Styles, standards and meaning (original) (raw)
Related papers
Three Waves of Variation Study: The Emergence of Meaning in the Study of Sociolinguistic Variation
Annual Review of Anthropology, 2012
The treatment of social meaning in sociolinguistic variation has come in three waves of analytic practice. The first wave of variation studies established broad correlations between linguistic variables and the macrosociological categories of socioeconomic class, gender, ethnicity, and age. The second wave employed ethnographic methods to explore the local categories and configurations that inhabit, or constitute, these broader categories. In both waves, variation was seen as marking social categories. This article sets out a theoretical foundation for the third wave, arguing that (a) variation constitutes a robust social semiotic system, potentially expressing the full range of social concerns in a given community; (b) the meanings of variables are underspecified, gaining more specific meanings in the context of styles, and (c) variation does not simply reflect, but also constructs, social meaning and hence is a force in social change.
Balirano, G. / Bamford, J. / Vincent, J. (eds) 2012. Variation and Varieties in Contexts of English
Balirano, G. / Bamford, J. / Vincent, J. (eds) 2012. Variation and Varieties in Contexts of English. Anglistica AION: An Interdisciplinary Journal 16(1-2) [Special Issue]. ISSN: 2035-8504., 2012
This issue of Anglistica deals with variation and varieties of English from a wide range of perspectives and methodological approaches mainly from within sociolinguistics and discourse analysis. The empirically oriented papers analyse a range of different types of field-gathered authentic data and corpora, covering intra- and inter-language, intra- and inter-speaker variation, variously involving register, genre, stylistic, diaphasic, diatopical, diastratic and diachronic types of variation. The issue aims to contribute to the ongoing debates on language variation and its implications, highlighting its dynamic social and socio-psychological functions and meanings as well as some taxonomic and terminological issues.
This article investigates the indexical relation between language, interactional stance and social class. Quantitative sociolinguistic analysis of a linguistic variable (the first person possessive singular) is combined with interactional analysis of the way one particular variant (possessive ‘me’, as in Me pencil's up me jumper) is used by speakers in ‘stylised’ interactional performances. The aim of this analysis is to explore: (1) how possessive ‘me’ is implicated in the construction and management of local identities and relationships; and (2) how macro-social categories, such as social class, relate to linguistic choice. The data for this analysis comes from an ethnographic study of the language practices of nine- to ten-year-old children in two socially-differentiated primary schools in north-east England. A secondary aim of the article is to spotlight the sociolinguistic sophistication of these young children, in particular, the working-class participants, who challenge the notion that the speech of working-class children is in any way ‘impoverished’. I'm happy to share an electronic copy of this or any other of my papers. Write to me at j.snell@leeds.ac.uk
Journal of Research Design and Statistics in Linguistics and Communication, 2019
Meaning and Linguistic Variation: The Third Wave in Sociolinguistics by Penelope Eckert is a linguistic research memoir that traces the illustrious career of a great and influential sociolinguist in the light of growth, development, and evolution of variationist sociolinguistics that span many decades. The book consists of several important works of the author that have contributed significantly to central issues and concepts in the continued expanding fields and subfields of sociolinguistics and linguistic styles. The book, which has 11 chapters divided into three parts representing the beginnings, the Second Wave, and the Third Wave, documents the development of sociolinguistic variation showing how theoretical and practical concerns progress from the initial focus on demographic and ethnographic issues to the construction of social meaning via variable measurement and selection. In other words, today’s approach to the studies of sociolinguistic variation is supported by an architecture of a more elaborate social meaning. Also, the identification and meaning of the stylistic practices that characterize and define societal language patterns of change have become more meaningful and noticeable. Hence the social meaning of relationships such as language and gender, language and race, and language and politics are just examples of how the discipline of sociolinguistics has become so central to the meaning of linguistic variation. Although the book has a subplot, which is to tell a ‘story’ about how a rookie linguist became not only a professional but a much-sought-after linguist, the veracity of such personal tales did not impact on the coherent messages that this collection of seminal works have to convey.
Language Variation: Sociolinguistic Variationist Analysis
Handbook of Linguistics, 1997
The study of language variation in linguistics is a hybrid enterprise. In some respects, it is a branch of sociolinguists, examining the ebb and flow of language in society. In other respects, it is more closely aligned with linguistics, developing explanations and models for complex linguistic systems. From this diverse work, the study of variation is often connected to the communities themselves, and scholars have worked to rectify false perceptions of vernacular dialect varieties.