Language Change Flashcards
What is age-grading?
A phenomenon in which, as a rule, all speakers of a community use more tokens of one variant at a certain age and more tokens of another variant at another age
What is apparent time?
A useful method where real time data is absent. The passage of time is instead measured by comparing speakers of different ages in a single-speech community at a single time. If younger speakers behave differently from older speakers, it is assumed that change has taken place within the community. This construct relies on the assumption that speakers only minimally change the way they speak after the critical period or in adulthood.
What is change from above?
A change taking place in a speech community above the level of individuals’ conscious awareness. One variant is clearly standard or has clear overt prestige. It does not refer to changes led by higher social classes (though this may often be the case).
What is change from below?
A change taking place in a speech community below the level of conscious awareness. It does not refer to changes led by lower social classes.
What is Community-wide change?
An entire group or community switch to use of a new variant at about the same time
What is a critical period?
The period during which language learning seems to be easiest; that is, in childhood and for some people going into early adolescence
What is generational change?
A change in which each generation in a community shows progressively more and more frequent use of a variant
What are independent factors?
Factors that have an autonomous effect on a variable
What is lifespan change?
A change to a speaker’s pronunciation or grammar that takes place after the critical period. In pronunciation, this kind of change appears to be severely restricted in its form: it normally only moves in the direction of the community overall and may also be constrained to certain input or starting points for a speaker. On the other hand, this type of change is well-attested for vocabulary.
What are panel studies?
Studies of variation across real time when the participants are held constant
What is the principle of accountability?
This term refers to a researcher’s obligation to accurately represent their data. All tokens must be included in a linguistic analysis, rather than focusing solely on the most typical uses, or only on examples that require very subtle, decontextualised judgements.
What is probability?
The likelihood with which a variant will occur in a given context, subject to the linguistic and non-linguistic constraints
What are Quotative verbs / quotatives?
Verbs introducing reports of discourse (e.g., direct and indirect speech or thought). They include older, more stable variants such as say and think, as well as newer ones such as be like, be all.
What is real time?
Augustinian time. The passing of years, hours, minutes and seconds that we measure with calendars and clocks and that we think we understand until we really think about it
What is the definition of significant?
In a technical sense, this term refers to a statistical measure that indicates a high likelihood that the indicated distribution of a variable is a highly reliable description of the data on which the distribution is based. In sociolinguistics, this is usually considered the case at a p-value below 0.05.
