LIN 1340 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: William Labov, Sociolinguistics, Social Stratification
Document Summary
Approaches to the study of language and social class. Native speakers of english, french, spanish, etc. are aware that speakers from different socioeconomic backgrounds do not use language in the same way. Different social classes or groups have different social dialects or sociolects. People often make social judgements about people based on the way they speak, illustrating that there is an important relationship between language and social class. Language and social class: a sociolinguistic perspective change. In the mid-1960s, the american sociolinguist, william labov, revolutionized the study of language in its natural social context by focusing on variation in inner city. He highlighted the key role that social class groups played (which group played the biggest role?). In order to look more closely at the relationship between social class and language variation. & change, we must first consider how we assign people to different social classes. to a clearer understanding of the social stratification of linguistic variation.
