“LANGUAGE, SOCIETY and CULTURE”

“SPEECH”Is a clue in terms

of:

-Regional accent

-Dialect

Has features unrelated to

regional variation

Two people growing up in the same place, may speak different because of social factors.

Is a form of social identity which indicates membership of:

SPEECH

-Different social groups-Different speech communities

Group of people who share a set of norms, rules and expectations regarding the use of language.

Speech communities

Investigating language from this perspective is known as

“Sociolinguistics”

Language

Society

SOCIOLINGUISTICS 1)Anthropology 2)Sociology 3)Social Psychology

1) Investigation of language and culture

2) Role of language in organization of social groups and institutions.

3) Attitudes and perceptions are expressed, how in group and out group behaviours are identified.

“SOCIAL DIALECTS”-Class-Education-Age-Sex

Varieties of language use by groups defined according to:

Social value Language use

Phenomenon:covert prestige

Better or positive valued of speaking

in social communities

Ex: schoolboys attach covert prestige to forms of “bad” languages.

“SOCIAL CALSS AND EDUCATION”•People who have leave the educational system early uses infrequent words in speech. Ex: Them boys throwed something•People who have gone to college and University have spoken language features from written language, that is why professors talk like books.

Social classes sound differentThe results of a study in New York, showed that:

U.S higher socioeconomic status more [r] sounds. Lower socioeconomic status, fewer [r] sounds.

But in England it has the opposite social value.

“AGE and GENDER”Grand parent-grandchild

time span, is the most noticeable variation of age.

•Recent researches have shown that:Female speakers tend to use more prestigious forms than male speakers with the same social background.

An extreme version of

variation according to

the gender speaker, was

found in the Carib

Indians, where different

sexes used different

languages.

Discuss personal feelings. They uses expressions associated with tentativeness ex: hedges(sort of), tags (isn't?)

Prefer to discuss sports and news. In conversations, men used to interrupt women.

“ETHNIC BACKGROUND”SOCIETY

ETHNIC BACKGROUNDS

Differences in speech

AFICAN-AMERICANSHave a dialect called

Black English Vernacular

It is a widespread

social dialect

Is stigmatized as “BAD SPEECH”

Ex1: Absence of the capula (forms of the verb to be), it is not standard English. “they mine or you crazy”

Ex2: The use of double negative.“He don’t know nothing”

IDIOLECTPersonal dialect of each individual speaker of a language.

“you are what you say”

STYLEIs related with the situation of use, it could be:-formal or informal writing or speaking.

REGISTER

The level and style of a piece of writing or speech, that is usually appropriate to the situation that it is used in.

JERGONTechnical vocabulary associated with a specifical activity or group.Ex: technology, engineering.