e.g.
  questions) addressed to this person. So it is
  indeed like a second person pronoun.
• E.g. Does Mr. Tanaka like sushi? This can mean
  Mr. Tanaka, do you like sushi? in Japanese.

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Kinship Terms

• Insider forms vs. outsider forms
• In-Group Forms (-san can be replaced by -tyan)
• too-san dad, okaa-san mom, onii-san elder
  brother, onee-san elder sister, ozii-san
  grandfather, ozi-san uncle, etc.
• Used within the family members like pronouns.
• They can also be address terms.
• Out-Group Forms
• titi father, haha mother, ani elder
  brother, ane elder sister, otooto younger
  brother, imooto younger sister
• Used outside the family circle.
• They cannot be address terms.

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Male vs. Female Language

• Males and females speak in different ways in
  Japanese. This is deemphasized recently, but the
  difference still exists. 1st person pronouns
  ore, boku (male) atashi (female), Sentence-ending
  particles -ze (male) wa (female) -naa (neutral)
• Kirei-na kesiki-da ze. It is a nice view.
• pretty scenery-be ending (male)
• Kirei-na kesiki-da wa. It is a nice view.
• pretty scenery-be ending (female)
• This rule is being broken nowadays.
• Yabai, yabai!. (young female college students)
• Be-in-trouble Its great. (can suggest Its a
  nice view.)
• (yabai used to be a word reserved for males and
  indicate a negative situation.)

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Names vs. pronouns

• Names are used more often in Japanese sentences
  than in English sentences.
• You can even use names in place of 2nd person
  pronouns. (In fact, using names is usually more
  appropriate/polite.) This is not possible in
  English.
• Mary is talking to John.
• Mary John-san wa nani-o bennkyo-si te imasu ka?
• John-HON TOP what-ACC study-PROG-PRES-Q
• What are you studying?
• Literally What is John studying?

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Kinship Terms used for Strangers

• Kinship terms are used as address terms/pronouns
  when dealing with strangers (getting obsolete and
  can be rude, but still used by older people)
• 1530ish male onii-san elder brother
• female onee-san elder sister
• 3060ish male ozi-san uncle, female oba-san
  aunt
• 4070ish male otoo-san father, female okaa-san
  mother
• 65 male ozii-san grandfather, female obaa-san
  grandmother

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Honorifics and Humble Forms

• Japanese distinguishes between honorific forms of
  verbs and humble forms of verbs in some cases.
• Honorifics (raise the status of the subject)
• Humble Forms (lower the status of the subject)
• syokuzi-o mesiagat-ta. (honorable person) ate.
• meal-ACC eat (honorific)-PAST
• Syokuzi-o itadai-ta. (humble person) ate.
• meal-ACC eat (humble)-PAST
• Syokuzi-o tabe-ta. (no honorific) ate.

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Honorifics and Humble Forms

• These different verbs with the same meaning give
  the listener some clue as to who the subject is.
  In this sense, honorifics are somewhat like
  agreement in European languages.
• Itadaku eat receive (humble) can be used as
  an auxiliary verb too.
• syatyoo-ni tegami-o kaite itadai-ta.
• president-DAT letter-ACC write receive-PAST
• (I) had the P. write a letter for me.
• Itadai-ta received the favor of