Accent and Dialect Flashcards
What is Howard Giles’ Accommodation Theory?
When a speaker chooses a language variety that seems to fit the style of the other speaker.
What is convergence? (HG)
Adapting to the other person’s communication characteristics to reduce the social differences.
What is divergence? (HG)
Contradicting the method of adaptation.
What dipthongs was Labov interested in? (Martha’s Vineyard)
/au/ /ai/
How did Labov take his study? (MV)
He asked specific questions that would encourage participants to use words that contained these vowels.
What did Labov find? (MV)
The old fishermen pronounced the dipthongs differently to the Up-islanders in order to establish an identity of themselves as Vineyarders, distancing themselves from the outside tourists. The Up-islanders converged their speech to the fishermen due to admiration.
What is social stratification?
Ordering of hierarchies due within our society due to different social classes.
What was Labov investigating? (New York)
The linguistic variable ‘r’ as a prestige form
What was the high end store? (NY)
Saks
What was the middle end store? (NY)
Macy’s
What was the low end store? (NY)
S.Klein
What did he ask the staff? (NY)
Where the fourth floor was
Where was the ‘r’ pronunciation favoured? (NY)
Saks, however the older assistants used it less than the younger ones
What percentage of assistants did not use the ‘r’ variable in S.Klein? (NY)
79%, however age didn’t really affect the pronunciation choice
When did the ‘r’ pronunciation increase in Macy’s? (NY)
It increased with age and when staff were asked to repeat their responses. This shows members of the highest and lowest social groups (Saks and S.Klein) tend not to change their pronunciation after it becomes fixed with adolescence.
