Tanmur Mahmud Liton Ma-ELT, 2nd Semester, NUB Sociolinguistics

Sociolinguistics: It is a branch of linguistics. It was emerged as an independent area of study in 1960s by the hands of William Labov and Dell Hymes. Generally it deals with the inter-relationship between language and society. According to Holmes, sociolinguistics is the study of relationship between language and society. Basically it studies the properties of language and languages require reference to social, including contextual factors in their explanation. So it can be defined as the study of language in relation to society. It is concerned with language as a social and cultural phenomenon. It also investigates the field of language and society and has close connections with the social sciences, specially social psychology, anthropology, human geography and sociology. In short, sociolinguistics is the study of how language serves and is shaped by the social nature of human beings. Scopes of Sociolinguistics: Sociolinguistics ranges from the wide variety of dialects across a given region down to the analysis between the ways men and women speak to one another. It examines the interplay of language and society with language as the starting point. Variation is the key concept applied to language itself and to its use. The basic premise of sociolinguistics is that language is variable and changing. As a result, language is not homogeneousnot for the individual user and not within or among groups of speakers who use the same language. Importance of Sociolinguistics: According to Wardwaugh, sociolinguistics is concerned with investigating the relationships between language and society and so it makes one understand better the structure of language and of how languages function in communication. It explains why people speak differently in different social contexts. It analyses many and diverse ways in which language and society intersect and entwine. It helps one to identify the social functions of language and the ways it is used to convey social meaning. It helps one to understand different cultures better in the world. By studying the written documents of sociolinguistics, one can examine how language and society interacted in the past. Difference between Sociolinguistics and Sociology: Sociolinguistics is the effect of the society on language and sociology is the effect of language on society. I think sociolinguistics refers to the way language shapes society and sociology of language describes how society shapes language. Besides, Sociolinguistic differs from sociology of language. Sociolinguistics deal with the effect of society on the language. It includes all aspects of society, such as: cultural norm, expectation and context. Its effect will attack the language use. Whereas, the sociology of language focuses on the language effect on society. It deals with the way of using a language in some points, they are: who can use the language the language; with whom and what condition. In other words, it refers to the effectiveness to use the language, or may come to some points in language function, such as: asking permission, requesting, etc.
Lecture-01

Speakers and Communities

Individualism: It is the quality of being different from other people and doing things in ones own way. Every society consists of individuals and it is essential to keep individuals firmly in the centre of interest. The individual speaker is very
Lecture-02

important in sociolinguistics in much the same way that the individual cell is important in biology. No two speakers have the same language because they dont have the same experience of language. The differences between the speakers may vary from the very slight and trivial to total differences within the universal characteristics of language. Two persons can both hear the same person talking but be affected in various ways. The society is structured in terms of a multidimensional space. Importance of Individualism: Once we constructed a model of how this multidimensional space looks from our point of view, we then have to choose where to locate otherwise in it. Language is only one part of the picture but particularly an important part because it gives us a very clearly structured set of symbols which we can use in locating ourselves in the world. At each utterance our speech can be seen as an act of identity in a multidimensional space. Conformity: It is the behaviour or action that follows the usual standards which are expected by a group or a society. The degree of similarity generally found between speakers goes well beyond what is needed for efficient communication. The two forces- one leading to individual differences and the other leading to similarities between individuals- are referred to as individualism and conformity. Four Social Factors according to Holmes (a) The participants: who is speaking and with whom? (b) The setting or social context: where are they speaking? (c) The topic: what is being talked? (d) The function: why are they speaking? The Sociolinguistic Development of a Child, according to linguistic model/ four life phases
(a) Babyhood: The models are parents and the carers who use baby-talks. For example, in Bangla- humba for cow, tutu for dog mew for cat and mum for water etc. (b) Childhood: The models are other children of the same age. Children are very conservative in their language. Even children tend to prefer members of their own sex and as a result, girls and boys develop differently. Children learn to recognize the social significance of different linguistic norms. (c) Adolescence: The models are other adolescents. At this phase new language or dialect cannot be learnt. Adolescents trend to be different from all previous adolescents and as a result, new teenage slang emerges. (d) Adulthood: The models are other adults. The competing models at this stage can be avoided or copied. Adults at this stage may accept more or less standard speech for work purposes under the pressures of the linguistic market-place. At the end of this stage adults are more or less stable linguistically confirming a place in the social world in terms of region, age, sex, social classes etc.

Society and Language

Society refers to the community of people living in a particular region and having shared customs, laws and organizations. In a society, people are related to each other through persistent relations. Basically, society is created by language. On the other hand, Language is a vehicle or medium of communication. Only the human beings have language but not other animals. Basically it is the system of communication in speech or writing which is used by the people of a particular country or area. In other words, it is the method of expressing ideas and emotions in the form of signs and symbols which are used to encode and decode the information. Society and language are inter-dependent and interrelated. Society cannot be created until a group of people some values in common and values require a language to embed them and articulate them. But it is language that brings people together and keeps them together. It always precedes
Lecture-03

society. In a static society, the language is the society and society is its language. So the two are one.

LANGUAGE AND SOCIETY (Relationship 1st 4 paragraphs)

The connection between language and society is tightly anchored. The relationship of the two is deeply rooted. Language performs various functions in the society and the society does the same way. If one will not exist, the other one will be affected. =Language is the primary tool for communication purposes, for establishing peace and order in our society, for showing authority and power, and for attaining goals and objectives. But, it can also destruct the society if it will use inappropriately. It must follow the conformity governing the society to avoid conflict s and to meet the boundary of individual differences. =Society however controls our language by giving us preferences as what are acceptable and not, because each one of us has our own perception or point of view. A group of people may accept our language, but for others, it could be kind of offence or insult. We must know how, when and where to say it and for what purpose. =Society changes when that which is of value to society changes. Social changes produce changes in language. However, social changes affect values in ways that have not been accurately understood. Social values are only the same as linguistic values when the society is a stable and unchanging one. Once society starts changing, then language change produces special effects. =Social changes produce changes in language. This affects values in ways that have not been accurately understood. Language incorporates social values. However, social values are only the same as linguistic values when the society is a stable and unchanging one. Once society starts changing, then language change produces special effects. Language incorporates social values. What is of value to society is incorporated into language to produce standards, ideals and goals.

Change of society and language or The Power of Language= Follow Sheet no-iii.

Speech Communities

Lecture-04

=> A Speech community is a group of people who share a set of norms and expectations regarding the use of language. This concept emerged in 1960s. According to Lyons (1970), Speech community [refers to] all the people who use a given language or dialect. Corder (1973:53) --- a speech community is made up of individuals who regard themselves as speaking the same language. Hockett (1958) says that a speech community is the whole set of people who communicate with each other, either directly or indirectly, via the common language. So, in short speech community in sociolinguistics refers to a group of people who use the same variety of a language and who share specific rules for speaking and for interpreting speech. Speech community is a concept in sociolinguistics that describes a more or less discrete group of people who use language in a unique and mutually accepted way among themselves. This is sometimes referred to as a Sprechbund

Types of Speech Community

Soft-Shelled vs. Hard-Shelled Speech Communities "An informal typology of speech communities as 'soft-shelled' versus 'hard-shelled' may be distinguished on the basis of the strength of the boundary that is maintained by language: the 'hard-shelled' community has of course the stronger boundary, allowing minimal interaction between members and those outside, and providing maximum maintenance of language and culture. "Speech communities which primarily use one of the world languages [such as English] are more likely to be 'soft-shelled,' because it will be known as a second language by many others, and interaction across the boundary will be relatively easy in both directions. A speech community speaking a language with more limited distribution

would more likely be 'hard shelled,' because relatively few outside the community learn to use it." Hard shelled` - strong bounderies - allows minimal interaction between outsiders and members of the s.c. - serves to preserve the norms of language and culture `Soft shelled` - much weaker bounderies - less likely to preserve existing language and culture

Factors of Speech Communities

(a) Socio-economic status: Group of people within a society who possess the same socioeconomic status. (b) Ethnicity: A member of a particular ethnic group, especially one who maintains the language or customs of the group. (c) sex (d) geographical location (e) Local knowledge of the way language choice (f) occupation (g) social relationships etc.

Problems of Speech Communities

1=People who speak who same language are not always the members of the same speech community. Most members of a society living in the same town belong to several speech communities. For example, an elderly person may have considerable difficulty following the monotonous chant of an auctioneer or comprehending what talk about among themselves. But both make the auctioneer and a college student can easily make the adjustment necessary to engage in a conversation with the elderly person and be fully understood. 2=Mismatch between subjective and objective reality. 3=Evidence against community grammars. 4=Evidence for network. 5=Small size of the most important communities.

Language Prestige
Lecture-05

Language is a living thing and so it has death and life. In sociolinguistics, language prestige describes the level of respect accorded to a language or dialect as compared to that of other languages or dialects in a speech community. Basically the position of language is the prestige of language. It deals with the comparative study of languages. In case of two languages, one is more powerful than the other is. Language prestige depends on social class. Prestige influences whether a language variety is considered a language or a dialect. It determines language standard also.

Class and Prestige

The concept of prestige in sociolinguistics is closely related to that of prestige or class within a society. Generally, there is positive prestige associated with the language or dialect of the upper classes, and negative prestige with the language or dialect of the lower classes. Prestige depends on social class as there is a relationship between social class and prestige. While some differences between dialects are regional in nature, there are also social causes for differences in dialects. Very often, the "public prestige dialect of the elite in a stratified community differs from the dialect(s) of the non-elite strata (working class and other)".[13] In fact, in an article which in part tried to motivate the study of sociolinguistics, Raven McDavid wrote that "the importance of language as a mirror of culture can be demonstrated by dialect differences in American English".[14] Thus the relation between the way speakers use a language and their social status is a long recognized tool in sociolinguistics. But the truth is all languages and dialects have equal merit if judged on purely linguistic grounds.

Types of Prestige
Overt Prestige: 'Overt prestige' and 'covert prestige' are terms usually used to refer to dialects. An overt prestige dialect is generally one that is widely recognized as being used by a culturally dominant group. Overt prestige is acquired by those speakers who

have command of a standard dialect (or dialects) that is socially defined as that spoken to gain social status within the wider community; often that of the elite. Covert prestige: It is generally assumed that non-standard language is low-prestige language. However, in certain groups, such as traditional working-class neighborhoods, standard language may be considered undesirable in many contexts. This is because the working class dialect is a powerful in-group marker, and especially for non-mobile individuals, the use of non-standard varieties (even exaggeratedly so) expresses neighborhood pride and group and class solidarity. There will thus be a considerable difference in use of non-standard varieties when going to the pub or having a neighborhood barbecue (high), and going to the bank (lower) for the same individual. A covert prestige dialect, on the other hand, is one that is generally perceived by the dominant culture group as being inferior but which compels its speakers to use it to show membership in an exclusive community. In this way, covert prestige can be likened to 'street cred': If you talk street, you may not be accepted by the power majority, but you earn respect among those who reject the values of that power majority. Covert prestige, however, is that acquired by those speakers desiring to belong; to be considered a member of a certain community. And when the need to be recognized as part of a particular group becomes the deciding social factor, success is defined by the amount of "success" that can be achieved within a group vs. without. And in a very real manner of speaking, a nonstandard language--despite the stigma attached by the wider community--can help achieve a much higher level of covert status than that of the overt in the outside world.

Standard Language
The language that has overt prestige is called standard language. It is the result of a direct and deliberate intervention by society. Standard languages are used in printed materials- books, newspapers, education, mass media etc. A standard language (also standard dialect or standardized dialect) is a language variety used by a group of people in their public discourse.[1] Alternatively, varieties become standard by undergoing a process of standardization, during which it is organized for description in grammars and dictionaries and encoded in such reference works.[1] Typically, varieties that become standardized are the local dialects spoken in the centers of commerce and government, where a need arises for a variety that will serve more than local needs.

Process of Standardization
1. Selection:

2. Codification: In linguistics, codification is the process of standardizing and developing a norm for a language. Codifying a language can vary from case to case and depends on the stage of standardization that already exists. It typically means to develop a writing system, set up official rules for grammar, orthography, pronunciation, syntax and vocabulary as well as publishing grammar books, dictionaries and similar guidelines. Several variants exist for a specific aspect, e.g. different ways of spelling a word, decisions on which variant is going to be the standard one have to be made.

3. Elaboration of function:

4. Acceptance: