Identity Theorists

?
  • Created by: Kim_Hurn
  • Created on: 05-11-17 15:27

PETER TRUDGILL

Suggested people were likely to use regional variation or RP depending on whether they were trying to achieve;

Overt Prestige - using the type of language that is nationally recognised and is used in official / educational contexts. 

Covert Prestige - not identifying with the standard language, sticking to non-standard forms. 

1 of 12

JEAN AITCHISON'S METAPHORS

Damp-Spoon Syndrome

. language changes because people are lazy.

. this view presupposes that one type of language is inherently superior to another.

Crumbling Castle View

. language is beautiful and must be preserved.

. holds there was a time when English was pure and perfect, and we must seek to preserve / return to that time.

Infectious Disease Assumption 

. 'bad' or poor language is caught like a disease from those around us.

. we should do all we can to prevent ourselves from catching the virus of poor English.

2 of 12

JULIA STANLEY

Discovered that many words for women had sexual overtones (220 for a sexually promiscuous female compared to 20 for a male) and that words to describe men were more positive. 

Therefore language embodies sexual inequality. 

3 of 12

MURIEL SHULZ

Argues it is not an accident that there are more negative words for women.

It represents patriarchal order and is rule-governed, meaning words that are marked for females become pejorated. 

4 of 12

LAVER

Phatic choices reveal strong indicators of social status. 

. positive polarity (no use of negatives).

. emotionally and ideologically uncontroversial.

. expect a positive but fairly committal response.

. any attention from these norms will generate certain effects. 

He identified three types of phatic token :

. Neutral token - context of situation common to both participants, 

. Other orientated token - a reference to the addressee.

. Self-orientated token - a reference to the speaker.

5 of 12

WAREING

Defined social groups and power

- political power

- personal group

- social group

- positional power

- instrumental power

- influential power

- personal power

6 of 12

JENNY CHESHIRE

All children who approved of peer group criminal activities were more likely to use non-standard forms, but boys more so.

All children who disapproved of such activities used non-standard forms less frequently, but the difference between the groupings was more stark.

Suggesting that variation in dialect is a concious choice, influenced by social attitude. 

Male are susceptible to covert prestige, but social attitude is more of a determining factor than gender.

7 of 12

PETER TRUDGILL

How gender affects the dialect in each social class.

Found that class is more of a determiner of non-standard usage than gender, though women in all social classes are more likely to use the overt presitge or RP form. 

Men overe-reported their non-standard usuage, implying that men wished to sound more standard, assuming that they used more covert prestige forms.

Concluded that womne are more susceptible to overt prestige than men, and men more susceptible to covert prestige. 

8 of 12

PENELOPE ECKERT

Used the idea of the role of social practice. 

She defined groups in terms of the social practices the speakers engaged in. She did this by observing friendship groups in a school; known as ethnography.

She established two very different groups in the school, the jocks and the burnouts, each containing individuals with a mix of social class.

The jocks were a group who actively engaged in and enjoyed school life, whereas the burnouts were quite the opposite, chosing not to become involved and interactive with the going-on of the school. 

She found people tended to speak more like their friends - those who shared social practices together - rather than belonging in the same demographic catergory as them.

9 of 12

KERSWILL

Investigated the changes in dialect in Milton Keynes, Reading and Hull by interviewing local residents of different ages and studied their pronunication of certain speech sounds.

Milton Keynes and Reading are towns where social and geographical mobility is high as there's plenty of newcomers from all scoial classes, expanding the economy of the areas. Whereas Hull is more geographically isolated and econoically depressed than the other towns, so social networks are closed. 

Milton Keynes - older residents used vowel sounds, a typical local accent whereas newcomers spoke with a variety of regional accents and children spoke like their parents later developing to estaury english. 

Reading - gradual change as children influenced by their local born parents, some change was apparent with older residents, pronouncing the post-vowel sound and young speakers using glottal stops. 

Hull - young speakers retained the nothern accent of their older relatives.

10 of 12

HOWARD GILES

Changes in the sociolinguistic situation of RP and its relationship to other accents. 

RP is perceived as being associated in the absence of information to the contrary, a speaker who is competent, reliable, eductaed and confident. Yet they scored low on traits like friendliness, companionability and sincerity while proving to be less persuasive. 

Chris Montgomery

standard accent - competent, intelligent, confident, ambituous and correct.

non-standard accent - socially attractive, honest, friendly and humourous.

11 of 12

MARTHA'S VINEYARD

Interviewed a number of speakers from different ages/ethnic groups and noted young speakers seemed to be taking away the pronunciations associated with the standard England norms and towards a pronunication associated with conservative and characteristically Vineyard speakers. 

Young men who thought they identified themselves as Vineyards, resented encroachment of wealthy summer visitors on the traditional island. These speakers seemed to be exploiting the resources of the non-standard dialect. 

The pattern emerged despite extensive exposure of speakers to the education system ; some college educated boys were extremely heavy users of vernacular vowels. 

12 of 12

Comments

No comments have yet been made

Similar English Language resources:

See all English Language resources »See all Identity resources »