Theorists Flashcards
Jean Aitchinson (2013) - 3 metaphors to describe peoples anxieties about language use?
Damp Spoon syndrome, Crumbling Castle, Infectious Disease
Damp Spoon Syndrome? (Jean Aitchinson)
This view suggests that language change is caused by sloppiness or laziness, the kind of sloppiness you get with a damp spoon being left in the sugar bowl - e.g glottal stops
Crumbling Castle? (Jean Aitchinson)
This view sees the English language as a beautiful old building which needs to be preserved - the english language has been gradually and carefully created until it has reached the pinnacle of splendour.
Infectious Disease? (Jean Aitchinson)
This view suggests that we ‘catch’ change from those around us.
Social change is indeed a key driving force for language change, but people pick up change because they want to, so it should not be seen as a force we are powerless to resist.
What did Donald Mackinnon suggest?
He suggested that language can be seen as:
correct or incorrect
pleasant or ugly
socially acceptable or unacceptable
morally acceptable or unacceptable
appropriate or innapropriate in their context
useful to us or useless.
This model is useful for exploring attitudes towards language use over time.
Suzanne Romaine?
Refers to the internal and external history of language. Internal=formation of new words and the inluence of dictionaries etc. Looks at what happens inside the language with no external factors.
External=the changing social contexts
Goodman?
We are living in a time of increased Informalisation- the process whereby language forms that were traditionally reserved for close personal relationships are now used in wider social contexts. What Fairclough termed ‘Conversationalised’
David Crystal?
refers to the ‘dialogic character of e-messaging’. Emails have a sense of immediacy of reply. Claims it is the dialogic nature of email, which is more significant than lexical informality. ‘Asynchronous’ and ‘synchronous’ boards vs. real time
Howard?
“The revolving cycle of euphemism has turned full circle in the U.S.-black has become acceptable, replacing Afro-American, which replaced Negro, which replaced coloured, which replaced darky, which in turn replaced black.”
Bollinger?
highlighted the increasing use of euphemisms in advertising- ‘fun-size’(small), ‘man-made’(fake), ‘crafted’(manufactured) and in the media where dysphemisms are avoided- ‘casualties’(dead bodies) ‘tragedy’(crime) ‘public relations’(propaganda)
Labov?
Martha’s Vineyard research- found that the locals of the Island had unconsiously (change from below) altered their language away from the holidayers who visited the Island, towards the dialect of the local fisherman as a sign of unity perhaps.
