Jennifer Cheshire - Social Variation (Networks)

Question 1

Where and when did Cheshire carry out her study?

Answer 1

Reading, 1980s

Question 2

How does her study differ from Trudgill and Petyts studies?

Answer 2

She looked at a wider range of linguistic analysis, she looked more at grammatical variables.

Question 3

What was Cheshire’s methodology?

Answer 3

She went undercover and blended in with the gangs to see how they spoke.

Question 4

What was Cheshire trying to find out?

Answer 4

If there was a relationship between language use and how much of a “hard core” gang member you were.

Question 5

What were the properties she based people being a “hard core” gang member by?

Answer 5

• participating in more crimes
• carry weapons
• more taboo language
• follow gang dress code

Question 6

What was Cheshire’s hypothesis?

Answer 6

If you were in the centre of the gang you were more likely to use vernacular pronunciation compared to the people on the edge of the gang.

Question 7

What sort of study is this?

Answer 7

(Vernacular) Social Network Study

Question 8

What did the score of all the different properties she based people being a “hard core” gang member give?

Answer 8

The vernacular culture index score

Question 9

How many different variables did Cheshire look at?

Answer 9

11

Question 10

What were the 11 different variables she looked at?

Answer 10

1. non-s. ‘s’
2. non-s. ‘has’
3. non-s. ‘was’
4. non-s. ‘never’
5. non-s. ‘what’
6. non-s. ‘do’
7. non-s. ‘come’
8. negative concord
9. ain’t = auxiliary ‘have’
10. ain’t = auxiliary ‘be’
11. ain’t = copula (not used as an auxiliary)

Question 11

Who did she compare the variables with?

Answer 11

“Good girls” - less hard core gang members (more middle class)
“Bad girls” - more hard core gang members (more lower class)

Question 12

What differences did Cheshire find between the good girls and the bad girls?

Answer 12

In most cases, the bad girls used the vernacular forms more than the good girls,
however in two cases the good girls used the vernacular forms the same amount as the bad girls
in one instance the good girls used the vernacular forms more than the bad girls

Question 13

What did this inconsistency of the data results show?

Answer 13

That there is an increased variability of younger language users and both groups of girls used quite a lot of non-standard English.

Question 14

Who did she also compare the groups of girls with?

Answer 14

Bad Boys and Good boys

Question 15

Were the results similar when comparing with the boys groups?

Answer 15

Yes

Question 16

What was the conclusion?

Answer 16

Hardcore gang members do have a higher frequency of non-standard forms. This is because the non-standard forms became a way in which people identified with the gang.