Language in Social groups

what is reclamation

a group begins using a word or phrase that has previously been used un an offensive way

what is linguistic determination

the idea that the language we use makes us think a certain way

what is a social group

groups of people who have something in common

what is density

a term used by lesley milroy to describe close connections someone has within their social group

what are tight connections

a term used by lesley milroy to describe close connections between members of a social group

what are loose connections

a term used by lesley milroy to describe less close connections between members of a social group

what are sociolinguistic features

broad features of language which do not tend to change when we are talking to different people e.g dialect, intonation, vocabulary range

what are stylistic features

narrower features of language over which we have more control e.g use of slang, subject-specific vocabulary

examples of social groups

local communities, occupational group, age group, hobby-based group, identity-based group

who devised social network theory

Lesley Milroy

when was social network theory devised

1987

what did social network theory analyse

the language of small, close-knit communities of people in inner-city belfast which at the time was a war-torn city (the troubles)

why was milroy critical of studies like petyt and labov

they externally define the social class of the participants rather than considering how the participants categorise themselves

she felt that such studies do not take into account how people view their own position in society​

what did milroy find about density in belfast

the higher someone’s density score, the stronger their accent was – particularly the localised pronunciation of ‘th’ and ‘a’​

this demonstrates a high level of convergence​

participants who had a lower density score often demonstrated less strong accents​

this was often the case with those who were isolated geographically, such as farmers​

what did milroy find about men

the stronger accent was particularly noticeable amongst men; high levels of unemployment during the ‘troubles’ meant that men were more likely to socialise with one another.​

what did milroy find about women

milroy found that women had less strong Belfast accents and demonstrated more features of ‘standard’ pronunciation​

this could be attributed to their gender and their desire for overt prestige ​

however, it could also be attributed to the fact that they tended to look for employment outside the community and so developed a number of ‘loose’ ties to other social networks – this could have affected females’ accents​

who came up with sociolinguistic/stylistic language feature

David Crystal

factors that affect sociolinguistic features

region, social class, education, gender

factors that affect stylistic features

occupation, hobbies/interests, social group, context

what is familect

a particular style of language only used within that family or household

what four categories of words tend to be found in familect

baby/ childish words​

mispronunciations/malapropisms​

more interesting words for boring objects​

words to name a concept that doesn’t have an adequate words​

how does familect link to performativity

the idea that we use language to perform a role

why might familect be used

memories, identify oneself as part of a group, form better connections within a family

what is a shibboleth

ways in which language features identifies someone as belonging to a particular group

what is sociolect

the language of a social group (eg a group of people who have a shared interest)

what are initialisms

phrases using the initial letters of a phrase (eg LFM -looking for more)

what abbreviations

shortened words (eg ad rather than advertisement)

what are conversions

a word used as a different word class (eg random as a adjective converted into a noun - randoms)

what is jargon

subject specific lexis

who carried out research into sociolect in 2000 in american highschools

penelope eckhert

which 2 groups did penelope eckhert identify

the jocks and the burnouts

what did penelope eckhert find about the burnouts

they were rebels who refused to participate in school life

tended to use the exaggerated pronunciations of their urban detroit neighbourhood, demotic language, specialist slang, casual greetings (yo)

creating a resistance identity

diverging from the language of their parents

what did penelope eckhert find about the jocks

spoke in amore socially prestigiousway, using standardgrammar andpronunciation​

tended to convergeto the language of theirparents​

examples of polari

ecaf (face), batts (shoes), scarper (run off)

what is polari

In the 1950’s and 1960’s, British gay men (especially in London) spoke Polari, a coded form of language that allowed the men to speak publicly about their sexuality​

what is amelioration

a word or phrases meaning becomes more positive over time

what does self-label mean

the term that an individual chooses to use to refer to themselves

what are stigmatizing labels

terms that have negative or derogatory connotations when used to label someone

what is a minority group

a group which is outnumbered or less powerful than another

why do people reclaim words

makes the users of the term fell more powerful

empowers members of a community

to control society

pride

political activism

to oppose

why does reclamation not work

people don’t always understand that the word has been reclaimed​

people have different meanings for the reclaimed version​

some people don’t want to reclaim a word​

it can distract from more meaningful causes

what research did galinsky do (2013)

power is defined as control over valuable resources so self-labelling is a form of power because it contests who can use the term

this research found that reclaiming a word was driven by a sense of group power​

the sense of group power increased through the reclamation of a stigmatizing label​

power only increased when a stigmatising label was reclaimed, not when a more neutral term was used.​

what two things does the use of familect illustrate about language

its creative and playful​

its emotional/linked to emotions​

what does coinage mean

adding new words to our language

what is a word-coiner

someone who makes up new words

five other ‘languages’ that have contributed to Polari

thieves’ cant, Cockney rhyming slang, backslang, Yiddish, American air force slang

who came up with the term ‘anti-language’

Michael Halliday​

why was polari necessary in the 1960s

homosexuality was illegal

why has the use of Polari has declined

Homosexuality more accepted​

Over exposure (on radio/TV shows)​

examples of words that have been reclaimed

queer, b*tch, sl*t, suffragette, the n word, ginger, nerd, geek, c*nt​

what is linguistic determinism also known as

the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis​

types of linguistic feature you might find in online gaming language

initialisms, abbreviations, conversions, jargon​