š«ā¢ Language & Social Groups: Key Jargon Flashcards
What is a social class?
A term to refer to a group of people with similar levels of wealth, influence and status
What are the 3 sociolinguistic terms used to determine social class?
- objective method
- subjective method
- reputational method
What is the objective method?
A measure and analysis of hard facts that relate to class
What is the subjective method?
When people are asked what they think of themselves
What is the reputational method?
When people are asked what they think of others
List the UK class system in order of prestige
TOP
Upper class
Middle class
Working class
Lower class
BOTTOM
List the core attributes of the Lower Class
- Low pay; poorest and most deprived class group
- 80% of class renting homes
- Common jobs: blue-collar jobs e.g. bricklaying (low pay manual labour jobs)
- Society views as: less comiptent and educated that other class groups with a many negative steryotypes associated with them e.g. unemployment
List the core attributes of the Working Class
- Strong class collectivism, close knit communities
- Primarily, Men: breadwinners & Women: carers for children
- Geared towards enduring difficult circumstances
- Common jobs: higher-end blue collar e.g. expereinced electrician, customer service/ resturant worker
- Society views as:the most hardworking & kind class, ackowledged for being largest contributor to society + most mistreated by government
List the core attributes of the Middle Class
- Strive for good education, tend to have disposable income, go on holidays e.g. overseas & having more than 1 car
- Common jobs: accountant, lawyers, teachers, doctors/ nurses/ midwives, police officers
- Society views as: (27% of UK citizens said) best class in system, view is that people are well-educated with good jobs who arent poor but arent rich
List the core attributes of the Upper Class
- lifestyle of highbrow activities, predominantly private education, attendance to elite universities being common
- magnitudes of money and therefore disposable income to spend on luxuries
- Common jobs: entrepreneur, surgeons, laywers, scientists,
- Society views as: class that contributes the least to society, being least sympathetic, having things easiest in life and being most powerful class
What is a percariat?
Commonly used to describe lower classes: people existing without predictability or security, impermenance, so much so that it affects their mental/ psychological wellbeing
What are class assumptions?
Steryotypical beliefs generated and applied to certain class groups, marginalising them to certian behaviours/ social personas e.g. lower class asociate with criminal behaviour
List some common social groups of this generation
- roadman
- chav
- emos
What is a discourse community?
Groups who have goals or purposes, and use communication to achieve these goals
What was the name of the linguist who founded the idea of a discourse community?
John Swales
What is a community of practise?
A group of people who share common goals, use similar vocabulary and commonly share expertism in relevant discourse who come together to fulfil both individual and group goals
What was the name of the two linguists who founded the idea of a community of practise?
Lave & Wegner
What is a difference between a discourse community and a community of practise?
- Discourse community = broad
- Community of practise = specific
What are the three characteristics of a community of practise?
- Domain - the domain of interest, what brings community together and guides their actions
- Community - activities to persue domain e.g. discussions, information sharing
- Practise - members are actual practitioners in said domain of interest, how community develops whilst interacting with common interest e.g. relationships building, learning from mistakes etcā¦
What are the 4 types of communities of practise?
- Helping communities
- Best practise communities
- Knowledge stewarding communities
- Innovation communities
Describe Helping communities as a type of community of practise + give an example of one
- When community members help eachother in everyday work and needs
- e.g. Collegiate heros (Older students helping teachers to help younger students)
Describe Innovation communities as a type of community of practise + give an example of one
- When communities create breakthrough ideas, new ideas and new practises
- e.g. Sports teams (What did we do here, how can we improve -> new tactics)
Describe Kowledge stewarding communities as a type of community of practise + give an example of one
- When communities organise, manage and create a body of knowledge from which members draw from
- Miss Roses Sistersā Halloween website (Sharing her knowledge and expertise to help others locate best halloween houses)
Describe Best practise communities as a type of community of practise + give an example of one
- When communities develop and spread best practises guidelines, stratagies and advice for their members to use
- e.g. Film Facebook group (All members attain best practise/ are experts and share new ways of doing things, new stratagies etcā¦)
What is social stratification?
The organisation of a society into groups based on socioeconmic factors such as wealth, gender, race, ethnicity, income, education, occupation, social status, or power. Its a heriarchy that places groups into different levels of privilege
What does it mean to be stratified?
To be placed into order/ a heirachy of sorts
What is linguistic stratification?
The idea that language is organized in terms e.g. language levels: phonology, lexis etcā¦
How does social stratificaiton link to language?
It significantly impacts language use with socioeconomic status influencing access to linguistic resources and shaping communication patterns e.g. restricted code
What is enregisterment?
When two things are linked. In terms of language: When one or more linguistic features are linked with a social persona/ a certain steryotyped speaker
What is a social persona?
A person who asociates themselves with a particular way of thinking, behaving, and dressing and, in some cases a social persona can be connected (enregistered) to a particular way of speaking/ certain linguistic features
What is social status in terms of language?
How prestigeous, correct, or standard a linguistic variety is judged to be e.g.
* People who speak linguistic varieties with high social status are often percieved as intelligent, compotent and educated
People who speak lingusitc varieties with low social status are often percieved as unintelligent, incompotent and bereft of a good education, and in some extreme cases just blatantly labelled as illiterate
What are the 2 types of ācodesā?
- Restricted code
- Elabourated code
Explain restricted code and its features
- A style of language used in a casual & informal setting
- Shorter and more condensed language, requires background information/ contextual undestanding of topic in order to undestand converstation, less formal conveying vast meaning in minimal words
- Jargonic
- Commonly asociated with working class e.g. plumbers using jargon when working on project - passing by person would struggle to understand
Explain elabourated code and its features
- A style of language used in more formal situations
- Essentially spells everything out clearly to that a non-specialist audience may understand
- No possibility for condensing due to requirement to be explicit, hence more words
- Longer, more complicated sentence structure than restricted, contains only complete and well laid out thoughts
- Commonly asociated with Middle class
Who developed the theory of language codes?
Bernstien
What is the significance of the language codes in relation to social class?
- Working class: predominantly only using restricted codes due to them only really having access to that code and therefore speaking only in an informal manner leading to limited language knowledge/ ability
- Middle class: have access to both codes therefore allowing for better application and use of language then social class
What are the 3 ātypesā of age divided by Penelope Eckert
+Explain Each
- Biological age - level of physical maturity reached by a person
- Chronological age - number of years a person has been alive
- Social age - age determined by a personsā social standing and experiences/ emotional maturity
Why is taking into consideration the different aspects of an individualsā age important?
As puberty isnt consistent, people of the same chronological age can be a more or less biologically developed, hence a different biological age entirely
What is an emerging adult?
- The age in between adolescent and adult
- When a person is not a teen, but equally not yet an adult e.g. sixth form
Can be defined by: - Identity exploration
- Instability
- Self-focus
- Feeling that anything is possible
Why is the āemerging adultā throwing a spanner in the works of existing sociolinguistis?
- Age is such a vital sociolinguistic variable
- So by ackowledging the emerging adult and their characteristics (e.g. them moving around lots so not having a tether to a particular geographical region and their accents therefore incapable of being āplacedā into a set region of origin) sociolinguistic/ linguistic causations have to be examined further and multiple variables e.g. a personsā gender, age, generation, home town, ethnicity etcā¦ have to be taken into consideration when labelling something so basic as a personsā accent
What is age-grading?
- Age-grading occurs when individuals change their linguistic behavior throughout their lifetimes in relation to their changing age
- When language features remain ālockedā to a particular age group
Examples include: - Nursery rhymes being age graded to children as they stop singing them as they grow older
- Excessive slang being age graded to teenagers as it is later dropped when the individualsā age on into adulthood
What language level does age-grading mostly apply to?
Lexis/ lexical language patterns
What is a resitance identity + how can it impact language?
- A tendency of teenagers to rebel from the standard and attemp to be their own individual.
- Can impact language -> teens e.g. diverging from their parentsā dialect in order to rebel and fit in with their friends more, resisting the standard āenforcedā upon them
What is a quotative?
- An expression used to indroduce a quote/ quoted words/ a story/ a personal experience
- Exampels may include ālikeā (very common in teens) or āwhen my sister saidā
What is a vocative?
- A noun that identifies the person being addressed (a vocative expression is one of direct address)
- Example: āI donāt know, John,ā John is a vocative expression as it indicates the party being addressed
List 4 common language features for Children
- Neologisms -> making up words
- Incorrect application of lexis
- Grammatical errors
- Fragmented syntax (Incomplete sentences)
List 4 common language features for Adolescents
- slag/ colloquilalisms
- tag -questions
- frequent use of expletives
- Dysphemistic due to being emotionally immature
- + seeking covert prestige due to resistance identity/ resisting standard and purposefully diverging
List 4 common language features for Adults
- formal language -> high prestige
- jargon
- Euphemistic due to being emotionally mature
- Judicious vocabulary
