Sociolinguistics: Theory

1984 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 46-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monica Heller
Keyword(s):  
Language Use ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Theoretical Issue ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Language Varieties ◽  
The Social ◽  
Variationist Sociolinguistics ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
The Relationship

In 1980, in this journal, Joshua Fishman presented the major theoretical issue in sociolinguistics as being the link between microsociolinguistic and macrosociolinguistic processes. In 1984 that is still the case, although the issue is receiving more explicit attention than it did four years ago.There are two branches of sociolinguistics which approach this issue in different ways. These two branches are interactionist and variationist sociolinguistics. Interactionist sociolinguistics is principally interested in what language use can tell us about social processes, and therefore a central concern is the social meaning of language use. Variationist sociolinguistics is interested in accounting for linguistic variation and change, at least partly as a product of the social distribution of language varieties. It is, therefore, less concerned with meaning as process, and more concerned with the interaction of linguistic and social systems; in this view the significance of language is mainly symbolic. In this review, I will discuss the contributions of these branches to the problem of the relationship between microsociolinguistics and macrosociolinguistics, as well as the theoretical problems peculiar to each branch.

The social life of style1

2012 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-83 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma Moore
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Language Variation And Change ◽  
Essential Information ◽  
The Social ◽  
Variationist Sociolinguistics ◽  
Social Meanings ◽  
Using Data

Variationist sociolinguistics has provided essential information about community-wide patterns of language variation and change. However, as the field has developed, the need to provide coherent explanations for observed correlations has highlighted problems with the conceptualization of style, social meaning and the linguistic variable. Using data from two case studies, this article illustrates how a more nuanced account of stylistic practice provides a richer understanding of the social and cognitive basis of language use. In particular, it is argued that the linguistic analysis of social groups should be driven by the specific social concerns of the groups studied, not by the search for variable ways to ‘say the same thing’. This approach not only enables a fuller account of the social meaning of language features, it demonstrates that social meanings may be encoded at the intersection of components of the grammar (phonology, morphosyntax and discourse), and in more complex ways than has previously been assumed.

Rivers, Gatherings, and Infrastructures

2021 ◽  
pp. 56-61
Author(s):  
Straw Will
Keyword(s):  
Media Studies ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
The Relationship

From an interdisciplinary communications studies perspective, this chapter triangulates the relationship between several ascendant approaches to music, media, and infrastructure. The author notes that infrastructure and affect have performed certain “gathering” functions within the past decades of media studies, albeit as distant poles of attraction. The chapter registers a similarly productive tension in the ways that infrastructural studies of music reassemble their object as the point of convergence of multiple histories of materials, movements, and social processes, while infrastructural media studies trace the ways in which materials, networks, and assemblages of various kinds carry out the social distribution of meaning, affect, and memory.

Die Macht der Bilder und Bilder der Macht: die sprachliche Konstruktion von Nationalismus und Konservatismus in der strategischen politischen Kommunikation von Vox España

2020 ◽  
Vol 136 (2) ◽  
pp. 538-566
Author(s):  
Sandra Issel-Dombert
Keyword(s):  
Language Use ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Multimodal Discourse ◽  
The Social ◽  
Core Elements ◽  
The Media ◽  
Right Wing Populism ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractFrom a theoretical and empirical linguistic point of view, this paper emphasizes the importance of the relationship between populism and the media. The aim of this article is to explore the language use of the Spanish right wing populism party Vox on the basis of its multimodal postings on the social network Instagram. For the analysis of their Instagram account, a suitable multimodal discourse analysis (MDA) provides a variety of methods and allows a theoretical integration into constructivism. A hashtag-analysis reveals that Vox’s ideology consists of a nativist and ethnocentric nationalism on the one hand and conservatism on the other. With a topos analysis, the linguistic realisations of these core elements are illustrated with two case studies.

scholarly journals Metapragmatic stereotypes about geographical diversity in Greece

2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-154
Author(s):  
Dimitris Papazachariou ◽  
Anna Fterniati ◽  
Argiris Archakis ◽  
Vasia Tsami
Keyword(s):  
Social Stratification ◽  
Geographical Variation ◽  
School Location ◽  
Language Varieties ◽  
The Past ◽  
Rural Settings ◽  
The Social ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Children's Beliefs ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract Over the past decades, contemporary sociolinguistics has challenged the existence of fixed and rigid linguistic boundaries, thus focusing on how the speakers themselves define language varieties and how specific linguistic choices end up being perceived as language varieties. In this light, the present paper explores the influence of metapragmatic stereotypes on elementary school pupils’ attitudes towards geographical varieties. Specifically, we investigate children’s beliefs as to the acceptability of geographical varieties and their perception of the overt and covert prestige of geographical varieties and dialectal speakers. Furthermore, we explore the relationship between the children’s specific beliefs and factors such as gender, the social stratification of the school location and the pupils’ performance in language subjects. The data of the study was collected via questionnaires with closed questions. The research findings indicate that the children of our sample associate geographical varieties with rural settings and informal communicative contexts. Moreover, children recognize a lack of overt prestige in geographical variation; at the same time, they evaluate positively the social attractiveness and the personal reliability of the geographical varieties and their speakers. Our research showed that pupils’ beliefs are in line with the dominant metapragmatic stereotypes which promote language homogeneity.

scholarly journals Beyond the Words in Print: Identity Construction in Messages of Condolence

2022 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-192
Author(s):  
Rita Akele Twumasi
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
Identity Construction ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Role Identity ◽  
Qualitative Approach ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
The Social

Death is part of human existence. When a person hears the news of someone’s death, it is very common for that person to express their feelings about it. This feeling is in the form of condolences which express the speaker’s sorrow, and condolences fall into the category of speech act. Semantically, condolences have a social meaning which refers to language use. Identities are created in relationships with others, and condolences are major platforms for the construction of identities, in that, existing relationships are, clearly, manifested in the messages that sympathizers expressed. Using a qualitative approach, the study analyzed twenty condolence messages which were purposely sampled from condolence messages posted in the portals of International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), when one of its members passed away. The analysis of the data revealed two main identity types enacted for the deceased: role identity and Social Identity. The major Role identity enacted, metaphorically, was Father while the least role was Achiever. Second, identity as an International Figure was dominant with the Social roles, but Good Personality was used less frequently. The present study adds to studies in identity construction, in general, and studies in condolence messages, in specific.

Partition signed social networks by spectral features and structural balance

2019 ◽  
Vol 33 (19) ◽  
pp. 1950211
Author(s):  
Xiaoyu Zhu ◽  
Yinghong Ma
Keyword(s):  
Social Networks ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Structural Balance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Signed Social Networks ◽  
Spectral Algorithm ◽  
Community People ◽  
Signed Network ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Relationship

In social networks, individuals are usually but not exactly divided into communities such that within each community people are friendly to each other while being hostile towards other communities. This is in line with structural balance theory which enables a comprehensive understanding of the stability and tensions of social systems. Yet, there may be some conflicts such as the intra-community negative edges or inter-community positive edges that affect the balancedness of the social system. This raises an interesting question of how to partition a signed network for minimal conflicts, i.e., maximum balancedness. In this paper, by analyzing the relationship between balancedness and spectrum space, we find that each eigenvector can be an indicator of dichotomous structure of networks. Incorporating the leader mechanism, we partition signed networks to maximize the balancedness with top-k eigenvectors. Moreover, we design an optimizing segment to further improve the balancedness of the network. Experimental data both from real social and synthetic networks demonstrate that the spectral algorithm has higher efficiency, robustness and scientificity.

Can we be friends with Mitsuku? A longitudinal study on the process of relationship formation between humans and a social chatbot

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 279-300
Author(s):  
Emmelyn A. J. Croes ◽  
Marjolijn L. Antheunis
Keyword(s):  
Longitudinal Study ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Communication Research ◽  
Relationship Formation ◽  
Social Attraction ◽  
Self Disclosure ◽  
Abcde Model ◽  
The Social ◽  
Machine Communication ◽  
The Relationship

This explorative study investigated (a) whether social attraction, self-disclosure, interaction quality, intimacy, empathy and communicative competence play a role in getting-acquainted interactions between humans and a chatbot, and (b) whether humans can build a relationship with a chatbot. Although human-machine communication research suggests that humans can develop feelings for computers, this does not automatically imply that humans experience feelings of friendship with a chatbot. In this longitudinal study, 118 participants had seven interactions with chatbot Mitsuku over a 3-week period. After each interaction participants filled out a questionnaire. The results showed that the social processes decreased after each interaction and feelings of friendship were low. In line with the ABCDE model of relationship development, the social processes that aid relationship continuation decrease, leading to deterioration of the relationship. Furthermore, a novelty effect was at play after the first interaction, after which the chatbot became predictable and the interactions less enjoyable.

scholarly journals Fish Canning Industry and The Rhythm of Social Life in the Northeastern Adriatic

2020 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tanja Petrović
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Work Conditions ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Tertiary Sector ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Local Impact ◽  
Late Socialism ◽  
Canning Industry ◽  
The Relationship

The article discusses the social world formed around canneries in small coastal and insular towns in the northeastern Adriatic. Although associated with hard, unpleasant labor and demanding work conditions, the fish canning industry, particularly in the period of late socialism, offered a framework in which a meaningful social life was organized and lived. In this way, the local impact of canneries reached much beyond providing financial means to its employees. To understand the social meaning of fish canning in the Yugoslav Adriatic, the article focuses on the relationship between the now largely vanished local fish canning industry and tourism that is increasingly becoming the dominant (and the only) source of income for local communities. Lefebvre’s concept of rhythmanalysis proves to be a productive lens to view the complex and often ambiguous relationship between the two industries, and to narrate the history of fish canning through the senses – what was seen, heard, smelled, felt. These intense, embodied, sensorial memories caution us that the dominant claims and narratives which interpret the replacement of industry with tourism (and other tertiary sector activities) as a necessary, inevitable and desirable developmental step should not be taken for granted.

scholarly journals The relational responding task (RRT): a novel approach to measuring social meaning of language variation

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (s1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Rosseel ◽  
Dirk Speelman ◽  
Dirk Geeraerts
Keyword(s):  
Native Speakers ◽  
Language Attitudes ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Implicit Attitude ◽  
Implicit Measure ◽  
Relational Responding ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
The Social ◽  
Attitude Measures ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractRecently, sociolinguistic attitude research has adopted a number of new implicit attitude measures developed in social psychology. Especially the Implicit Association Test (IAT) has proven a successful new addition to the sociolinguist’s toolbox. Despite its relative success, the IAT has a number of limitations, such as the fact that it measures the association between two concepts (e.g. ‘I’ and ‘skinny’) without controlling for the relationship between those two concepts (e.g. ‘I am skinny’ vs. ‘I want to be skinny’). The Relational Responding Task (RRT), a novel implicit attitude measure recently developed by social psychologists, makes up for exactly that limitation by presenting participants with full propositions expressing beliefs rather than loose concepts. In this paper, we present a study that explores the RRT as a novel implicit measure of language attitudes. We employ the method to investigate the social meaning of two varieties of Dutch: Standard Belgian Dutch and colloquial Belgian Dutch. In total 391 native speakers of Belgian Dutch took part in the study. A training effect in the data aside, our results show that the latter variety is associated with dynamism, while the former is perceived as prestigious.

Employment, Individualization and Insecurity: Rethinking the Risk Society Perspective

2005 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabe Mythen
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Risk Society ◽  
Sweeping Process ◽  
Employment Relations ◽  
Environmental Transitions ◽  
German Sociologist ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
Society Perspective ◽  
The Relationship

German sociologist Ulrich Beck maintains that economic, technological and environmental transitions have radically reshaped employment relations in Western Europe. Whilst theories of employment transformation are historically ubiquitous, Beck's contribution is rather unique. Utilising risk as a lens through which subterranean shifts in employment, the economy and society can be visualised, Beck's work has been heralded as a significant theoretical landmark. The risk society perspective emphasizes the diffusion of two interlinked macro-social processes. Firstly, Beck identifies a sweeping process of individualization which recursively generates personal insecurity and reflexive decision-making. Secondly, changes in the relationship between capital and labour are said to have facilitated an underlying shift in the pattern of social distribution. This paper scrutinises Beck's understanding of these two processes, as a means of developing a broader critique of the risk society perspective. Theoretically, it will be argued that Beck deploys unsophisticated and artificial categories, amalgamates disparate forms of risk and compacts together diverse employment experiences. Empirically, the paper demonstrates that – far from being directed by a universal axis of risk – labour market inequalities follow the grooves etched by traditional forms of stratification.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document