Masterslides-1b - Arbeitsbereicheroland/SLANG12/presentations/Handout-1b.… · carried out using three main methods: speech, writing and ... FAMILY TREE AND WAVE MODELS ... SLANG

11.06.2012

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TRANSMISSION AND

DIFFUSIONWilliam Labov, University of Pennsylvania. June 2007

Presented by Milena Jakubaszek.

LINGUISTIC TRANSMISSION

�The unbroken sequence of native – language

acquisition by children

�Transmission of language is connected

with the transmission of culture

�Language is transmitted culturally; that is, it is

learned.

�The children very largely acquire their mother

tongue by “grammar construction” from

exposure to a random collection of utterances

that they encounter.

Transmission of language (our thoughts, feelings, ideas) is

carried out using three main methods: speech, writing and

signing.

LINGUISTIC DIFFUSION

�Lost of a language pattern

�lexical diffusion is both a

phenomenon and a theory.

�Example: English /uː/ has changed to

/ʊ/ in good and hood but not in food;

some dialects have it in hoof and roof

but others do not; in flood and blood

�Transfer across branches of the family

tree)

FAMILY TREE AND WAVE MODELS OF CHANGE

�Linguistic family tree presents the relations between languages

�There can appear the influence of distinct terminal branches of the tree on one another.

�Every language change arises in a specificregion and then moves in very variousdirections because of migrations.

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� Language change processes are ilustrated by the

the waves created when a stone is thrown into a

body of water

``EPICENTERS``

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TRANSMISSION

AND DIFFUSION

The transmission of linguistic change:

within a specific (speech) society is described by an

incrementation within a faithfully reproduced pattern

characteristic of family tree model.

The diffusion:

accros communities shows weakening of the original

pattern and a loss of structural features.

EXAMPLES OF TRANSMISSION AND

DIFFUSION AND FURTHER CONSEQUENCES

Two studies of Transmission and Diffusion:

1. the diffusion of the grammatically conditioned

short-a split of NYC

2. the diffusion of the northern cities shift

1. and 2. are supposed to ilustrate the

phenomenon of linguistic transmisson and diffusion

which are the results of the difference between the

learning abilities of children and adults.

THE DIFFUSION OF THE NEW

YORK CITY SHORT-A SYSTEM

� The diffusion of the NYC short-a system. Almost all

North American dialects show a raising and fronting

of some members of the historical short-a class.

Phonetic conditioning is always present: in some

cases as a continuum, in others as a discrete

division into tense and lax distributions. In some

cases the tense and lax classes are phonetically

predictable by simple rules; in others, they are not.

�There are five basic types:

�(a) The nasal system, All short-a before nasal consonants are tense (man, manage, span, Spanish) while all others are lax.

�(b) Raised short-a. �(c) Continuous short-a raising. �(d) Southern breaking. �(e) Complex short-a systems.

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� The dialect of New York City is confined to the city itself

and several neighboring cities in northeastern New Jersey.

� The NYC short-a distribution follows the same distribution

throughout this area, and as far as we know, has been

stable through most of the twentieth century.

� the New York City short-a system is very far from whatever

beginnings it had as a simple, phonetically determined

sound change.

� Research: an opportunity to see what happens to this

complex structure when it diffuses to other communities.

� The New York City pattern has diffused to four other

communities, along the paths shown in Figure 7.

FIGURE 7. DIFFUSION OF THE NEW YORK CITY SHORT-A PATTERN

TO FOUR OTHER SPEECH

COMMUNITIES.

DIFFUSION TO NORTHERN NEW

JERSEY.

�A very common utterance for all residents of this

Northern New Jersey area was, ‘Did you say C-A-N

or C-AN-T?’ since the vowel is tense in both words

and the /t/ is often neutralized by a following apical

obstruent (as in ‘I can’t tell you’).

�Tense vowels are found in am, and, an as well. The

whole change appears as an instance of the loss of

structural detail in the diffusion of the NYC short-a

system to dialects with which it is in contact.

DIFFUSION TO ALBANY.

�Albany was settled before New York

City.

�The back vowel /oh/ in law and coffee:

raised to upper mid back position AND

shows the type of rounding (‘pursing’)

that is specific to New York City.

�the Albany system shows some

marked departures from NYC.

DIFFUSION TO CINCINNATI.

�The city of Cincinnati is represented by

speakers analyzed acoustically.

�The analyze is focused on the basic

division into tense and lax sets

characteristic of NYC.

�The tense set includes short a before

nasals (ham, aunt, chance, divan),

voiceless fricatives (cash, hashbrowns)

and voiced stops (mad, sad, dad).

FIGURE 11. SHORT-A SYSTEM OF LUCIA M., 58[1994],

CINCINNATI OH, TS 120.

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�Cincinnati has general tensing before all voiced stops except /g/.

�Why..?

� Westward migration from New England, 19th

century

�Effective diffusion:

� Cincinnati dialect resisted leveling with other Midland dialects to the end of the 20th century.

�Therefore, the British broad-a class was transformed early in the formation of the American English of the two major cities of the Mid- Atlantic states; does not diffuse to others.

DIFFUSION TO NEW ORLEANS

�Commercial relationships with NYC.

�New Orleans has the palatalized form of

the r-less mid central vowel [´I] (work,

thirty)

� It forms the main stereotype of older New

York City speech.

�However, the r-colored form used by

many New Yorkers today shows a

continuing trace of palatalization.

FIGURE 12. LPC ANALYSIS OF PRONUNCIATION OF VOWEL NUCLEI

OF (A) FIRST AND (B) PERS(ON)

BY SYBIL P., 69 [1996], NEW ORLEANS LA, TS611.

a b

� Figure 12 displays this phonetic characteristic of

New Orleans in two mid-central vowel nuclei as

pronounced by one of the oldest ANAE speakers

from New Orleans, Sybil P, 69, of German-Italian

background.

� 19th century, the New Orleans port of shipment for

the cotton trade financed by New York bankers.

� Among the bankers closely related to New Orleans

were many representatives of the large Sephardic

Jewish families

� The relations between the Jewish population of the

two cities were intimate, which deals with social and

business relations from 1718 to 1812.

� There is no longer a difference between [Cardinal]

/mæniN/ and /mæhn#iN/ [the pumps].

� The main agents in diffusion are adults who are less

likely to observe and replicate abstract features of

language structure.

DIFFUSION ACROSS COMMUNAL

GROUPS

� So far: -the diffusion of linguistic structures

from place to place.

-white mainstream population

� Most American cities include three major communal

groups, in the sense defined in Blanc’s 1964 study

of the Muslim, Christian and Jewish dialects of

Baghdad.

� Contacts between such communal groups are

primarily among adults, and when linguistic patterns

diffuse from one group to the other we can expect

the same loss of structure that was observed in

geographic diffusion.

THE TRANSMISSION AND DIFFUSION OF

MERGERS AND SPLITS.

� Adult language learning must be focused on the acquisition of new grammatical constraints.

� They can be faithfully transmitted across generations through children’s language learning abilities.

� But: this complexity cannot be learned as a second dialect, even by children.

� Children of parents from regions with allophonic short-a distributions of type (a-c) above showed the opposite tendencies, favoring phonetic generalization.

� This strongly suggests that the NYC families had acquired their own short-a pattern as a lexical list rather than as a rule-governed distribution.

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So) what does happen in the cities?

�An unbroken sequence of parent-to-child

transmission

�If speakers from other dialect areas enter

the community in large numbers, their

children will dilute the uniformity of the

original pattern.

THE SOCIAL CONTEXT OF TRANSMISSION

AND DIFFUSION.

� The incrementation of change: children learn

to talk differently from their parents.

� Children align the variants heard in the

community with the vector of age: the

younger the speaker, the more advanced the

change.

� On the other hand, contact across

communities involves learning, primarily by

adults, who acquire the new variants of the

originating community in a simplified form.

�Analyze: adults are capable of changing their language, but at a much slower rate than children.

�Adult learning loses much of the fine structure of the linguistic system being transmitted.

�The diffusion of specific linguistic structures: spring from adult language contact.

�Observation: common marks of adult language learning: the loss of linguistic configurations that are reliably transmitted only by the child language learner.

PROSPECTUS

The main thrust of the paper is to explain the

difference between the learning abilities of

children (unbroken sequence of parent-to-

child transmission ) and adults (the major

effects of diffusion).

� Adults do participate in ongoing change, more

sporadically and at a much lower rate than children.

� When language forms are transmitted by contact of

single adults or individual families, less regular

transmission can be expected.

THE CASE: the basic reason why structural

borrowing is rare:

the adults who are the borrowing agents do not

faithfully reproduce the structural patterns in the

system they are borrowing from.

OVERVIEW

�Expectations:

� From where the differences

between languages are coming out

in general

� Why some people product clicks

sound and other sch, u, ü, ą, ź, ć.

�This paper: tensing and laxing the

vovel – a )

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BUT)

�More detalis of the paper work are cut,

more interesting things can be seen!

�NYC short –a system as an example of

many other social networks, language

changes, dialects.

�Not typical explenation of the differences

between adults and children language

learning skills.

�<finally, I was satisfied.

A study by William Labov, University of Pennsylvania 2006

SLANG SEMINAR12.06.2012

Sabrina Galasso

12.06.2012 32SLANG - Unendangered Dialects, Endangered People

1. Introduction

2. The Unendangered Dialect AAVE

3. Residential Segregation

4. The Minority Gap in Reading

5. Differences by Region

6. Conclusion

Outline:Outline:


What the article is about:

� Linguistic diversity and it’s influence on features of social life

� Focused on the development of a special dialect (AAVE)

What makes it special as a paper about linguistic diversity:

� a different view of the concept of linguistic diversity

� Explains that social factors can cause a dialect to diverge

� Shows that this divergence can affect social conditions in a negative way


1. 1. IntroductionIntroduction


2. The 2. The unendangeredunendangered dialectdialect AAVEAAVE(African American (African American VernacularVernacular English)English)

� principally spoken by working-class African Americans

� not an endangered dialect

� Emerges as a geographically uniform system

� The following characteristics show that it is steadily diverging

white vernaculars AAVE

New York City(Labov 1966,1994)

shifting (ay) to the back shifting (ay) to the front

Northern Cities Shift(Gordon 2000)

/ae/-raisingcad � ked or kid

/o/-frontingcod � cad

/ɛ/ -backing bed � cad



a) no participation in regional sound changes of white vernaculars(dialects)

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b) Alignments of AAVE with general sociolinguistic features

�alignments exist, but occur in a higher frequency:

Example: t,d –deletion (e.g. “street” becomes “stree”)

� White groups with very little contact to blacks:20 to 30% show t,d-deletion before obstruents

� Black groups with or without contact to whites:50 to 100% show t,d-deletion before obstruents

(in Philadelphia; Study by Ash and Myhill 1986)


c) Absence of morphosyntactic features:



•-t,-d deletion

•possessive {s} deletion

•3rd singular {s} deletion

•copula {s} deletion Percent absence for 4 features for 287 elementary school

children by language and ethnic-group(in Philadelphia, Atlanta and California)

d) Changes in the semantics of tense

� Labov considers changes in semantics to be a more dramatic development, than morphosyntactic changes

� Use of had + verb instead of simple preterit:

They went to the cinema.

They had went to the cinema. (�often no use of past participle, in this case ‘gone’)



e) Changes in the semantics of mood and aspect



The rise of the habitual ‘be’

An invariant form of be, which does not alternate with is, amor are:

[Penn student, observing outside of MacDonald’s:]Homeless: You got any change?Me: No. Sorry.Homeless: A’ight, maybe when you come out.Me: Maybe.[after I come out]Homeless: You got any?[hand him some change]

Homeless: Thank you man. People be tellin’ me when they

come out they still don’t have change and I KNOW they be

lyin’. Thank you.

‘be’ as an essential and permanent state

meaning is not habitual, but a permanent and steady state, an essential characteristic of the subject

‘HAH! I be the number one chosen just to keep you openChill with your thoughts I got your brain frozen’--Busta Rhymes, Do My Thing/The Coming

Thedevelopment of ‘be done’

perfect ‘be done’:will have + past participle � be done + past participle

“They be done drunk up all the wine by the time we get there”

resultative ‘be done’:

I’ll be done killed that XXX if he tries to lay a hand on my kid again.



a) The Great Migration of African Americans from the rural south to large cities primarily in the North (1914-1970)


3. Residential Segregation3. Residential Segregation

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� residential segregation is a by-product of the initial stages of immigration to large cities

� Normally thought:immigrant groups follow a natural path of decreasing concentration over time (obtain jobs, intermarry etc.) � assimilation to American society

� According to a study of five ethnic groups:African-American group is the only one that shows a rise in residential segregation from 1850 until 1970

� Possible reason for that:many other social problems, such as racial segregation, that afflict specifically this ethnic group



b) interrelationship :poverty rate -- other social conditions -- residential segregation

The higher the poverty, the higher is also �the crime rate �the percent of female-headed families�the percent of high school students scoringbelow 15th percentile

(especially at a level of complete racial segregation)



c) The core speakers of AAVE

The closer the contact to speakers of other dialects, the less the characteristics of AAVE



Percent absence of three morphological features of standard English in North Philadelphia

(Ash and Myhill 1986)

residential segregation + growing poverty

minority gap in reading

Only a small proportion of African-American 4th graders are proficient readers:


4. The 4. The MinorityMinority Gap in ReadingGap in Reading

Interrelationship:

percentage of readers -- percentage of low income students


4. The 4. The MinorityMinority Gap in ReadingGap in Reading


5. 5. Differences by RegionDifferences by Region

differences in the grammar of AAVE by region:

�caused by different percentages of African-Americans in the given regions

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6. 6. ConclusionConclusion

A vicious circle:� The contact between speakers of AAVE and speakers of

other dialects should be supported

� A reduction of the residential segregation which has led to a falling off in quality of social life in the inner cities should be pursued

� More effective educational programs should be created

�AAVE wouldn’t diverge anymore as much as it is diverging at the moment, but it would improve social conditions.



My opinion:

it demonstrates the interplay between the development of a dialect and the development of social criteria:

�kind of network, where language conditions affect social conditions and the other way around. �Where should the vicious circle be interrupted? In the schools, so that children learn to read more competently, or should a better economic base be built first of all?�the starting point is the language which is directly followed by inadequate instructions. So in my opinion first of all the situation in education should be supported financially. Unfortunately we end at the point, where money is needed, but mostly not present.

Labov’s conclusion: “conditions that favor the divergence of AAVE should be changed”



What I would like to point out:

language and cultural diversity is an essential property of the human race

But:We should share each other’s ideas.

We should be interested in each other’s way of interpreting the world.

We cannot profit from this diversity by living in an isolated way, segregated

from other races, religions or cultures in general.



http://www.teachersofcolor.com/

William Labov, Columbia University

(1964)

� Introduction

� Study of Martha‘s Vineyard

� The Lower East Side Study- The consonantal (r)- Variation for (dh)- The aspect of social mobility- Responses to subjective evaluation tests bymobility type

� Conclusion

� Personal Statement

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� Five variables of the sound system display a regular structure of social and stylisticstratification in New York City

� Linguistic behavior is associated with theeconomic status

� Present study: further analyzation of thisstratification in correlation with thedimension of social mobility

� Observation: complex distribution of thecentralization of the diphtongs /ay/ and /aw/ in words like right, ride or about

� Made by people who laid claim to native status as Vineyarders and who had a positive orientation towards the island� Vineyarders who moved to the mainlanddid not show centralization

� Vineyarders who stayed on the island orreturned from the mainland showed

strong centralization

� Linguistic change reflects social movement

� Linguistic change has to be analyzed underthe aspect of social mobility

� Observation: wide range of variation in thesound system of New York English

� Supposition: correlation between linguisticbehavior and socio-economic status

� Interviews with adult native English speakerswere carried out

� Based on their educational level, theiroccupation and their family income they werecategorized into four groups:Lower Class, Working Class, Lower MiddleClass and Upper Middle Class

� Five phonological variables were examinedregarding casual speech, careful speech, reading style, pronunciation of individual words and minimal pairs

� Examination of the consonantal (r) in final and pre-consonantal position, e. g. in beard, car or bore

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� The higher the class, the higher the useof the consonantal (r)

� Deviation: lower middle class surpassesupper middle class in the more formal contexts� „hypercorrect“ behavior

� Variation for (dh), the initial consonant of this, then, the, etc.

� Index is built on a scale which rates- the fricative [ð] as the prestige form as (dh-1)- the affricate [dð] as (dh-2)- the stop [d] as the most stigmatized form as (dh-3)

� The higher the (dh) index, the greater thepercentage of nonstandard, nonprestigeforms

� Stratification of the population into twomajor groups:lower class and working class at the top,middle class groups near the bottom ofthe scale

� Two data as measures of social mobility:1) occupation of the father2) first occupation after leaving school

� Splitting of the occupations into four groups:

� Out of these data the following types of socialmobility were established:

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� Three principal mobility types:U, S and D

� People of these types from the firstsection were interviewed

� Results for the use of (r) in table 4

� Lower class: minimum tendency of using [r] in careful speech; lowest recognition ofprestige value of [r] in subjective responsetests

� Surprising: working class Ds do not showthe lowest (r) indexes, D is intermediate between U and S

� The U‘s among the working class and thelower middle class show the pattern ofhypercorrection in the use of (r)

� The hypercorrect pattern is morecharacteristic of upward mobility than ofmembership in any particular socio-economic group

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� Lower middle class: sharp differencebetween U and S, the S group showing freeruse of stigmatized form and the U groupholding much closer to the upper middleclass norm

� Lower class: irregular situation as the D type has a higher (dh) index in casualspeech as expected…

� … but the situation is different duringcareful speech

� Therefore in all tables a vertical viewthrough columns is most realistic andaccurate

� High agreement in recognizing middle classnorms of careful speech

� The following scheme could be confirmed:1) highest degree in the endorsement of thesenorms appear in the lower middle class

2) more moderate values in the upper middleclass

3) least recognition of middle class languagevalues in the lower class

� U group in the lower middle class: recognition of the prestige of (r)

� No differentiation in the working class andlower class regarding (r)

� In case of (dh) again the U group in thelower middle class shows highestagreement, in this case the lower classes

as well

� The English in the Lower East Side is sociallystratified

� Most striking: a group of speakers with a pasthistory of upward mobility is more apt toresemble the next higher socio-economicgroup in their linguistic behavior than the onewith which they are currently associated� upwardly mobile persons adopt the normsof the next higher group with which they

are in contact

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� A group which shows a past history of social stability tends to be governed more by its own linguistic norms, without style shifting

� A downward mobile category deviates in its nonacceptance of the normative patterns which other segments recognize

� The article is interesting but not up to date� Status of women and black people haschanged

� Very interesting:the linguistic behavior ofpersons who want to be in a higher class� Independent of the linguistic aspect thisbehavior can also be seen in everydaylife

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Masterslides-1b - Arbeitsbereicheroland/SLANG12/presentations/Handout-1b.… · carried out using three main methods: speech, writing and ... FAMILY TREE AND WAVE MODELS ... SLANG