Chapter 8- Language Change

Traditional approach to historical linguistics

Historical linguists compiled sets of systematic correspondences between languages they thought were genetically related, then compared sounds in the language to the earliest forms of the related ones and presented genetic relations in a tree diagram. They also believed that sound changes must be studied diachronically, years after they happened, because the changes were too gradual to be observed.

Modern/sociolinguistic approach to historical linguistics

Weinrich, Herzog, and Labov (1968) said that although not all linguistic variation involves change, all language change involves variation, and we can observe language change synchronically, or while it is happening, which reveal their linguistic outcome and social mechanism (how they begin & spread)

Apparent time construct

States that a person’s language is relatively fixed after acquisition (critical period), and that older speakers represent the state of language when they acquired it as children

Age grading hypothesis

Opposite of apparent time hypothesis, states that language can change over adulthood, so young people may begin to speak like older people as they age, and language will remain diachronically stable

Labov (1963): Martha’s Vineyard

• Variable:Raising of /ay/ (price) and /aw/ (mouth) diphthongs

• Sample: 69 native islanders on Martha’s Vineyard, MA

• IV: Age, occupation, ethnicity, and place of residence

• Method: sociolinguistic interview

  • Divided by IV, as well as their attitude toward the island (positive, neutral, negative)

• Results

  • Centralization is seen most prominently in the 31-45 age group, fishermen, people from the up-island

    • Most advanced in people in 30s & early 40s who were fishermen living in the up-island

  • Centralization is also seen most in those with a positive view of the island

• Conclusion

  • Residents exaggerated their centralization to show solidarity and separation from the summer population

  • Those who identified more with the island centralized more

Eckert (1989)

• Variable: Northern Cities vowel shift in Detroit

• Sample: students from a white suburban Detroit High School divided into pro-school “jocks” and anti-school “burnouts”

  • Jocks: middle-class or middle-class aspiration students

  • Burnouts: WC or want to identify as such

• Results

  • Variables for girls ranged more for girls than for boys

    • Difference between jock and burnout girls was greater than jock and burnout boys

  • Girls were required to do linguistically more than boys to establish their places

  • NCS phrases (backing) are used by burnouts

  • Older phrases (raising trap and fronting loft) are led by girls

  • Social distinction more important for girls than boys

Labov (1990)

• Variable: vowel shifts in Philadelphia English: /eyC/ raising in snake, raising of /aw/, fronting of /owF/

• Results

  • 3 of 4 changes led by women

  • Female-led changes has curvilinear correlations with SEC being more advanced among UWC and least advanced among LWC

• Conclusion

  • Changes from below led by women as a response to their SEC

  • Enthusiastic participation of women results in opportunities for

Sankoff & Blondeau (2007)

• Variable: /r/ backing in Montreal French

• Sample: 120 speakers recorded in 1971

• Method: real and apparent-time study

• Results

  • 120 speakers in 1971 had dorsal /r/ increasing in apparent time

  • 32 of the speakers were recorded again in 1984, and 20 speakers were stable between studies, proves apparent time hypothesis

  • 9 displayed increase in dorsal /r/

• Conclusion

  • Change across lifespan

General transmission of change

Change from below, involves children learning local community patterns from parents and peers

Spatial diffusion of change

Change from above, involves adults learning new variants from communities with external prestige