Linguistic

Today
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What is sociolinguistics?
Language variation
Dialects

Readings: 10.1-10.2, 10.4

Sociolinguistics
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The study of the relationship between
language and society, of language
variation, and of attitudes about
language
Variation may occur at all levels of the
grammar

Language variation
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No two speakers of a language speak
exactly the same way
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Between group variation = intergroup
variation

No individual speaker speaks the same
way all the time
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Within-speaker variation = intraspeaker
variation

Dialect
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A variety of a language spoken by a group
of people that is characterized by
systematic features (e.g., phonological,
lexical, grammatical) that distinguish it
from other varieties of that same language
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Idiolect: the speech variety of an individual
speaker

Language =
a continuum
of dialects

Language

… dialect dialect dialect …
Dialect =
a continuum
of idiolects

… idiolect idiolect idiolect …

Misconceptions about ‘dialect’
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Dialect ≠ ‘substandard’
Dialect ≠ ‘incorrect’
Dialect ≠ ‘slang’
FACT: Everyone speaks a dialect

Language vs. dialect?
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Linguistic criterion
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Mutual intelligibility
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YES? = dialects
NO? = languages

e.g., British vs. American vs. Irish vs. Australian
(= dialects of English)

L1
L1 (D4)/L2(Div)

L2

http://italian.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/
XJ&sdn=italian&zu=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.italica.r
ai.it%2Fprincipali%2Flingua%2Fbruni%2Fmappe%2
Fmappe%2Ff_dialetti.htm

Language or Dialect?

Q: Why do dialects exist?
A: Because of isolation or long term separation of groups
Isolation can be across time, geography or social barriers. Two types of
“dialects”:
(1) sociolects or “social dialects”: linguistic differentiation based upon on
membership in a longstanding socially-isolated or separate group
(2) regional dialects: linguistic differentiation based upon on membership in a
longstanding geographically-isolated or separate group

Problems (cont’d)
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Asymmetries in intelligibility, e.g.,
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