Sociolinguistics Lecture Key Terms

Vocabulary terms and definitions from sociolinguistics lecture notes covering research methods, language varieties, and theories on language and society.

Variety

A neutral term used to refer to any kind of language — a dialect, accent, sociolect, style or register — that a linguist wants to discuss as a separate entity.

Language change

Linguistic variation over time.

Linguistic variation

When there is more than one way of saying the same thing.

Linguistic/sociolinguistic variable

A linguistic feature such as a sound, word, or grammatical form which has more than one variant, each carrying sociolinguistic significance.

Sociolinguistics

Work intended to achieve a better understanding of human language by studying it in its social context or to understand the interaction between language and society.

Sociology of language

A macrosociolinguistic branch of sociolinguistics focusing on the relationship between sociological factors and language choice.

Macrosociolinguistics

The study of relatively large groups of speakers, concentrating on the use of a variety and its social significance.

Microsociolinguistics

The study of relatively small groups of speakers, concentrating on linguistic variables and their significance.

Communicative competence

An concept by Dell Hymes referring to the ability to select grammatically correct expressions that appropriately reflect social norms governing behavior.

Ethnosemantics

The scientific study of the ways in which people label and classify the social, cultural, and environmental phenomena of their world.

Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis

The hypothesis of linguistic relativity claiming that language structure affects speakers' world view or cognition.

Semantic relativity

The idea that the ideas that can be expressed differ from language to language, as cited by Hudson in 1996.

Linguistic determinism

The idea that language and its structures limit or determine human knowledge, thought, and processes such as categorization or memory.

Speech community

A group participating in a set of shared norms, shared language use, and frequency of interaction.

Community of practice

An aggregate of people who come together around mutual engagement in an endeavor, based on Wenger (1998).

Virtual community

A group who may or may not meet face to face, exchanging words and ideas through digital networks.

Discourse community

A group that has shared goals or purposes and uses communication to achieve them.

Social network

An anthropological concept referring to the web of direct or indirect relationships an individual has through friendship, kinship, or other social ties.

Abstand language

A term by Heinz Kloss referring to a variety regarded as a language in its own right due to being linguistically very different (‘language by distance’).

Ausbau language

A term by Heinz Kloss for a variety that derives its status as a language from social, cultural, and political characteristics like autonomy (‘language by extension’).

Standard variety

A variety of language that has undergone standardization, is codified, and serves as a model to a larger speech community.

Standard English

A polycentric standard variety used in writing and by educated native speakers, with no single associated accent.

Language planning

Deliberate and conscious efforts to influence the behavior of others regarding the acquisition, structure, and functional allocation of language codes.

Language policy

The general linguistic, political, and social goals underlying the actual planning process.

Multilingualism

A sociolinguistic situation in which more than one language is involved within a society.

Diglossia

A situation where a prestigious ‘High’ variety is used in formal domains and a ‘Low’ vernacular is used in all other contexts, and members are native to the L variety.

Heteroglossia

The coexistence of distinct linguistic varieties, styles, or points of view within a single language.

Triglossia

The coexistence of three closely related native languages or dialects among a population.

RP (Received Pronunciation)

The pronunciation considered to be least regional; the accepted standard pronunciation of a specified area.

Estuary English

A variety of modified regional speech representing a mixture of non-regional and local south-eastern English pronunciation.

Dialect

A language variety differing grammatically, phonologically, and lexically, associated with a geographical area (regiolect) or social group (sociolect).

Isogloss

A line on a map that divides two different variants of the same linguistic variable.

Dialect boundary

A bundle of isoglosses occurring in the same location.

NORM

An acronym for Non-mobile, Old, Rural, and Male, describing the main group typically investigated for dialect studies.

Sociolinguistic interview

A research method consisting of multiple stages ranging from formal conversation to casual speech, and involving reading word lists and minimal pairs.

Age-grading

A phenomenon where speakers in a community gradually alter their speech habits as they get older.

Real-time studies

Studies of linguistic change investigating speech in a community and returning years later to observe how it has changed.

Deficit theory

Robin Lakoff's theory that women’s language is weak or deficient, reflecting their subordinate status in society.

Dominance theory

The theory that power differences between men and women are the main causes of discourse variation.

Difference theory

The theory that men and women develop separate styles because they are segregated into subcultures with different norms.

Social constructionist theory

A postmodern theory that gender is performative and identity is constructed differently according to the situation.

Slang

Vocabulary associated with very informal styles, matching social identity as an ‘in-group’ language.

Antilanguage

A variety of language usually spoken by marginal groups to be incomprehensible to other speakers or to exclude them.

Back slang

A form of antilanguage where words are disguised by being pronounced backwards, such as ‘yob’.

Pig Latin

An American schoolchild antilanguage created by moving the initial consonant to the end and adding the syllable /ei/.

Argot

A linguistic code specifically associated with street gangs.

Cant

A linguistic code specifically associated with organized gangs.

Register (diatype)

A language variety associated with a particular topic, subject, or activity, defined by field, tenor, and mode.

Genre

An identifiably distinct type of discourse or text recognized by a culture with specific linguistic characteristics.

Style

Internal variation of register associated with social context and levels of formality.

Multimodality

An inter-disciplinary approach understanding communication as being more than just language.

Intertextuality

The way in which texts are connected to one another and carry traces of other texts in form or content.