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70 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
- 3rd side (hint)
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Sociolinguistics |
The scientific study of the relationships between language and society. |
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Social category |
A way of grouping people by traits that are relatively fixed, such as class, gender or ethnicity, or open to active performance and construction, like identity. |
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Social relationships |
How each of us adapt our language to suit the situation and the audience. Often contrasted with social characteristics, the socially relevant traits that we are seen to possess. |
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Free variation |
A term used when the speaker's choice between forms (or variants) is completely arbitrary and unpredictable |
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Structured variation |
A term used when a speaker's choice between forms (or variants) is linked to other factors |
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Cateogrical |
The opposite of probalistic - categorical rules are absolute; they apply every time that they can apply |
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Sociology of language |
The branch of sociology concerned with language. Unlike sociolinguistics, this approach studies the social context of language without recourse to analysis of linguistic structure. |
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Mentalist |
The philosophy or approach that describes how language is represented in the mind |
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Competence |
A distinction drawn by Chomsky in 1965 (vs performance) that refers primarily to what speakers know about language |
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Performance |
What speakers actually produce when speaking (which might be full of false starts, errors, hesitations and other such "noise" as well as switches between dialects) |
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Empiricist |
The philosophy or approach that knowledge comes from sensory experiences |
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Standard |
The codified variety of a language that is taught in schools, used in formal writing and used by those trying to project authority or ability |
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Non-standard |
Varieties of a language other than the standard |
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Descriptive |
A non-evaluative approach, focused on how language is actually used without deciding if it's "right" or "wrong" |
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Prescriptive |
An approach to language that is focused on rules of correctness and how language "should" be used |
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Mutual intelligibility |
If people speaking different varieties of languages/dialects can understand each other, their varieties are mutually intelligible |
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Dialect |
A term referring to the subvarieties of a language. Often used by non-linguidtd as a synonym for accent. |
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Interlocutor |
The person you are talking to |
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Social distance |
The degree of intimacy or familiarity between interlocutors |
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Ethnography |
A branch of anthropology that deals with the scientific description of individual cultures |
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Speech community |
A group of people who are in habitual contact with one another, who share a language variety and social conventions, or sociolinguistic norms, about language use |
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Social network |
The different groups of people that each of us has interacted with over the years |
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Community of Practice (CofP) |
Unit of analysis that looks at a smaller analytical domain than social networks. Characterised by mutual engagement, a jointly negotiated enterprise and a shared repertoire. |
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Sociolinguistic norms |
A combination of expressed attitudes and variable linguistic behaviour shared by all members of a speech community |
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Dense |
A term used to describe the number of connections within a social network |
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Multiplex |
A term used to describe social networks in which members have multiple connections with one another |
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Speaker agency |
The ability of speakers to control what they do and make conscious choices |
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Heuristic |
Guidelines for how to approach a research question |
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Brokers |
People who participate in multiple communities of practice and bring ideas from one into the other |
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Corpus lingusitics |
A linguistic research method based on the quantitative analysis of collections of naturallly-occuring language data |
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Qualitative |
Smaller scale intensive research using methods such as interviews and ethnography that aims to study meanings and motivation rather than quantitative frequencies or correlations |
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Conversation analysis |
A method that looks at the sequential organization of a conversation and how participants manage the conversation using strategies such as turn-taking |
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Communities of choice |
Communities that people chose to belong to as opposed to communities of circumstance |
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Dialect leveling |
The process by which regional features of a group converge towards a common norm over time |
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Rhotic |
A term used to describe English dialects where the /r/ following a vowel is pronounced. |
Also known as r-ful |
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Lexical set |
A way of identifying vowels using a set of words in which they occur as posed to a linguistic symbol |
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Monophthongs |
A pure vowel sound spoken in a single piece of articulation with no change in quality e.g. 'bat' instead of 'bite' |
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Canadian Raising |
A phonological process found in Canadian English in which the MOUTH and PRICE vowels are pronounced differently when preceding a voiceless consonant in the same syllable in the words such as 'hike' and 'stout' |
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Physical isolation |
A dialect/language can be physically/geographically isolated from others i.e. being on an island |
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Lingusitic isolation |
When speakers of a dialect or language are cut off from other varieties and have retained older features |
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Social isolation |
A dialect or language can be socially isolated by conventions or attitudes e.g. by class or race prejudice |
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Shibboleth |
When the pronunciation of a word becomes a stereotype of a speech community |
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Reified |
Made into a concrete thing |
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Enregisterment |
A process through which a lingusitic feature or repertoire becomes a socially recognised register |
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Covert prestige |
A norm or target that speakers unconsciously orient to with a sort of hidden positive evaluation that speakers give to other forms |
Lingusitic Street cred |
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Supralocal |
Used to refer to the level 'above the local' in which speakers adopt the language features of the nearest large city |
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Crossing |
When speakers use language features or linguistic styles associated with another ethnic group |
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NORMs |
Non-mobile older rural males |
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Isolgloss |
An imaginary boundary or line drawn on a map that separates particular linguistic features. |
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Probalistic |
Probalistic constraints are not absolute but rather tendencies in one direction |
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Linguistic constraint |
A lingusitic factor that governs the use of a particular variant |
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Social constraint |
A social factor like sex or age that governs the use of a particular variant |
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Status |
Social patterns that society assigns to its members, or the differences between social groups, in terms of prestige associated with them by others |
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Variable |
The abstract representation of a source of variation, realised by at least two variants e.g. gonna and will are variants of the variable future temporal reference |
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Prestige |
Variants associated with higher-status groups are considered prestige forms |
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Borrowed prestige |
Speakers' setting and the role they're playing can lead then to use language features associated with a particular class |
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Aspirations |
People often try to talk like who they want to be (Chambers, 1995) |
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Crossover effect |
In formal situations, speakers using prestige variants even more than the group above them |
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Social hypercorrection |
When speakers overdo what they see as the linguistic requirements of a situation |
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Linguistic insecurity |
The force hypothesised to drive people to use a variant that is thought to be prestigious or correct and that is not part of their own causal speech |
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Salient |
Refers to a noticeable variant; one that stands out due to physiological, social or psychological factors |
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Stereotype |
A variable factor that is socially marked, very noticeable and often discussed |
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Marker |
A variable that speakers are less aware of but whose use they can control in style shifting |
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Indicator |
A variable that can show differences by age or social group. Often associated with particular characteristics but not subject to style shifting. |
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Caste |
Where social mobility is more difficult and lingusitic boundaries are more rigid, social groups (castes) tend to be fixed e.g. traditional Hindu Indian social structure |
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Sociolect |
A subset of language used by a particular social group or class - sometimes called a social dialect |
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Unmarked |
A feature that does not get noticed |
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Overt prestige |
Postivie/negative assessments of variants that are in line with dominant norms associated with sounding "proper" and that people are aware of |
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Covert prestige |
A norm/target that speakers unconsciously orient to with a hidden positive evaluation that speakers give to other forms |
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Basilect |
A term used in creole studies to refer to the most creole like variety |
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