Language and social class/groups

Divergence

Changing language forms to match someone else - be seen as equal/same

• common in some working class people

Convergence

Keeping language forms the same, to uphold power or prestige

• common in middle/upper class people

Labov’s NY department study 1966

Sak’s - high

Macy’s - middle

Klein - low

• repeating ‘fourth floor’

• high and middle end stores tending to pronounce rhotic ‘r’, whilst low did not

Labov’s Martha’s Vineyard study 1963

• Chilmark fishermen - elongated vowels

• The young population - converged with CF as seen as wise (covert prestige)

• Tourists

Looked at /aw/ and /ay/ phonemes in house, spice.

Eckert Jocks and Burnouts 2000

Jocks adopted a middle-class culture

13% double negation for girl jocks

48% double negation for girl/boy burnouts

Milroy open and closed networks (Belfast) 1978

Studying non-standard forms like the pronunciation of the /th/ in ‘father’

• Open = One’s contacts tend to not know each other

• Closed = one’s contacts tend to know each other

Men - dense, closed networks and high non-standard forms

Women - less dense, open, low non-standard forms

* Shows that social class is more controlling over language than gender *

Trudgill Norwich study 1974

Studied g-dropping in ‘walking’ and ‘talking’

• Women over-reported number of standard forms used (cared about overt prestige)

• Men over-reported use of non-standard forms (showing desired covert prestige)

  * The higher the class, the more use of standard forms *

Basil Bernstein codes 1970s

Restricted code - implicit, context-dependent, simple and relaxed conjunctions

Elaborated code - explicit, detailed, subordinate clauses/conjunctions

• Middle class freely switched between codes, as both are advantageous.

• Rare to see working-class using elaborated.

Giles Accommodation Theory 1971

Individuals diverge speech to maintain or decrease bonds, and match speech patterns with interlocutor (other party in convo) to strengthen social bond.

• interpersonal - communication driven by personalities

• intergroup - driven by identity as members of wider social group (teachers act on behalf of all teachers etc)

Cheshire Reading study 1982

Boys - more likely to be sympathetic to crime and use non-standard forms more

• consciously using covert prestige in non-standard forms

Shows that peers enforce norms of language

Moore Valley Girls (Bolton) 2010

Studied pronunciation of NSF of ‘were’ and ‘what’

1. Populars: anti-school

2. Townies: risky behaviour

3. Geeks: institutionally orientated

4. Eden Valley girls: desirable home area, shopping etc (middle class)

All used NSF except geeks = despised.

Joanna Thornborrow

One of the most fundamental ways we create and identity and alter people’s perceptions of ourselves = through language

Goffman’s facework theory 1967

• face = positive social value one gains during interactions

• facework = strategies to maintain or defend face

Types of facework:

• avoidance - preventing situations threatening face

• corrective - fixing face when damaged (apologising)

Halliday’s theory of anti-language

used by subcultures (prisoners, gangs)

• Screw = guard

• strapped = carrying a gun

used to disguise activity and intent