EL1102: Lecture 7 (Part 1)

The social aspect of language use

Speech is a form of social identity - used consciously or unconsciously, to indicate membership of different social groups or different speech communities.

1.Social variation and social varieties – varieties of language use defined according to class, education, occupation, age, sex, etc.

2. Some models for analysing social variation

3.The notion of competence, performance and communicative competence

4. The notions of genre

Inter–Group /Speaker Variation

Historical variation (Diachronic - over time)

A. Old English (5th – 10th C)

Middle English (11th – 14th C)

Modern English (15th – present day)

B. Ælfric (10th C.)

Chaucer (14th C.)

Shakespeare (16/17th C)

Lawrence (20th C.)

Variation within a community sharing a single, more encompassing variety/ language

A community has VERBAL REPERTOIRES, made up of subvarieties which correlate with a number of social factors:

Ethnic languages / cultures

- in Britain - Irish English, Scottish English, Welsh English, . . .

- in America - Black Vernacular English, Texan English, . . .

- Singapore - differences between Chinese and Tamil speakers of English, e.g.

1. Alex leh? Is he joining us for dinner?

(associated primarily with Chinese speakers)

2. That boy cannot eat meat, this that all.

(associated primarily with Tamil speakers)

Age

pictures vs. movies wireless vs. radio

chap vs. guy icebox vs. fridge

expensive vs. pricey fashionable vs. trendy

splendid vs. brilliant I suppose vs. I guess

angry vs. mad mad vs. crazy

younger generation: hip, cool, corky, fag, pig out

Occupation

disc jockeys vs. waiters vs. travel agents vs. priests vs. politicians vs. doctors vs. newscasters vs. fashion designers vs. lawyers, etc.

Social class

Compare:

3. We didn’t see any people / no people

4. In (H)artford, (H)ereford and (H)ampshire (h)urricanes (h)ardly (h)appen

5. Cut / it / out (the use of glottal stop in place of ‘t’)

6. Shootin(g), fishin(g), runnin(g), walkin(g), talkin(g)

7. Non-rhotic accent in New York

Education (often associated with class)

8. He be late..

9. I don’t have no money.

10. I don’t want nothing

Intra- Group / Speaker Variation

Much of intra-group/speaker variation is functional, i.e. it is VARIATION ACCORDING TO USE.

There are no ‘single style’ speakers /users. Speakers command a complex range of styles or REGISTERS ( [sub-] varieties according to use ) an move from one to the other for different functions / purposes. That is, there is a different communicative behaviour associated with different functions / purposes, among other things.

Some very general examples:

Speech	Writing
Hey, how about dinner?	We would very much like you to join us for dinner tonight.
Nothing doing! No way! I can’t let you have this.	I regret to inform you that I will not be able to accede to your request.
Informal	Formal
A: What a car! So shiok! Shall we buy that one? B: No, lah. Where got so much money ?	A: The car is a real beauty. Would you care to check it out one of these days? B: I don't suppose we could afford to pay such a stupendous price for a car like that.

The difference here reflects the amount of attention paid to language by the user, which depends on the context.

The different registers or sub-varieties are marked by differences in vocabulary, grammar, discourse conventions, prosodic features, paralinguistic features, etc.

Some Models for the treatment of Variation

1. Halliday’s Model : Style and Register

	What is being focused on	Where: Context of situation
FIELD	The topic (“what”) and the purpose (“why”) of communication	If Doctor – patient, medical history, ailments, hospitalisation. If Teacher-pupil, in a science lesson/ Physics lecture
MODE	The means (“how”) of communication: whether spoken or written, face-to-face, one-way or two-way, etc.	If spoken, face-to-face or telephonic. If written, personal or official or newspaper / journalistic or academic, etc.
TENOR	The style (“to whom”) of communication – whether formal or informal, determined by the roles of the participants & their relationship with each other.	Doctor - patient (F) Teacher – student (F) Interviewer – interviewee (F) Mother - child (INF) Friend – friend (INF)

Style and Register (cont’d)

There is a gradation of style of speech, from the very formal to the very informal. For example, compare 1 & 2, or 3 & 4:

11. “Excuse me, is the manager in his office? I have an appointment.”

(Something that you may say to the secretary if you’re going for

a job appointment.)

12. “Hey is that lazy bum still in bed? I gotta see him about something

you know.”

(If you’re speaking to a friend about another friend)

13. The city has passed an ordinance that expressly prohibits the

following while aboard public conveniences. Eating or Drinking.

The Playing of Electronic Devices.

14. “No eating or drinking here! And if you’re thinking of switching on

your radio, forget it.”

TASK : Style and Register (cont’d)

Style-shifting - i.e. changing our style of speaking according to role- relation is a common phenomenon of everyday language use. We all have a variety of names or ‘titles’ which are used by different people, at different times, to get our attention. For instance, imagine yourself in each of the social roles shown in the list on the left below, and consider which form (or forms) of address you would most likely use to the person whose various names are listed to the right:

1. A tailor calling up to say his new suit is ready

2. A good friend for a number of years

3. His young grandchild

4. His drill sergeant in the army

5. His former elementary school teacher

6. A store-detective who thinks he’s a shoplifter

7. His former Hollywood agent

Ron

Mr Reagan

Ronald

Gramps

Reagan

Ronnie baby

Hey, you

2. Fishman’s Model

“Who speaks what language to whom and when”

DOMAINS	Certain spheres of activity Institutionalised contexts/ Classes of “congruent” situations / major clusters of interaction situations	home, school, market / shop, religion, office, recreation, etc.
ROLES	Sets of mutual rights and obligations – determined by socio-cultural norms & expectations	Parent- child, sibling, Teacher-student, Buyer-seller, Employer- employee
FUNCTIONS	Diglossia – functional allocation of use of two varieties of a language – High (H) and low (L).	To inform, acquire, buy, sell, reassure, etc.

Situation	Setting Scene	Physical, time and place e.g. LT 15, AS 6, NUS Abstract, psychological setting, involves cultural definition of occasion. e.g. EL 1102 Lecture
Participants	Speaker / Addressor Hearer / Addressee, Audience	Whom the speech act is addressed to, & who it is uttered by. Often participants are allocated communication roles by their culture – e.g. ‘doctor – patient’, ‘teacher – student’, ‘interviewer- Interviewee’, ‘therapist - client’.
Ends	Purposes – outcomes Purposes- individual goals	Some speech events have conventional outcomes, e.g. a diagnosis’, ‘a sale’ or ‘a verdict’
Act sequences	Message form Message content	HOW it is said WHAT is said
Key	Tone, manner or spirit in which the event is carried out	Informal, formal (style) perfunctory, relaxed, intense
Instrumentalities	Channel or mode of discourse Forms of speech Spoken, written, written but read aloud, recited, etc	The dialect, accent or other variety of speech in which the act is uttered.
Norms	Ns of interpretation Ns of interaction Expected interpretation.	Interpretation in relation to the conventions of conversation, turn-taking, etc
Genres	Text types or categories of texts	Poems, myths, stories, sermons, lectures, editorials, etc.

The patterned nature of variation

From the intra-speaker/group viewpoint – considerable variability of usage - “societally patterned variation in talk” (Fishman)

- based on correlations between linguistic resources (rules of grammar, vocabulary, etc.) and variable features of the social situation.

- NOT idiosyncratic, random, haphazard

- BUT systematic, conventionalized, patterned - RULES OF USE which govern linguistic performance & behaviour in actual social contexts.

- not inattentive, makeshift, unmindful, anyhow; involves SKILLED work based on knowledge and control of the rules.

- Language as ACTION/PRAXIS : The use of language appropriate to the social context on the basis of these rules, whereby speakers conduct their individual and social lives in ways that make the most sense to them, by acting in and on their contexts.

The notion of Competence (Chomsky, 1957)

Knowledge of Language = linguistic competence + linguistic performance

Linguistic Competence : The rich body of INTUITIVE knowledge about language and its rules of grammar that speakers have naturally internalised (ie made part of their mental structure) as they acquired it.

This involves:

A. The ability to make judgements of grammaticality

15. a) Revolutionary new ideas appear infrequently.

b) *New appear infrequently ideas revolutionary.

c) Colourless green ideas sleep furiously.

B. The ability to detect ambiguity and unravel ambiguity

16. Visiting relatives can be difficult.

Two possible meanings:

a) We have to visit relatives. This can be difficult.

b) Relatives visit us. They can be difficult.

17. Flying planes can be dangerous.

Two possible meanings:

a) We fly planes. This activity can be dangerous.

b) Planes are flying. And they can be dangerous.

C. The ability to see relations (structural, semantic) among elements which are not overt

18. a) Tom is easy to please. (A pleases Tom)

b) Tom is eager to please. (Tom pleases A)

a) Someone wants to please Tom. This is easy to do.

b) Tom wants to please someone. He is eager to do so.

Linguistic COMPETENCE and linguistic PERFORMANCE

- the actual USE of the rules in concrete situations; this differs from person to person, situation to situation, etc.

Analogy of a symphony (score) or a play (script) and its performance

- often regarded as “degenerate” - unpredictable, marked by errors, slips of tongue, changes of direction, memory lapses, etc. all making underlying rules of grammar difficult to perceive.

- BUT, it is not random, haphazard. Is governed by RULES or PRINCIPLES OF USE.

The notion of Communicative Competence (Hymes )

To be competent in a language is to know its rules of grammar / Lexis AS WELL AS its rules of use.

TWO kinds of Competence: linguistic competence and communicative competence

Communicative Competence: The INTUITIVE knowledge and control of the rules / principles of USE. This knowledge is functional as opposed to linguistic competence, which is by and large formal.

“a normal child acquires knowledge of sentences, not only as grammatical, but also as appropriate. He or she acquires competence as to when to speak, when not, and as to what to talk about, with whom, where, in what manner. In short, a child becomes able to accomplish a repertoire of speech acts, to take part in speech events, and to evaluate their accomplishment by others.”

(Dell Hymes, On Communictive Competence)

The notion of genre

-- Categories / types of texts, each with its own goals, purposes, methods, etc. e.g. poems, novels , plays, news reports, editorials, expository writing, service encounters, mother-child interaction, etc.

-- Characterised by a relatively stable organisational structure in terms of (i) thematic content, (ii) style, & (iii) compositional structure

-- They represent specific activities or events carried out in specific social contexts and have very specific goals or purposes.

A combination of all these complex factors then determines the patterns of language use for each specific genre.

-- The focus is on the functionality of language, which derives from the crucial two-way interaction between language and social contexts during its use in those contexts. i.e. they are shaped by and shape social contexts and social practices.

-- Institutionalised: typical patterns of language use associated with certain social institutions, occupations, professions, fields of discipline, i.e. they reflect the patterns of language use typical of particular communities /societies / cultures -- reflecting in some ways the structure of society itself.

-- This specific way in which language is used also constructs a view of the subject matter that ties on with these activities, goals, etc.

-- Instruments, vehicles, devices that generate belief and value systems. “Patterns of action” by which systems, ideas, beliefs, views of reality, ideologies are transmitted, maintained and changed.

Some examples of genres

1. Mahathir: Why I shamed Anwar

Premier tells Newsweek how he had only two choices: either shame Anwar or let the country be humiliated for being led by a homosexual.

By BRENDAN PEREIRA IN KUALA LUMPUR

HUMILIATE a friend or allow the whole country to be humiliated.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad said that left with only two choices, he decided to make public the abuse of power and alleged sexual misconduct of his former deputy, Anwar Ibrahim.

He conceded that Islam discouraged public shaming of a person, but he

defended his action. "If this country is led by a man who, later on, we discover is a homosexual and all that, it would bring shame to the whole country," the 74- year old leader said in an interview with Newsweek.

He dismissed talk of a conspiracy to end the political career of his heir apparent, saying that the baton of power was about to be handed over then. Instead, it was Anwar who had a hidden agenda. He built a cult of personality while in government, the Prime Minister charged.

2. All’s well on the domestic front

Singapore

The outlook for the bourse remains mixed as positive local factors do battle with negative external factors.

On the one hand, the Singapore economy and, in particular, corporate results of listed companies suggest that a recovery is well under way.

NatSteel – the island’s largest steel company - had double its first-half profit, and with less that a week of the corporate reporting season left to go, Liang Court and ITE Electric are the only companies that have reported interim losses.

Some dealers expect the bourse to trade higher this week with improvements in earnings of listed companies and a better economic outlook.

On the other hand, the gush of positive news seemed to have been negated largely by developments outside Singapore.

GOLDLION

The symbol of quality, style and elegance, Goldlion is committed to nothing but the highest standard. Leather goods, ties, shirts, accessories.. . . . Only Goldlion can give you such a variety that helps you stand out whenever and wherever you are. Goldlion. For the man of today.

4. Vieri marks debut with hat-trick

There was no shortage of thrills at the San Siro where a delirious crowd saw Vieri erase all the bad memories of last season’s disastrous campaign.

He opened the scoring in the 16th minute on the break, while his stand-in strike partner Ivan Zamorano hit the woodwork just minutes later

Zamorano made way for Ronaldo at the start of the second half but it was Vieri who continued to find the target, scoring again in the 53rd and 65th minutes.

Milan took the lead when Liberian veteran George Weah hit the post and then drilled home the rebound, but Lecce drew level five minutes later through defender Alberto Servino.

5. Surprise Apple Cake

Ingredients

1 large tin Nestle Condensed Milk

Grated rind of 1 Lemon

3 Eggs

4 ozs. Cake Crumbs

2 tbl. sp. Melted Butter

2 tbl. sp. Lemon Juice

½ pint Apple Sauce or drained Stewed Apples

½ tsp. Cinnamon

Mix the butter and cinnamon with the cake crumbs. Spread a thick layer on the bottom of a greased sandwich tin. Beat the yokes well and add the Nestle’s Milk, lemon juice, rind, and apple sauce. Fold in the stiffly beaten whipped whites and pour into the sandwich tin. Cover with the rest of the crumbs and bake in a moderate oven for 50 Minutes. Serve hot or cold

Academic Genres

Each academic field has its own characteristic, specialized genres, each of which constructs choices through field, tenor and mode.

- command of academic subjects involves command of these specialised patterns of language use, these subject –specific genres.

- academic genres constitute empowering discourses

- they represent the abstract distant knowledge of specialist / expert

- they are not ‘COMMONSENSE KNOWLEDGE” associated with

“COMMON SPEECH”

- they claim “objectivity”, but embody particular views of reality of the subject and its concerns, which are predetermined by the interests of the groups involved.

- the need for CRITICAL AWARENESS of how exactly they work BEYOND THE MERE DECODING of what “is there”. And to INTERROGATE what we read, DECONSTRUCT them, RESIST them where necessary, RECONSTRUCT them to express our own meanings

Move on to Lecture 7 (Part 2)

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