Social Class (paper 2)

Question 1

Peter Trudgill (1974)

Answer 1

• NORWICH STUDY
• looked at the pronunciation of the words “walking” and “talking” for G-DROPPING (walkin’ and talkin’)
• also looked at the use of “s” in verbs
  eg. “he goes to school” verses “he go to school”
• aim was to see if there was a correlation between class, gender and the use of the non-standard forms

Question 2

Trudgill - findings

Answer 2

• he asked participates to state how often they used standard and non-standard forms
• women of all classes over-reported the number of standard forms they used - shows they cared about overt prestige
• men over-reported their use of non-standard forms - shows desire for covert prestige
• women used more standard forms than men in a direct class for class comparison
• the higher the class, the more use of standard forms
• CONCLUSION - class is more of a determiner than gender

Question 3

Petyt (1985)

Answer 3

• BRADFORD STUDY
• looked at aitch-dropping (losing “h” in words like “horse and “hold”)
• the RP “u” sound in words like good
• the “uh” sound in words like “put”
  in the city of Bradford

Question 4

Petyt - findings

Answer 4

• found that the lower the social class the more likely the speaker was to drop the aitch
• the socially aspirational speakers incorrectly used the sounds in words like cushion - pronouncing it with the “uh” sound instead of the “u” sound

Question 5

William Labov

Answer 5

• investigated the use of the post-vocalic rhotic r (the “r” sound that appears after vowels) in words like “banter” and “mark”
• visited three stores in New York: a high status (Saks) a middle status (Macy’s) and a low status (Klein’s)
• Labov asked a question about the location of a department that would evoke the answer “fourth floor”
• then tell the assistant that he had not heard them and ask them to repeat - at this point speech stops becoming spontaneous and starts becoming more conscious

Question 6

Labov - findings

Answer 6

• lower middle class were most aware of overt prestige - indicative of their need to social climb
• lower classes were more aware of the prestige form and so more likely to change the way they spoke when consciously speaking
• upper middle class changed the least - indicative of their already higher social status

Question 7

Labov’s Martha’s Vineyard study

Answer 7

• looked at three groups of people in Martha’s vineyard (an island in Massachusetts):
  1) the older Chilmark fishermen
  2) the younger population
  3) the tourists
• research looks at the “aw” and “ay” phonemes in words like “house” and “spice”

Question 8

Martha’s Vineyard - findings

Answer 8

• younger population used the vowels used by the Chilmark fishermen to appear distant to the tourists
• Chilmark fishermen exaggerated their vowel sounds
• an example of covert prestige and convergence towards one social group in order to diverge from a different social group