LEL1B Theories

Specific theories by named scholars relevant for LEL1B

Trudgill (1999: 118)

[Standard English] is the variety of English normally used in writing, especially printing; it is the variety associated with the education system […], and is therefore the variety spoken by those who are often referred to as "educated people"; and it is the variety taught to non-native learners

Grimm’s Law 1

PIE voiceless stops become PG voiceless fricatives (spirantisation), but not went following an obstruent

/p t k/ > /f θ x/

Grimm’s Law 2

PIE voiced stops become PG voiceless stops (devoicing)

/b d g/ > /p t k/

Grimm’s Law 3

PIE voiced aspirated stops become PG voiced unaspirated stops (deaspiration)

/bʰ dʰ gʰ/ > /b d g/

Verner’s Law

A sound change that occurred after Grimm’s Law 1 in which voiceless fricatives become voiced fricatives, but only when following unstressed syllables

/f θ x/ > /v ð ɣ/

Chomsky (1959)

A finite-state machine is insufficient to capture the nuance of the more abstract thought used in the construction of sentences

Hockett (1960)

The design feature of a language is the ability to say completely new things which can be completely understood by other speakers

Aristotelian Theory of Concepts

A set of properties that characterises all and only instances of one singular concept

Austin (1962)

Coined the theory of speech acts

Grice’s maxims

Rules of conversation proposed to explain what people expect of their interlocutors, based on quality, quantity, manner, and relation

Dale & Reiter (1996)

Argument that, in a goal-oriented view of language, Grice’s Maxims are irrelevant as desired behaviour is likely to happen naturally

Ochs (1976)

Not every culture obeys every Gricean Maxim: e.g. Malagasy speakers do not obey the Quantity maxim due to their custom of secret guarding

Labov (1966)

Foundational sociolinguistic study of rhoticity in workers in three New York City department stores, finding that workers in Klein’s (working class) are less rhotic than those in Saks (upper-middle class)