Social Groups Flashcards
Discourse Community
A group of people with shared interests and belief systems who are likely to use language in similar ways.
Goffman’s Face Theory
The concept that all communication relies on presenting a ‘face’ to listeners and audiences.
Face Threatening Act
An act which challenges the face of another participant in the conversation.
Interactional Speech
Communication that primarily severs the purpose of social interaction, e.g. small talk and conversation.
Lavendar Linguistics
The study of LGBTQ+ language.
Polari
A coded language used by the gay community established to prevent discrimination against homosexuality
“Bona to vada your dolly old eek!”
That may seem like a string of nonsense words from Dr Seuss’s The Cat in the Hat or Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange but it’s a real-life greeting gay men in the UK would say to each other in the 1950s and 60s. It means “Good to see your nice face.”
Until 1967, homosexual sex was illegal in England and Wales. To avoid imprisonment, gay men used Polari, a language that the Oxford English Dictionary says is “made up of Italianate phrases, rhyming slang and cant terms.” It had sprung up in the 1700s and 1800s as a secret language vagrants, itinerant performers, sailors and “gypsies” – many of its words, in fact, derive from the Romany people scattered across Europe.
Multiplexity
The number of separate social connects between any two people. A single tie between individuals, such as a shared workplace, is a uniplex relationship.
Positive Politeness
A way to make a request without giving offence by highlighting friendliness – often shown through compliments, common ground, jokes, tag questions, honorifics (title of address such as Mrs) and specific discourse markers (please).
For instance, a popular (if sometimes controversial) feedback strategy is the feedback sandwich: a positive comment before and after a criticism. The reason this strategy is often criticized in management circles is because it is, in fact, more of a politeness strategy than a useful feedback strategy.
Negative Politeness
A way to make a request without giving offence by showing deference – often shown through hedging (a word or phrase that makes a statement less forceful or assertive), questioning and presenting disagreements as opinions.
A high-stakes historical example of negative politeness strategies occurred in 1546, when Catherine Parr, the sixth and final wife of Henry VIII, was nearly arrested for her outspoken religious views. She managed to deflect the king’s anger through deference and presenting her disagreements as mere opinions that she had offered up so that he could be distracted from his painful health problems.
Oppressive Discourse Strategy
Repressive Discourse Strategy
Power is displayed more subtly, and can go unnoticed in conversation. Indirect language is used, and social standing is subconsciously demonstrated. e.g. a group member stating ‘they prefer the quiet’.
Social Network
The structure of a particular speech community. Social networks, and the interactions between the members within them, are a driving force behind language change
Lesley Milroy findings in Belfast
Social networks are composed of a ‘web of ties’ between individuals.
Taboo Language
A word, topic, or phrase that is social custom to avoid using or discussing as people find them embarrassing or offensive.
Transactional Speech
Language which is used to make a transaction, and creates a result. It is different from interactional language which is used to maintain relationships.
Stenstrom et al on Teen Speech
Common features of teen speak include: slang, irregular turn taking, verbal duelling, overlaps, teasing and name calling, indistinct articulation, taboo and language mixing.
Martinez about Teens vs Adults in language
Teenagers use more negatives than adults; are more direct and not afraid of face threatening acts. Multiple negation is a common feature of teenage language.
Penelope Eckert
age
Argues that three different ways to define age: chronological age (years since birth), biological age (physical maturity) and social age (linked to life events such as marriage and having children).
Penelope Eckert on slang
Slang is used to connect an individual to youth culture and to disassociate themselves with other generations.
Unni Berland on Teenagers use of tags
Teenagers often use tags such as ‘innit’, ‘right’ and ‘yeah’. ‘Innit’ is used more by working class and ‘yeah’ by middle class.
Vivian De Klerk talk on young people’s ability
Younger people have the freedom to challenge linguistic norms; they seek establish new identities. Patterns of speech formed by parents are eroded by patterns within their peer groups.
Zimmerman
Factors that influence teen speak include the media, music, graffiti and new forms of communication.
Jenny Cheshire on language development
Adult and child language develops in response to important life events such as marriage, child birth and change in social situations.
Anti Language and its creator
A minority dialect, or method of communicating, within a minority speech community that excludes members of the main speech community. Michael Halliday
Anti-languages are basically created by a process of relexicalization–the substitution of new words for old. The grammar of the parent language may be preserved, but a distinctive vocabulary develops, particularly–but not solely–in activities and areas that are central to the subculture and that help to set it off most sharply from the established society.
