ATS1291 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Idiolect, Jargon, Baby Talk
10 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Language Variation; Sociolect, Register & Style
What makes language use different (across different types of people)
• Ethnic backgrounds
• Education
• Religion
• Profession
• Hobbies
Ethnic Backgrounds
• "Ethnolect" is defined as a dialect spoken by an ethnic group
i.e. Blak Eglish Veraular BEV or Afria Aeria Eglish; "His aa ait goi tell
othi to oody o ore"
Note their use of double negatives in order to sound 'stronger'
• In literature and media
• In music
Education
• Education level
o Early school leavers tend
• Education background (major)
o Professiolect
o Communicating with someone in the same major vs someone who isn't (use of jargon or
not)
Social Class
• People can judge what social class you're from just from the way your talk and what
grammatical patterns you use (manner of speaking, pronunciation etc.)
Religion
• Hell/Heaven
• May God find you in good health
• God bless you
• Community practice
What is sociolect?
• 'a variety or [dia]lect which is thought of as being related to its speakers' social background
rather than geographical background' (Trudgill 2003: 122).
• the language spoken by a particular social group, class or subculture, whose determinants
include such parameters as gender, age, occupation, and possibly a few others
Culture; everyone has 'layers' of identity and cultures (culture v sub culture)
Gender; do women and men speak differently?
• Women use;
• Lexical hedges or fillers
• Tag questions
• Rising intonations on declaratives/emphatic stress
• Empty adjectives (gorgeous, marvellous)
• Precise colour terms
• Hypercorrect grammar
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