Language and Social Groups

Question 1

Milroy Social - Network theory

Answer 1

Milroy argues that increased geographical mobility leads to the ‘large-scale disruption of close-knit, localised networks that have historically maintained highly systematic and complex sets of socially structured linguistic norms’.

Question 2

Labov - NYC dept. stores

Answer 2

Labov believed social class affected how people spoke. He predicted that, the higher the social class, the more people in New York would pronounce the (r). The (r) had considerable social prestige in New York City. Labov decided to study the speech of sales assistants in three Manhattan stores, drawn from the top (Saks), middle (Macy’s) and bottom (Klein’s) of the price and fashion scale. Put simply, Saks was an upper-class store, Macy’s was middle-class and Klein’s was working class. Labov found that the sales assistants from Saks used (r) the most and those from Klein’s used it least. He also found that those from Macy’s showed the greatest upward shift when they were asked to repeat.

Question 3

Giles - CAT theory

Answer 3

Communication Accommodation Theory:
the notion that people change their speech to signal their feelings about who they’re speaking to.

Convergence: Changing your speech to match the person you’re talking to.

Divergence: Changing your speech to distance yourself from the person you’re talking to.

Question 4

Giles - Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT)

Answer 4

Communication Accommodation Theory:
the notion that people change their speech to signal their feelings about who they’re speaking to.

Convergence: Changing your speech to match the person you’re talking to.

Divergence: Changing your speech to distance yourself from the person you’re talking to.

Question 5

Petyt - H-dropping

Answer 5

Study showed that the greater regional accent use in working class, diminishes as you move up the social class scale. Results showed that the upper-class rarely used H-dropping (12%) compared to the lower end of the social class scale, the lower-working class that had a very frequent use of it (93%). When individuals may move up the social class scale (social mobility), they would modify their speech a bit further towards RP as well as making less use of non-standard features like H-dropping.

Speakers who moved up in the social class scale made a conscious effort to change their pronunciation of vowel sounds, known as hypercorrection.

Question 6

Labov - Martha’s Vineyard

Answer 6

On Martha’s Vineyard a small group of fishermen began to exaggerate a tendency already existing in their speech. They did this seemingly subconsciously, in order to establish themselves as an independent social group with superior status to the despised tourists. A number of other islanders regarded this group as one which epitomised old virtues and desirable values, and subconsciously imitated the way its members talked. For these people, the new pronunciation was an innovation. As more and more people came to speak in the same way, the innovation gradually became the norm for those living on the island.