An Introduction to Sociolinguistics chapter 2 by Ronald Wardhaugh

1. Chapter 2
Linguistics variation
• An Introduction to Sociolinguistics by Ronald Wardhaugh
• Contents:
• Languages, Dialects, and Varieties, Language and Dialect –
Regional Dialects – Social Dialects – Styles, Registers

2. • Language vs. Dialect
• Language (prestige) and dialect (stigma) The stigmatization of
the term dialect 1. I don’t speak dialect 2. in reality, all
speakers of English speak some dialect, regardless of its social
status.
• Most speakers use a variety of different dialects or styles in
different situations. • Writing • Colloquial speech (with
friends, family) • Formal speech (with strangers, authority
figures)
• LANGUAGE AND DIALECT
• • What is the difference between language and dialect? •
Variety is a term used for to replace both terms - Hudson says
“a set of linguistic items with similar distribution” • Variety is
some linguistic shared items which can uniquely be associated
with some social items

3. Factors that contribute to variation
• • Social situation
• • Occupation
• • Age
• • Geography
• • Education
• • Gender
• • Social status/class
• • Ethnicity

4. Facts about dialects
• • All languages consist of dialects (a language is a group of dialects;
to speak a language is to speak a dialect of that language)
• • Therefore, everyone speaks at least one dialect
• • Dialect differences are usually minor and dialects of a language
are usually mutually intelligible
• • Dialects are geographically, socially, politically determined
• Facts about dialects
• Dialect variation is a matter of difference, not deficit.
• Nonstandard dialects are “self-contained” systems, with their
regular phonological and syntactic rules.
• Nonstandard dialects of English are close relatives to SE, sometimes
reflecting older forms of SE.

5. Everybody speaks a dialect
• Accent → differences in pronunciation between one variety of a language and another
• Dialect 1. a variety of language used by a group whose linguistic habit pattern both
reflect and are determined by shared regional, social, or cultural perspectives. 2. all the
differences between varieties of a language, those in pronunciation, word usage,
syntax, and variation of the given community. 3. to apply to all varieties, not just to non-
standard varieties.
• E.g
• 1. We’re not coming (Standard English dialect)
• 2. We ain’t coming (non-standard English dialect
• The dialectal variation between Have you got the time? in British English vs. Do you
have the time? in American English.
• The dialectal variation between lift (British English) and elevator (American English).

6. Some English dialects:
• Received Pronunciation Cockney (East
London)
• East Anglian (Norfolk, Suffolk and North
Essex) Black British English
• Geordie (Newcastle upon Tyne)
• Scouse (Merseyside)
• Mancunian-Salfordian (Manchester &
Salford) Etc.

7. Kinds of dialect
• 1. Regional dialect 2. Social dialect
• It is possible in a given community, people speak more than one dialect.
• Social dialects
• Factors such as occupation, place of residence, education, income, racial or ethnic origin, cultural
background, caste, religion related to the way people speak.
• Social dialect originate from social groups and depend on a variety of factors; social class, religion, and
ethnicity.
• Social dialects: examples
• e.g. 1. Caste in India often determines which variety of a language a speaker use. 2. Christian, Muslim and
Jewish in Baghdad speak different variety of Arabic. 3. Ethnic group in America, e.g. Labov’s work in NY. 4.
Speakers of Jewish and Italian ethnicity differentiated from the standard variety or Black English.
• Regional Dialect
• Very distinctive local varieties → regional dialect 1. It is reflected in the differences in pronunciation, in
the choice and forms of words, and in syntax. 2. There is a dialect continuum. 3. Various pressures-
political, social, cultural, and educational- serve to harden current national boundaries an to make the
linguistic differences among states 4. Dialect geography → term → used to describe attempts made to
map the distributions of various linguistic features
• 17

8. Accent
• An accent is a stress or emphasis on a particular part of
something, usually a word. Pronounce the word "doofus" with
the accent on the first syllable: DOO-fuss.
• Accent comes from the Latin accentus, which means "the
intonation of singing." We use accent for different kinds of
emphasis in speech. In some foreign languages, the mark
above a letter is an accent that signals how to pronounce it.

9. Conti…
• An accent is the way a person speaks.
• Some people pronounce words differently. A
lot of the time, different countries that speak
the same language pronounce the same
words in a different way. Usually they can
understand each-other, but they
will notice that they sound a little different

10. • People speaking the same language can have
different accents. Even people in the same
country can have different accents. Sometimes
people can tell what city someone lived in when
they were a child by the way that person speaks.
One example is a New York City accent. They
might say "bwoll" (/ˌbwɔːl/) instead
of ball (normally /ˌbɑːl/ in America), like used
in sports and games; or they might say "hwot
dwog" (/ˌhwɔːt dwɔːɡ/) instead of hot
dog (normally /ˌhɑːt dɑːɡ/ or /ˌhɑːt dɔːɡ/ in that
country). It sounds different, but people still
know they mean "ball" or "hot dog" when
they're talking.

11. Why do some dialects have more
prestige than others?
• Some dialects have more prestige because;
1. Historical factors
2. Political factors
3. Other factors
• Such dialect is called ‘standard’ or ‘consensus dialects.
This designation : 1. Externally imposed 2. The prestige of a dialect shifts as the power
relationship 3. The prestige of the speakers shift
• Dialect: Prestige and Stigma
• • A prestige variety is a dialect associated with mainstream social prestige – for
example a dialect that sounds “educated” or “sophisticated”
• • A stigmatized variety is a dialect associated with negative features, from a
mainstream social perspective: e.g. “uneducated” “lower class”

12. Standard vs. non standard language
• Standard language
• 1. Variety of English, used in print, taught in schools to non-native
speakers.
• 2. Spoken by educated people & used in news broadcast.
• 3. The centralization of English political and commercial life at London
• 4. Gave the prominence over other dialects Standard English →widely
codified grammar & vocabulary
• RP → developed largely in the English public schools & required of all BBC
announcers (BBC English)
• non-standard language:
• In contrast, there are non-standard forms of a language that are used, for
example, in different regional dialects and these non-standard varieties
are different from each other.

13. Nonstandard dialect
• A nonstandard dialect or vernacular dialect is a
dialect or language variety that has not
historically benefited from the institutional
support or sanction that a standard dialect has.
• Like any dialect, a nonstandard dialect has an
internally coherent system of grammar. It may be
associated with a particular set of vocabulary,
and spoken using a variety of accents, styles, and
registers

14. Isogloss
• An isogloss is a line indicating the degree of linguistic change.
(Gleason 1963 : 398) Isogloss is a representation of statistical
probabilities, a graphic way of portraying a translation of speech
characteristics of one area to another, a bundle of isoglosses may be
interpreted as marking a zone of great translation of speech.
• An isogloss is a geographical boundary line marking the area in which
a distinctive linguistic feature commonly occurs.
• This linguistic feature may be phonological (e.g., the pronunciation of
a vowel), lexical (the use of a word), or some other aspect of
language.
• Major divisions between dialects are marked by bundles of
isoglosses.

15. • An isogloss is a line drawn on a real or
hypothetical map marking the boundary
between two distinctive linguistic features. For
example, in England one could draw a line
running vaguely across the country separating
the part where the G is pronounced as a
glottal stop in words such as singing and
shouting (the North) from the area where
people saysiŋiŋ and shoutiŋ (the South).

16. Isogloss (contd..)
• It indicates a dialect boundary
• A term modelledon geographical terms –
Isotherm( a line joining areas of equal
temperature) and Isobar (a line joining areas
of equal atmospheric pressure
• It is in contrast to Isograph-any line on a
linguistic map, indicating a uniformity in the
use of sounds, vocabulary, syntax, inflection,
etc.

17. Conti…
• A term used for a line drawn on a dialect map
which marks off an area which uses a
particular variant from another neighbouring
area which uses a different variant.
• The term applies to phonological, grammatical
and lexical boundaries.
• e.g. the use of paper bagin Northern dialect of
Midwest America vs. paper sackin Midland
dialect of Midwest America.

19. Speech Community
• A speech community is a group of people who
share a set of rules and norms for communication
and interpretation of speech.
• “Rules and norms” includes everything from
intonation and vocabulary, to body positioning
and eye contact
• “A speech community is a group of people who
share one or more varieties of language and the
rules for using those varieties in everyday
communication.” (Ottenheimer pg. 94 )

20. Conti…
• The idea of a speech community allows us to
do two things:
• 1) Focus on a smaller social unit than all the
speakers of a language.
• 2) Get away from the idea that one language
= one culture

21. STYLES AND REGISTERS
• STYLES
• • Varieties which are associated only with particular
social situations(contextual way of speech) are known
as styles.
• • Language variation which reflect changes in
situational factors such as addressee, setting, task or
topic.
• E.g;
• • What do you intend to do, your majesty?
• • Waddya intend doin’, Rex?
• • Whateva ya do.

22. types of Linguistic style
• Frozen: it refers to historic language or communication that is intended to remain unchanged, like
a constitution or prayer. Examples: The Bible, the United States Constitution, the Bhagavad Gita,
"Romeo and Juliet."
• Formal: Less rigid but still constrained, the formal style is used in professional, academic, or legal
settings where communication is expected to be respectful, uninterrupted, and restrained. Slang is
never used, and contractions are rare. Examples: a TED talk, a business presentation, the
Encyclopaedia Brittanica, "Gray's Anatomy," by Henry Gray.
• Consultative: People use this often in conversation when they're speaking with someone who has
specialized knowledge or who is offering advice. Tone is often respectful (use of courtesy titles) but
may be more casual if the relationship is longstanding or friendly (a family doctor.) Slang is
sometimes used, people may pause or interrupt one another. Examples: the local TV news
broadcast, an annual physical, a service provider like a plumber.
• Casual: This is the style people use when they're with friends, close acquaintances and co-workers,
and family. It's probably the one you think of when you consider how you talk with other people,
often in a group setting. Use of slang, contractions, and vernacular grammar is all common, and
people may also use expletives or off-color language in some settings. Examples: a birthday party, a
backyard barbecue.
• Intimate: Linguists say this is reserved for special occasions, usually between only two people and
often in private. Intimate language may be something as simple as an inside joke between two
college friends or a word whispered in a lover's ear.

23. • Imagine that you're going to be introduced to a very
important person who you have never met. Maybe it is the
Queen of England. When you meet her, would you say:
'Hey, dude! What's up?' Probably not. You would say
something more formal such as 'It is an honor to meet you,
Your Highness.' On the other hand, you wouldn't call your
best friend 'His Royal Highness.' Instead you would be fine
using the informal address, 'dude.'
• In every situation you encounter, you use speech
appropriate to the person to whom you are speaking and
his or her context. The language you use when talking to
your friends is not the same language you would use when
meeting someone as important as the Queen. This
difference in language formality is called style.

24. REGISTER
• Crystal (1991, p. 295) defines register as "a
variety of language defined according to its
use in social situations, e.g. a register of
scientific, religious, formal English.’’ Register is
widely used in linguistics to refer to ‘’varieties
according to use’’

25. Conti…
• Some definitions of Registers By register we
mean a variety correlated with performer’s
social role on a given occasion. Every normal
adult plays a series of different social roles-
one man ,for example, may function at
different times as head of a family, motorist,
cricketer, member of a religious group,
professor and so on, and within his idiolect he
has varieties shared by other persons and
other idiolects appropriate to these roles

26. Conti…
• Talking about the role of speaker, A young
lecturer, for example, will speak in different
ways when communicating with his wife, his
children, his father, his colleagues, his
students, when shopping, and so on. Each of
this varieties will be register.

27. Register and Style
• Based on situational factors (see chapter about speech situations),
different speech situations influence the speaker's choice of a language
variety. Registers are functional varieties; they ‘function’ in different types
of speech situations. Accordingly, a register is a linguistic variety regarded
as appropriate to use in a particular speech situation. Register is usually
associated with a particular speech situation (Kortmann 2005: 255f).
• Legal language, or Legalese, is an example of a register normally only used
in the field of law and justice.
• The choice of register in different types of speech situations is termed
‘situational variation’. The term ‘style’ is also occasionally used to refer to
situational variation. However, it includes variation in grammatical
structures, too. It is less predictable and more dependent on personal
preferences than register (Kortmann 2005: 256).
• There is a terminological distinction between register and style. Both are
associated with a specific speech situation but whereas register often
refers to the specific vocabulary chosen and expected in connection with a
particular speech situation, style also includes grammatical variation (cf.
Kortmann 2005: 255ff).

28. Factors effecting register use:
• 1. Whether written or spoken as informal or formal.
• 2. Literal variety and colloquial variety.
• 3. Kind of subject matter; physical setting and
occasions of language activity.
Functions of register:
• There is a strong tendency among individuals and co-
communicators to develop register variation along
many dimensions.
• One person can control variety of registers.
• Each register help one express his identity at specific
time and place.

29. Idiolect
• a variety of language used by one individual
speaker, including peculiarities of pronunciation,
grammar, vocabulary etc.
• A dialect made of idiolects of a group of speakers
in a social or regional subdivision of a speech
community
• Idiolect is “an identifiable pattern of speech
characteristic of an individual.” or “ Ideolectis the
individual’s personal variety of the community
language system” (A Dictionary of Linguistics:
1954)

30. Diglossia
• . When two or more dialects or languages in regular use, the
situation called diglossia One dialect or language given higher
status or prestige, and is reserved for certain functions in a society,
such as government, education, the law, religion, literature, press,
radio and TV The prestige dialect often called the standard dialect
(the language)
• A type of linguistic situation in which there is a division between
two languages or two varieties of a language such that one
variety, the so-called 'high' or H variety, is used in public life —in
addresses, in the media, in schools and universities, etc. —and
another variety, the so-called 'low' variety or L variety, is used in
domestic life —with family and friends. Examples of diglossic
situations are to be found in Switzerland (Hochdeutsch and
Schwizerdütsch), in various Arabian countries (Classical Arabic and
the local dialect of Arabic), Paraguay (Spanish and Guaraní).

31. Jargon
• Jargon is the term for specialized or technical language
that is only understood by those who are members of a
group or who perform a specific trade. For example,
the legal profession has many terms that are
considered jargon, or terms that only lawyers and
judges use frequently.
• Writers sometimes use jargon to appeal to a specific
group, or to embed a hidden meaning behind their
writing that only certain groups would
understand. Jargon is also used as a method of
characterization. When characters use jargon it tells us
something about that character and his/her interests
and profession.

32. examples of Jargon:
• 1. I need a script in order to pick up the medicine.
(medical jargon for "prescription")
• 2. I need a nurse to room 12 stat. (medical jargon
for "in a hurry")
• 3. Your objection is overruled. (legal jargon)
• 4. We need to take data points to determine if
there has been a response to the intervention.
(educational jargon)
• 5. The suspect is headed west on Route 10. All
available units, respond. (police jargon)

33. Many examples of jargon exist because
of its use among specialists…few are
• Architectural terminology
• Business jargon
• Chemical nomenclature
• Computing jargon
• Economics terminology that differs from common
usage
• Mathematical jargon
• Legal terms
• Medical terminology
• Musical terminology….

34. Jargon and Slang
• Jargon is sometimes wrongly confused with slang, and people often take it in the
same sense but a difference is always there.
• Slang is a type of informal category of language developed within a certain
community, and consists of words or phrases whose literal meanings are different
than the actual meanings. Hence, it is not understood by people outside of that
community or circle. Slang is more common in spoken language than written.
• Jargon, on the other hand, is broadly associated with a subject, occupation, or
business that makes use of standard words or phrases, and frequently comprised
of abbreviations, such as LOC (loss of consciousness), or TRO (temporary
restraining order). However, unlike slang, its terms are developed and composed
deliberately for the convenience of a specific profession, or section of society. We
can see the difference in the two sentences given below.
• Did you hook up with him? (Slang)
• Getting on a soapbox (Jargon)

35. Conti…
• Similar to slang, jargon implies the use of specific words.
Jargon, however, refers to the specialized vocabulary
characterizing the language use of various groups of
people, often occupational or recreational groups (e.g. the
medical jargon or the law/legal jargon). The specialist
words and expressions of a particular jargon may be
incomprehensible to outsiders. This is why we can find
dictionaries which translate such words into more common
words. The internet provides such dictionaries, for example
for the medical and legal jargon.
• In contrast to slang, jargon is not restricted to situations of
extreme informality and generally lacks the rebellious
undertones connected to the use of slang expressions.

36. slang
• A register used in situations of extreme informality is slang. Used in this
type of situation, slang is characterized by an extreme form of linguistic
informality. While not all informal vocabulary is automatically slang, all
slang is highly informal. In contrast to informal talk, the more general term
slang implies a high degree of ungrammaticality. Particularly popular
among teenagers, though not limited to this group, slang can include the
use of in-group vocabulary with an in-group meaning different from its
usual meaning. Such slang expressions can function as identity
markers because they distinguish in-group members from members that
are not part of the group. Their use expresses a desire for social distance
to language users outside the group and their mainstream values.
• Any speaker of any age and any educational or socioeconomic status can
legitimately use slang if the appropriate speech situation is given.
• Examples: diss, wasted, kick ass, bling-blings

37. • The medical field is filled with cryptic jargon, including innumerable
scientific terms and medical abbreviations.
• acute - a condition that comes on suddenly
• agonal - term to signify a major, negative change in a patient's
condition
• atypical - something that isn’t completely normal
• comorbid - two or more conditions that occur at the same time
• iatrogenic - something that didn’t go as planned

38. • Examples of Police Jargon
• Law enforcement officers and professionals have their own set of
police jargon as well.
• 10-4 - radio jargon meaning, “Okay” or “I understand”
• assumed room temperature - an individual has died
• beat - an officer’s parole area
• berries and cherries - the lights on top of a police car
• code eight - term that means officer needs help immediately

39. Any question