Social Variation Revision Questions 2017-18 The following are some sample exam questions 1. How does stylistic variation relate to other sociolinguistic variables? · Week 2 lecture · Define stylistics · Labov studies (mainly focussing on social class): word pairs, reading passages, interview on a personal topic - audience design and accommodation theory · Intra-speaker relation to inter-speaker · Meyerhoff: Bell: intra speaker variation will never vary more than the linguistic style of the group that they are trying to adhere to · overt/covert prestige, lexical, syntactic, phonological · Foxy Boston study - ethnicity study 2. "The key to a rational conception ... of language itself is the possibility of describing orderly differentiation in a language serving a community ... It is absence of structural heterogeneity that would be dysfunctional." How does the above quote from Weinreich et al 1968) relate to the concept of orderly heterogeneity. Illustrate with reference to at least two studies. · Arabic study - orderly variation - society is structured in that way · Swedish study on social class and gender . before labov variation was considered error, labov proved that variation important · department store study, Trudgil gender study is 3. "[W]e must beware of relegating speech to the role of the 'symptom' of social relations. Speech and language use itself may play an active role in the development of the subjective aspects of gender identity and hence in the development and use of language itself." Discuss the above quote from Smith (1979), including different ways in which people 'do gender' with speech. · speech is not a consquence of social relations it also shapes it · do gender: gender paradox (labov) self reporting (labov), wearing certain things, doing certain activities etc. · lakoff 1975: gendered discourse structure
4. What are the opportunities afforded by using age as a proxy for language change? What are the weakness of interpreting apparent-time conclusions as evidence of actual language change? · define apparent time hypothesis · studies: labov · weaknesses of apparent time hypothesis · Linguistic marketplace · opportunities afforded = advantages: dont need to wait for time to pass before doing a comparison study 5. Can ethnicity ever be the only factor in the language choices that an individual makes? What other social factors might have a part to play? · ethnicity not the only factor in lang choice, combined with other factors · London mle paper by cheshire · counter point - studies where ethnicity is the most salient factor 6. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of working within a social network framework in sociolinguistic research. Where appropriate, provide examples from relevant studies. · advantages and disadvantages of networks · loose or dense networks need to be taken into account but are difficult to identify · allows you to focus · peripheral members very important as they spread the variation 7. Studies have shown that non-linguistic information can affect how listeners perceive and interpret a speaker's linguistic output. Discuss with examples from relevant studies. · Physical