LANGUAGE VARIATION

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LANGUAGE VARIATION

• Social Variation and Regional Variation
• Sociolinguistics Dialectology

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Not determiners of sociolects

• Family (too little)
• Region/Space (not based on social norms)
• Occupation/Hobbies (only lexical differences, and
  it is the least stable)

• Ethnicity/race
• Age
• Social class
• Education
• Religion
• Gender

Sociolect A dialect or variety based purely on
societal norms (race, social class, etc)
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Important Terms

• Dialect (any variety) vs. Accent (pronunciation)
• Sociolinguistics vs. Dialectology
• Sociolects (basilect, mesolect, acrolect) vs.
  regional dialects
• Hypercorrection ( a standard rule applies in
  contexts where its not supposed idear or
  warsh?, you I, he am)
• Grammatical vs Lexical variation
• Jargon (specific vocabulary) vs. borrowing (from
  other languages)
• Standard vs non-standard
• Migration vs. immigration
• Linguistic Atlases (maps of regional variations)
• Language contact vs. linguistic isolation

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Lexical differences across regions

• Northern
• Pail, swill, whiffletree ( a thick quilt)
• Johnny cake, salt pork, darning needle
  (dragonfly)
• Midland
• Blinds (roller blades)
• Skillet (eaves)
• Piece (food taken between meals)
• Snake feeder (dragonfly)
• Southern
• Lightwood, lighter (kindling)
• Hasslet (edible pig inner organs)
• Chittlins (small intestines)

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Phonological differences (regions)

• Northern
• o / ? (hoarse / horse)
• s in grease (V) and greasy
• Vowel in root and wood are equal
• Midland
• Hoarse horse (??)
• Verb rounding (frog, hog, wasp, wash)
• Monophthongization (single Verb) of new, due
• South
• Diphthongization of Tuesday, new, due
• Final z in Mrs.
• Monophthongization of five
• Diphthongization of ten

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Morphosyntactic Differences (Regions)

• Northern
• Double modals hadnt ought
• Past tense been see
• climb for climbed (past tense marker lost)
• Uninflected be (How be you?)
• Midland
• clum for climbed (irregularization of past
  tense)
• seen for saw (forms reduction/simplification)
• Southern
• you all / you (second person distinction)
• Seed for saw (regularization)
• holp for helped (irregularization)

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Basic Definitions

• Standard in the US
• Middle-class Midwesterners vs.
• Non-Standard
• African-American Vernacular Latino English, or
  Spanglish, Appalachian, Old poor Southerners, etc.

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Some Fundamentals

• Knowing non-standard dialects is helpful for both
  teacher students. In urban ghettos, we find
  very little adjustment to school forms.
• Many bidialectals, when in contact with a
  super-ordinate (dominant) dialect, may reflect
  their awareness of that dialect as much of their
  own.
• Nonstandard dialects should be studied within
  their own system (in their own right), but also
  in comparison to other dialects of English (such
  as Standard English).

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Some Common Non-Standard Dialect Features

• No -ed inflections (past participle,
  especially)
• Double negation (He dont want no trouble)
• i becomes e before m/n
• Zero copula (no is, are, am)
• Habitual be
• Non-redundant pluralization (the boys, but six
  boy)
• Regularization of possessive pronouns (mine,
  yourn)
• Regularization and Non-redundant plural in
  reflexive pronouns (hisself, theirself vs.
  himself, themselves)
• Object pronouns in subject position (specially in
  compound subjects) (Us girls)
• them as demonstrative adjective (them books)
• Adjective adverbs (good for both well/good)
• Loss of 3rd person sing. marker(he want or I has)
• ? becomes n in word-final position in -ing
  words.

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Black English features (Black English
recognized legally in 1979)

• zero copula no is, am, are
• Pre-Verb been
• Auxiliary done
• De-fricativization of voiced interdental
• Multiple negative
• No s inflection for 3rd person singular
• Extend 3rd person to 1st or 2nd.
• I has some good friends. He dont be rub me the
  wrong way. Dem books be boring.

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William Labov (1970)

• Non-standard varieties of English are
  rule-governed systems and neither corrupt or
  inferior
• Advocates understanding of AAVE as ignorance
  leads to teacher-student conflict
• Can not draw on intuitions of children or
  non-standard speakers as the superordinate
  variety will be reflected
• In general, one can say that whenever a speaker
  of a nonstandard dialect is in a subordinate
  position to a speaker of a standard dialect, the
  rules of his sic. grammar will shift in an
  unpredictable manner towards the standard

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Labov, continued

• Labov uses systematic analysis to connect the
  meanings in non-standard and standard varieties
• He states it is important for teachers to be able
  to understand the intended meaning to be able to
  supply the standard equivalent
• Differences between the varieties are not as
  sharp as they first appear
• Non-standard varieties are not inferior as a
  means of communication contrary to early beliefs

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Pinker

• Linguists fight the myth that working class
  people and the less educated speak a simpler or
  coarser language
• It is usually only the refined aspects of
  language (grammar, pronunciation) that are
  noticed
• A language is a dialect with an army and a navy
  (Max Weinreich)
• Early conclusions that non-standard dialects were
  grammatically deficient were based on subjects
  shy or sullen reactions to test batteries
• There are areas where AAVE (BEV) is more precise
  than the standard variety
• He be working (he generally works, perhaps
  regularly)
• He working (he is working at the time of the
  utterance)

• Labovs research showed that AAVE speakers had a
  vastly higher percentage of grammatical
  utterances (within the system of the dialect)
  than the norm academics had the lowest

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Rachel Jones

• Not White, Just Right
• Claims skills with Standard English opened doors
  that would have otherwise been unattainable as a
  poor black girl
• Frustrations ensue from the idea that black kids
  believe speaking accurately is a white trait
• Such kids are submitting to the idea that success
  is a white thing
• States that recognising languages such as
  Ebonics is a damning commentary on our history
  of inequality and lack of access to equal
  educational opportunities in this country
• Claims Standard English has empowered her
• Claims mastery of Standard English is important
  for any group hoping to succeed in America

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African American Vernacular English (AAVE)

• Also known as Black English, Ebonics, AAE
• CNN Report on Oakland Ebonics Decision
• LSA Resolution on the Ebonics Issue
• More on AAVE

AAVE