Phonological Change

Features of Phonological Change

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Jenny Cheshire - relationship between use of dialect and peer group culture.

William Labov - Martha's vineyard (deliberatley diverging from other tourists but converging with locals).

Milroy and Milroy - high network strength score correlated with use of non-standard form.

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Reasons for change are not always clear - e.g. no one is sure why the Great Vowel Shift occured.
Social factors - we imitate the speech of people we admire or respect, so then language spreads.
Aitchinson (1991) identified 4 stages to phonological changes:
- STAGE 1: speech of a social group differs in a way that words would be pronounced from where they are from.
- STAGE 2: a second social group begins, possibly unconsciously, to imitate the speech of the first group.
- STAGE 3: the new pronunciation becomes established in the second group, so now part of usual accent.
- STAGE 4: a third social group begins to form on the second group, and the process repeats itself.

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The Rise of the Interrogatory Statement by Stefanie Marsh.
The article focuses upon the phonological feature of intonantion.
Marsh uses the noun phrases:
- 'Irritating verbal tic' to show her dislike of this feature.
- 'Dur-brained Valley Girls' to link the feature to lack of intelligence.
Marsh uses the adjectives 'infected', 'epidemic' and 'spreading' to suggest this change is diseased.
Marsh uses the extended metaphor 'falling victim' sto show the feature is like a disease.
Marsh says that the feature is common, 'especially among women' and 'children'.
Intonation used to be interpreted as having 'self-doubt' and the 'desire for approval' and also 'th result of having either foreign parents or low self-esteem'.
Intonation is now interpreted as 'controlling your interlocutors' and 'compelling a response' and is associated with 'powerful speakers'.
It is also now interpreted with 'an aggressive need to direct conversation' and 'self-confident and socially aggressive'.

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