Synchronic Language Change

Synchronic Language Change

Political Correctness

Political correctness is the avoidance of using language or forms of expression that excludes, marginalizes, or insults groups of people who are socially disadvantaged or discriminated against.


http://www.economist.com/style-guide/political-correctness: 'Coloured' is deemed as offensive in some cultures but is commonly used in South Africa for people of mixed race.


It is important in business and marketing not to insult or offend your audience or potential consumers; this can be linked to influential power and Fairclough's synthetic personalisation by using the language to address them specifically.


http://www.virginia.edu/woodson/courses/aas102%20%28spring%2001%29/articles/names/dubois.htm: Names are not merely matters of thought and reason; they are growths and habits. Some people are against the idea of political correctness as they believe that changing the word of something will not change the attitudes of it. For example in this text the writer says that if people are racist towards black people, calling them 'African' or 'coloured' instead of 'negroes' will not affect or change their attitudes towards them.


This can be linked to how words become offensive because they have 'pejorated' over time. e.g. 'gay' and 'spastic'.

Crystal Mark

Crystal Mark is a seal of approval to say a document is clearly written. Many businesses use it to ensure they are providing clear and reliable information.

Language Change Revision

Language Change Revision

Accents and Dialects

• Prejudice exists in language with accents and dialects and is seen as 'socially acceptable'.
• "Native speakers of English are generally at least bi-dialectal" - meaning they can switch between at least two dialects. This suggest they can apply these dialects in particular contexts to suit different audiences. E.g. A student wouldn't use their Essex dialect in a job interview.
• This is called code-switching according to context.
• Language changes according to societal attitudes.
• Slang lends covert prestige - tends to make you sound more 'down-to-earth' or more 'cool' and in particular occupations and situations this technique can be advantageous.
• Divergence - to speak differently to your audience by using language with either a higher social status or a lower social status than you.
• Convergence - to speak similarly to your audience by using language with either a higher social status or a lower social status than you.

Arguments For Banning Slang in Schools

• Head teacher of Ongar Academy head teacher, David Grant, says that students’ dialect "may not favourably reflect on them when they attend college and job interviews".
• Lindsay Johns: "Language is power". It affects what people think of us and accents give perceptions of us being uneducated.

Arguments Against Banning Slang in Schools

• "Because children are sensitive to how they’re perceived, stigmatising their everyday speech can be harmful" - links to Julia Snell's ideas about language.
• "Our dialect and language use are part of our identities, connecting us to time, place, community, and self-image."
• Michael Rosen: "There is no evidence that speaking using one type of slang prevents us from speaking using another."
• Michael Rosen: Banning language doesn't work. "Teachers have been trying to ban slang in schools for over 100 years."
• Stan Carey (writer for the guardian): Children should not be lead to believe that there is something inferior or shameful about their dialects.
• Julia Snell: "children may simply remain silent in order to avoid the shame of speaking ‘incorrectly’, and miss the interactions crucial to learning."

CLA Revision

CLA Revision

Noam Chomsky 

- Nativist - the capacity to acquire language is innate within humans.

- Human brain is programmed to acquire grammatical structures.

- LAD (language acquisition device)

Overextension

- Children overextend physical qualities of others and features such as shape, sound, taste, movement, size, textures.

Piaget

- Cognitive - Children develop their linguistic competence alongside their ability to understand the world around them.

-Will only acquire more complex forms if their intellectual development can cope.

- It will be unsuccessful to try and teach them things before they are ready.

Michael Halliday 

Functions of Speech: 

- Instrumental - to fulfil a need.

- Regulatory - to influence the behaviour of others. (influential power)

- Interactional - to build social relationships.

-Personal - conveying opinions, ideas and personal identity.

-Representational - facts and information.

- Imaginative - creating an imaginary world 

- Heuristic - to learn about their environment 

Jerome Bruner

- LASS (language acquisition support system) 

- The childs interaction with the adults around them helps them develop their language.

- Scaffolding - that adults gradually withdraw the support as their children's language skills develop.

Child Directed Speech 

-imperatives and interrogatives 

- higher pitch 

- repetition 

- present tense

- fewer verbs/modifiers

- concrete nouns

- yes/no questioning 

- one-word utterances 

- expansions or recasts 

Standardisation of the English Language

Standardisation of the English Language

• Dr. Samuel Jonhson published the most famous first extensive English dictionary published in 1755 and was the standardisation for spellings, definitions and meanings. The dictionary enlisted 40,000 words and took 8 years to compile.
• This dictionary made the Midlands accents the preferred way of writing and spelling and the dictionary was based on this accent.
• Now words and spellings were written and recorded so standardisation began.
• After the English dictionary was published, Lowth published grammar books in 1762 to meet the demand for 'politeness' and 'correct' English in a newly standardised society. This included standardised past participles.
• These grammar books were re-issued all the way up to 1800 so all became more aware of grammar rules and spellings.

Reasons Why Language Changes

Reasons Why Language Changes

• Neosemy is the process where we begin to use words in different ways and therefore develop new meanings.
• Meanings can also shift completely e.g. fond. - meaning now is to like something or to be affectionate but it used to mean foolish or silly. It has ameliorated.

Processes of Neosemy

• Generalisation/Broadening
• Specialising/Narrowing
• Amelioration
• Pejoration
• Weakening/Bleaching
• Metaphor
• Euphemism
• Polysemy - words that acquire many possible meanings that coexist with the original.

What Affects Language Change

External factors:

• Cultural Changes
• Technological Innovation e.g. virus, bug, crash, windows
• Social Convention e.g. LGBT
• 
  

Language Change - Periods of English

Language Change

Periods of English

• Old English - 5th Century

English developed from the Angles, Jutes and Saxons (Anglo-Saxons). Vocabulary was drawn from Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse. Latin was very influential and was highly regarded as 'upper-class'. Dialects developed from different areas of settlement. Little consistency with written language as this was before standardisation.

• Middle English - 11th Century

Norman Invasion was a significant event and French became the language of the court and administration. Latin remained in written documentation and in the church. Writers such as 'Chaucer' chose to write in English rather than French and this was where English came to prominence.

• Early Modern English - 15th Century

Caxton introduced printing press, which helped to standardise the English language. The South-East dialect was the basis for the standard form. There became a growing interest in using English. Shakespeare produced his work in English and James I commissioned the first Authorised version of the Bible in English.


In this period, Samuel Johnson's dictionary was published. It took just over 8 years to compile and
listed 40,000 words. This is what led to the standardisation of the English Language.

• Modern English - 18th Century

English language grew at an incredible rate and it had borrowed words from lots of other languages like Latin and Greek. The grammar and structure of the language began to develop in the patterns that people used language. There then became standard ways of writing and speaking.

• Present-Day English - 20th Century

English has developed through influences like technology, media and travel and English has become the international language.

CLA - Research Task

CLA Research Task

1) CLA developmental phases in correct order: Cooing, Babbling, Holophrastic, Two-word, Telegraphic, Post-Telegraphic.

2) A - Nativist -> N. Chomsky

    B - Cognitive -> J. Piaget

    C - Behaviourist -> B.F. Skinner

    D - Interactional -> J. Bruner

    E - Critical Period -> E. Lenneberg 

3) This process is 'overextension' by analogy. The child sees similar shapes to the orange and uses the term by overextension to include the orange in the term.

4) This is called 'underextension'. This is because the child does not know the word 'shoes' is a hypernym and can be applied to other shoes. Cannot relate the term to a similar item. 

5) This process is called 'overgeneralisation', when the child applies the general rule to an irregular verb. This term supports Chomsky's LAD theory.

6) Telegraphic stage - child has used subject verb but has missed out the copular verb 'is' and the preposition 'to'.

7) The child is using the first person object pronoun 'me' instead of the first person subject pronoun 'I'.

8) Substitution - child is replacing the 'ch' for a simpler sound 't'. But could also be seen as consonant cluster reduction as the child might have found it difficult to pronounce the 'ch' sound therefore it is reduced to a smaller unit.

9) Deletion - leaving out last consonant, child cannot recognise that they are not pronouncing.

10) Deletion of unstressed syllables - removal of 'ba', difficult to pronounce polysyllabic lexis.

11) Instrumental - expresses needs and wants e.g. 'want juice'.

Regulatory - to give commands 'lift me up'.

Interactional - to create interactions 'bye bye'.

Personal - to express thoughts, likes, dislikes and opinions e.g. 'I don't like fruit'

Imaginative - to create imaginary words or thoughts 

Heuristic - to seek information 'what are you doing?'

Informative - to relay information - 'we had beef for dinner'

12) Jean Berko - using a made up animal tested application of the children of the '-s' plural rule and found nearly all applied it to a noun they've never heard before.

13) nouns - most common items around a child and easily understood as they can see them

14) equal so as if the child is a full participant, and teaching a child a Q&A style conversation.

15) CDS- stress of pronunciation on particular morphemes, interrogatives, imperatives, simplified grammar, tag q's & turn taking, paralinguistic.

16) A girl named the 'wild child'. She could not speak or communicate as she was locked in a room for 12 years and wasn't interacted with. Her case proves Lenneberg's 'critical period' and Bruner's 'interaction' theory.

17) Jim was born to deaf parents and placed in front of a tv in hope that he would pick up language from there but he didn't. Supports interaction theory (Bruner).

18) David Crystal, Jean Aitchison, Noam Chomsky.

19) Language Acquisition Device. 

20) Determiners, Auxiliary Verbs.

Michael Halliday's Functions of Speech - CLA

Michael Halliday's Functions of Speech - CLA

Instrumental:

The child begins to use language to express their needs. Directly concerned with obtaining food, drink and comfort, e.g. 'want juice'.

Regulatory:

Child begins to use language to influence the behaviour of others. Persuading/commanding/requesting others to do things. E.g. 'go away'.

Interactional:

Child uses language to develop social relationships and ease the process of interaction.
Concerned with the phatic dimension of talk e.g. 'I love you.'

Personal:

Child uses language to express personal preferences and individual identity e.g. 'I am good'. Sometimes referred to as the 'Here I am!' function - announcing oneself to the world.

Representational:

Child uses language to exchange information. Concerned with relaying or requesting facts and information.

Heuristic:

Child uses language to learn of and explore the environment to learn. This may be questions and answers, or the kind of running commentary that frequently accompanies children play e.g. 'What is the tractor doing?'

Imaginative:

Child uses language to tell stories and jokes, and to create an imaginary environment. May also accompany play as children create an imaginary environment.
May also accompany play as children create imaginary words, or may arise from storytelling.

Evie 'All the Things' Mini Investigation

Evie 'All The Things' Mini Investigation 

Introduction

• Title: What characteristics of language are the two participants, Evie and her grandmother, displaying in the "All the Things' transcript? 
• Hypothesis: According to theory, I would assume that Evie should display several linguistic features of the telegraphic stage of language development and her Grandmother should display several features of Child Directed Speech.
• I would assume that Evie's grandmother is likely to use several interrogatives; imperatives and cloaked imperatives as these are features of Child Directed Speech. Because Evie is 2 years and 7 months at the time of this video, I would suggest she would display some non-standard pronunciations and using beginning to use negatives in a more standard way placing 'not' or 'no' in the standard place in the sentence. I chose these features as theory suggests that these are features of the telegraphic stage which is the stage Evie will be in according to her age.

Methodology

• I picked one transcript called 'All the Things' and quantified features that would display Evie in the telegraphic stage and to show her grandmother using Child Directed speech. Every feature tested above was applied to the transcript. 
• Picked random participants so I did not know the participants personally and so would not make biased judgements on the data. 
• It is ethical because Evie's parents had given full consent for this recording to be used for teaching purposes.
• As this is only a mini investigation, I only have one sample of data therefore it is not fully representative of Evie and her grandmother's language. Only a small sample might not show how Evie and her grandmother tailor their language to other audiences. 

Analysis

• In the transcript, Evie's grandmother asked 45 questions while Evie only asked 3, this shows that Evie's grandmother is leading the conversation and is using features of Child Directed Speech to communicate with Evie.
• Evie's grandmother also uses 3 imperatives while Evie uses 1. This shows more of a similarity between their language but still shows grandma uses a higher frequency of imperatives as she is displaying Child Directed Speech. Evie may have used an imperative as she is beginning to transition into the telegraphic stage and so is beginning to be able to ask and order adults in order to get what she wants.
• Grandma uses 4 cloaked imperatives while Evie uses one. Similar to previously, this could be because Grandma is using Child Directed Speech to Evie to lead the conversation.
• Evie makes 10 non-standard pronunciations, which shows she is still in the telegraphic stage. She says a couple of things that are inaudible so I didn't count them as non-standard pronunciations as they could have been pronounced correctly just not clearly.
• Evie also pronounces things with an 'f' sound at one point in the transcript. This is a typical pronunciation mistake during child language acquisition. This is interesting because when a child wants to make a 'th' sound like in the word 'things' or 'three', the 'th' sound gets substituted for the 'f' sound. This is an example of substitution which is classed as a mistake in sounding words, as it is assumed that the 'f' sound is easier to pronounce than the 'th' combined consonant sound.
• Evie also is beginning to recognise where the negative i.e. 'no' or 'not' should be placed in the sentence and is using it standardly. She only did this once but as I only have one sample of data it is not really representative of her ability to use it properly. This would suggest she is transitioned into the telegraphic stage as she is using these standardly.

Conclusion

• In conclusion, I would say that there was massive limitations due to the very limited data pull, only one transcript can not really conclude anything about language patterns. 
• My data supports my hypothesis as Grandma used much more interrogatives, imperatives and cloaked imperatives to display features of Child Directed Speech.
• My data also supports my hypothesis as Evie used many more non-standard pronunciations and  showed a limited ability to use negatives in the right place in a sentence grammatically. 

Theory to test in Investigation for Coursework

Kroll’s 4 stages of development   

February 7, 2012

Barry Kroll (1981) identified 4 phases of children’s development and further work by other researchers such as Katherine Perera added the suggested age ranges.

Preparation – up to 6 yrs – basic motor skills are acquired alongside some principles of spelling.

Consolidation – 7/8 yrs – writing is similar to spoken language including more colloquial and informal register.  Also a string of clauses joined together by the conjunction “and”.

Differentiation – 9/10 yrs – awareness of writing as separate from speech emerges.  In addition a stronger understanding of writing for different audiences and purposes is evident and becomes more automatic.

Integration – mid-teens – this stages sees the use of the “personal voice” in writing.  It is characterised by evidence of controlled writing, with appropriate linguistic choices being made consistently.

The Five Spelling Stages

Pre-phonemic: Imitate writing, mainly scribbling and using pretend writing; some letter shapes are decipherable.

Semi-phonetic: Link letter shapes and sounds, using this to write words.

Phonetic: Understand that all phonemes can be represented by graphemes; words become more complete.

Transitional: Combine phonic knowledge with visual memory; an awareness of combinations of letters and letter patterns, including the 'magic e' rule.

Conventional: Spell most words correctly

Bibliography: AQA English Language Specification B Textbook

CLA Coursework Preparation

CLA Coursework Preparation

I intent to test  the development of child writing and how the vocabulary and grammatical structures develop over the long period of language acquisition. I also plan to investigate how the child's ability of displaying idiolect and dialect begins to shape as they get older. The children I am going to study are two boys ages six and seven so it will be interesting to look at their books from younger years and see how their writing abilities have developed including writing for an audiences and manipulating register. I predict that as the child gets older, they are more likely to develop the ability to manipulate register, display idiolect and dialect, the complexity of vocabulary and the complexity and range of grammatical structures used will all be displayed more and I also predict they will make less grammatical and spelling mistakes.



I am planning to collect several workbooks from both of the boys over the years at similar ages, and look at the factors stated above. It would be good to acknowledge Noam Chomsky's theory of children being born with the ability to acquire language and to test the presence of their Language Acquisition Device (LAD). This means I can test the way in which the grammatical structures are used i.e. if  'runned' is used instead of 'ran' during the development stage then this shows understanding of adding the 'ed' to past tense verbs and therefore proves Chomsky's theory of children already having these grammatical 'rules' imprinted on the brain. I can also look at how easy it is for the children to acquire more vocabulary and test how this is linked to Chomsky's theory.


It will be difficult to compare the development of the language of the two boys as their development will differ and this is not fair to assume that one may be more linguistically developed than the other at a certain age. However I can use their own data to compare with their own data in previous years. This means I have  two children so I can perhaps analyse certain pieces of data that I might not have seen with just testing one child's writing ability and I can learn more about the difference of their development, errors and improvements. This will be a difficulty as it will be hard not to compare the two however comparing their data might help me to discover some things about their individual development. I cannot assume that one child at the same age as the other is less developed as there are other factors that could influence that which I have not controlled.

Phonics Research

Phonics Research

There are a range of phonetic techniques to teach children, however the dispute is which one to teach them. The more traditional method of teaching phonics is called 'synthetic' phonic teaching, which involves the introduction of 44 different phonemes without putting them in context. However the new, updated version of phonics teaching is 'analytic' phonic system, which involves teaching phonics in context, so the sounds from children's books are recognised and focusing heavily on rhyming groups.


According to the Independent, research shows that using the 'analytic' phonic system, children's reading age as improved by 9 months and the brightest by 14 months, as apposed to the more traditional 'synthetic' phonic method improving children's reading age by a year. Furthermore the two methods are still being disputed as to which is more beneficial for children and more research needs to be carried out to confirm this.

Child Speech Development

Child Speech Development

According to the American Speech, Language and Hearing Association, there are guidelines on what a child should be able to do with language at specific ages and if this is not happening with a child, then they are most likely going to suffer from a Speech or Language disorder. 

The most crucial age of a child acquiring their first language is from birth to three months. I am primarily focusing on speech development and so at this period of time in a child's life they will usually be making pleasure sounds i.e. cooing or gooing, will cry for its needs and will smile at a parent when recognising them. 

From four to six months, the child will start to make babbling sounds and the development of p, m and b sounds begins. At this age also, children tend to show their excitement and displeasure through different sounds and will make gurgling sounds when engaged with an activity or when concentrating but also in order to get attention when they are left alone.

The next stage is seven months to one year, and this is when the child will repeat babbling sounds in a sequence, starting to understand the structure of words, such as 'tata' and 'bibi'. Starts to actually use speech to get attention instead of making noises or crying. The child will also use gestures to communicate such as stretching out their arms if wanting to be picked up. They will begin to imitate speech sounds that they have heard before and this is the primary form of acquiring speech. Towards the age of one the child will be able to relevantly use a couple of words such as 'dada', 'hi', 'dog' and 'mama'. 

It is also important that the parent or carer looks at the child and speaks to them, tells them things and asks them questions, in order to reinforce communication and trigger the recognition of speech in the baby's mind. It is also good to repeat your son or daughters facial expressions so that they can understand how they are expressing themselves and what this means in context. A parent should also talk about what they are doing, where they are going, why they are doing it, and how they feel about it so the child can begin to understand why we communicate and how we do it.

Source: http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/01.htm

Reading Log and Summaries for A2

Reading Log and Summaries for A2

Child Language Acquisition 

Noam Chomsky - Chomsky believed that children acquiring a language was innate and they had a natural ability to create sentences which he said must have 'already been imprinted on the mind'. He called this ability the 'language acquisition device' and this encodes grammatical structures in the brain so when a child learns new vocabulary, they simply apply it to the structure they already know. He believed this because he noticed in his research that children never get their subjects, verbs and objects in the wrong order; they would notice if an adult purposely said an grammatically incorrect sentence; and also that they say some things which are incorrect grammatically for example 'I drawed' instead of 'I drew' but they could not have repeated this from hearing it, therefore learning is not just through imitation.

David Crystal - Crystal's theory of child language acquisition is that a child will learn in five different stages. Stage one is where children learn to say things for three different reasons: to get something they want; to get someone's attention; or to draw attention to something. Stage two is when the child learns to use interrogatives and usually start with 'what', or 'where'. Stage three involves lots of questions being asked and the development of state of actions and simple verbs such as 'listen' and 'know'. Stage four is when the child develops the ability to use more complex grammatical structures and can explain things, ask 'why' questions or making lots of requests. Stage five is when the child has fully developed language and uses it for all its purposes: to give information and explain things, ask and answer questions, requesting, expressing etc.

Jean Aitchison - Aitchison believed that a childs development of language is biologically organised and every child follows a similar pattern. She identified three stages of child language acquisition. One stage is labeling: this involves linking sounds to objects and associating a name to something. The second stage is packaging: this involved understanding the meaning of a word and the range of the meaning. The last stage is called network building: which is the understanding of the connection between words, and understanding that words have synonyms and antonyms. 

B.F. Skinner - Skinner believed that language acquisition are learned through associating events known as classical conditioning. This is said to be done by children associating objects with sounds or words. They are then rewarded by their parents by smiling or praising by their parents, which is called operant conditioning, as a positive reinforcement is likely to encourage the behaviour to be repeated. 

Neural networks - Some cognitive neuro-scientists have created neural networks that can some aspects acquire language. They are not programmed just exposed to lots of expamples of language. They are able to learn grammatical structures and make past tense forms with verbs. This supports the study that language is learned and developed as we grow up, not that we are born with the ability.

Bibliography - https://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/chomsky/

http://www.sparknotes.com/psychology/psych101/languageandcognition/section2/page/2/

http://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-language-acquisition-theories-stages-quiz.html

Investigating Language on Twitter - A2 Mini Investigation

Investigating Language on Twitter - A2 Mini Investigation

Introduction

I have chosen to focus on how gender affects language as my specialised topic area in this investigation, and in order to study this I put together a hypothesis. My hypothesis for this investigation is 'I think that men are more likely to show dominance than women in their twitter posts.' I have chosen to focus on particular feature areas such as how men and women use language features to show male dominance and female language deficiency in their tweets. I am going to focus on imperatives, multi-modal tweets, uncertainty features, empty adjectives and abbreviations and quantify them to see which sex used which features more. I would also focus on how the male and female participant used co-operative or competitive language however this would be harder to evaluate as they are not communicating to a particular speaker in a conversation thread. I also wanted to see how this would link to Robin Lakoff's deficit model and how the amount of empty adjectives and uncertainty features would show how women's language is deficient and this could link to how male speakers tend to be more dominant.

Methodology

When constructing this investigation I decided to pick two celebrities and systematically select 5 tweets from each. We did this by choosing every fifth tweet on their feed and chose celebrities so it was unbiased rather than using someone we knew personally and this could affect how we interpret the results. We also picked random celebrities so it was not biased and opinions could not affect what we analysed from the data. One benefit of using data from twitter is that we don't have to ask for consent as the celebrities who have posted these tweets are essentially allowing their information to be used as they have posted it publicly. However one limitation with our data that we collected is that it is only a very small pool of data and therefore we are unable to generalise this data to males and females in general as it is not fully representative.

Analysis

We found that Taylor (female) showed a higher amount of empty adjectives and uncertainty features than Zac (male). However Zac used a higher amount of multi-modal tweets (pictures and words), but also imperatives and abbreviations. From these results we could suggest that men are much less descriptive and more concise with their language in their tweets whereas women are much more expressive with words and describe something in more detail. This is proved as 4 out of 5 of Zacs tweets were multi-modal which incorporated pictures and words. We could also suggest that men are more dominant due to their higher amount of imperatives. However, one of Zac's tweets was an anomaly because due to my pragmatic understanding the tweet was song lyrics, however it uses the uncertainty feature 'like', but I don't know whether to consider it as his language use as he didn't put it in quote marks. We also considered the average number of features per tweet and didn't count 'retweets' as they were not written by the celebrity themselves and therefore cannot evaluate their language use. Taylor uses 'SO MUCH' in one of her tweets and this was a dilemma because both of these words are individual uncertainty features, and we can't decide to count them as one uncertainrt feature or two, as they are used in a phrase and work together.

Conclusion and Evaluation

There are massive limitations in this investigation as the data pool is very small and limiting as tghere was only 10 tweets. However, the data proves hypothesis as female uses more uncertainty features and empty adjectives however the male uses more multi-modal tweets, imperatives and abbreviations, which could prove male dominance in language. 

How is Gender shown in a conversation between Ricki and Vicki from Geordie Shore? How could we compare this with other data?

How is Gender shown in a conversation between Ricki and Vicki from Geordie Shore? How could we compare this with other data?

Key: I= Interviewer, R= Ricci, V= Vicki

R and V: [laughs]
I: will we be seeing a geordie wedding this season (.) or coming up?
V: (1) no (.) we're not um (.) I think we'll (.) in (.) oh (.)
R: you lost for words babe?
V: | [laughs]         |
R: | is she feeling | alright?
V: I'm not lost for words I'm just tryna work out how to | put it |
R:                                                                                      | yeah  | ok
V: shut up!
R: I can't believe this like
V: |we don't have a wedding |
R: | when she's on camera     | this never happens

Analysis

Due to the nature of this interview, we can tell that Vicki is trying to conceal some information about the next series, as the purpose of this interview is to encourage viewers to watch the new upcoming series of Geordie Shore, without giving too much information away. This factor could affect the significant amount of uncertainty features that Vicki uses as she is reluctant to use her speech as freely as possible, rather than just applying Robin Lakoff's 'Deficit Model' with women's language. She uses false starts; hesitations including 1 second pauses and micropauses; and fillers, such as 'um' and 'oh' as seen in the extract above. This is interesting as it supports Robin Lakoff's theory as she suggested that these features made women's language deficient as they were unnecessary in conversation. I also noticed that Ricci, the male speaker interrupts several times throughout the interview, and from the extract above, he interrupts three times consecutively while Vicki doesn't interrupt at all. This supports Zimmerman and West's theory as they suggested men interrupted much more frequently  than women and this was as a result of their dominance. I can also tell that there is a relationship between the speakers from their informal register as they laugh a lot with each other and Vicki also tells him to 'shut up' however we can tell from the context and the way he reacts to her, that it is a light-hearted joke. However after she says this, he flouts the maxim of relevance as he shifts the agenda back to what he was talking about before. You could suggest that this shows his dominance and power of him being able to shift the agenda, but she also does the same by carrying on to talk about the wedding in a competitive way. Ricci says 'I can't believe this like' and Vicki says, 'we don't have a wedding' which also flouts the maxim of relevance and juxtaposes with stereotypes of language and gender that men are usually more competitive and women are more cooperative.

In order to compare this conversation with other data collected first-hand, I could interview and record one-on-one mixed gender conversation, preferably a couple who are familiar with each other, by introducing a topic or debate. This way we could analyse how features of their language support or contradict gender theory and compare it with this interview with Vicki and Ricci to see whether the gender roles coincide in both interviews. However, to limit external variables that could affect the ability to establish cause and effect, we would have to choose two Geordie speakers, because regional dialect could really influence the language features used and this could be a factor to affect their language rather than gender being the influencing factor. I would also use a couple who are in a relationship or close friends because if the couple did not know each other this could affect how they speak to each other as they are likely to be more polite. If I were to use this as my data for an investigation I could title it 'How does gender affect the way couples speak in mixed gender conversations when presented with a particular topic of conversation?' to study different language features in relation to gender stereotypes.

Romantic Fiction Piece

Weakness and Strength

Weakness placed her delicate fingertips along his medium complexioned skin. She felt broad, strong shoulders and a firm chest. She breathed in considerably, allowing all of the salty, crisp air to fulfil her lungs, and her pulse to take over her fragile heart. She felt his too, on the left side of his chest, steady but intense.
This moment was like no other, a blanket of the ocean cascading up the shore wrapping around their feet, the sound relaxing their ears like a lullaby. The silent sun was glistening on the water at sunset, and glowing towards their very presence, creating a silhouette of two figures behind them on the velvety, pale-pink sand.
Strength ran his large, masculine hands through her hairline slowly and delicately, as if he was touching a feather, and carried his hand towards the back of her neck. He held the back of her head in the crease of her neck and Weakness felt her pulse quicken. She already felt something extraordinary after knowing him just a few weeks. He pulled her slightly closer so their chests were pressed together and he looked into her mesmerising jade-green eyes. She looked back into his, crystals of hazel and dark ocean-blue coruscating in the evening light, more beautiful than hers, she thought. She felt a lump of nervousness in her chest as she wanted to make an impression on him, as he had already done with her, but she had no idea how he felt anyway and she needn't worry about that now. This moment is all that counts.
He moved his chin ever so slightly, pressed his forehead lightly onto hers, and closed his eyes. He took a small breath and Weakness felt her pulse now racing. He then turned his chin. He looked at her one last time. Then placed his rounded lips upon hers as he held her face. He kissed her with passion and amorous. Weakness felt a feeling she had never felt before, it was indescribable.  Her body felt delicate and fragile, as he grabbed her waist strongly and lifted her up in the air towards him. This all felt so surreal. She could not comprehend how she felt like this. Strength placed her back on the sand, kissed her forehead lightly and walked up away from the beach. She watched his dark, curled hair sway in the sunset as he walked away, and his bronzed, dampened skin as he took one glance back at her.

An introduction to Language and Gender - with relevant theories.

Language and Gender

Robin Lakoff (1975) studied and published an account of women's language. From his research he set some assumptions and claims about women's language. Lakoff suggested that women use super-polite terms and forms of phrases whereas men do not tend to as much. He also suggested that women speak much less frequently and use hyper-correct grammar and pronunciation which is also apparent is the extract. I am going to look at how this is shown in an extract from a Mills and Boon romantic novel:

# Please note I have removed descriptions outside of the dialogue to purely focus on language used #

Male: I don'y suppose you took time to eat dinner, either. 

Female: I... had something earlier. On the plane.

... Male: Plastic food. 

Female: I don't know what concern it is of yours. 

Male: None. 

This extract shows that when the female speaker, Jill, is still trying to be fairly closed and tying not to let her guard down, but also seems to be getting rather irritated with him, as he is interrogating her with questions she may not want to answer if she does not know the man very well. She may not really care what he thinks of her, but she still uses the more polite form of 'I don't know what concern it is of yours' rather than the more bald, on-record form of perhaps 'It's none of your business'. Instead she uses negative face because it almost seems like that is how she is used to acting, with a lack of confidence due to established and identified gender roles of the man being seen as more dominant, and therefore she may not want to disregard this and lose respect from the man himself. This example proves Lakoff''s suggestion that women use more polite forms of language.

Zimmerman and West (1975) studied into the idea of a difference and dominance theory in language. They carried out a study and recorded 31 segments of conversation between men and women, they found that in 11 conversations, men interrupted 46 times and women only twice. This study helped to put forward their theory of dominance, as men are much more likely to interrupt, they tend to be more dominant in conversation and certainly have more air time. 

This is a short transcript at home, at meal-time on a Sunday:

# Vertical lines show overlap in conversation #

Female 1: Everyone! Dinner's ready!

Female 2: Oh this looks lovely darling, did you put oregano in it?

Female 1: Yes I did Mum, | tell me if it needs some more though.

Male 1:                               |Which one's mine?

Female 1: It's that one, Sven.

This small extract demonstrates how men have a tendency to interrupt much more often than women. I find this interesting because I don't know if it's because they have more power or dominance or whether its just a conversational habit that men usually develop. Either way, this example demonstrates how men are more likly to interrupt which leads to a particular dominance of their air-time in conversation.

Pamela Fishman (1983) developed a theory as regards to interaction: 'the work women do' theory. She suggested that conversation between the sexes sometimes fails, because of the way men respond and react to women's utterances, or don't respond. Fishman also claimed that in mixed-sex langauge interactions, men speak on average for twice as long as women. 

This is another extract from a Mills and Boon romantic novel to prove this theory:

# Please note I have removed descriptions outside of the dialogue to purely focus on language used #

Female 1: Thank you

Male 1: I might have saved your life, you know.

Female 1: How?

Male 1: You could have drowned.

Female 1: Not very likely. I had no intention of swimming.

Male 1: You can't trust the tides here. Even this close to the shore, the waves are capable pf jerking your feet out from under you. You might easily have been swept out to sea.

This again represents how a male speaker dominates the conversation through air-time. As it is a dialogue and there are no other speakers in the conversation, they take part in fair turn-taking, however he is speaking for much longer than her and always attempts to set and shift the agenda, which represents power and dominance in the conversation which could be associated with stereotypical male gender roles.

Grice's Maxims - Applied to the Teacher and Student Text

Grice's Maxims - Teacher and Student Text

Quote from the text:

Teacher: Right. Well the "winter" stands for society that is er priggish and . (looks at Alex, who is toying with his pen) What does "winter" stand for, Alex?

Alex: (smiles) What if I don't answer?

Analysis

Alex deliberately flouts the maxim of relevance in this text, by answering a question from his teacher which he is obliged to answer, with a following question. This interrogates his teacher by challenging her instrumental power and dominance in the classroom, and almost battles for status in order to look more powerful in front of his classmates. This actually results in any influential power that the teacher may or may not have, being taken away from her in a competitive way. From the contextual information we can understand that the teacher is going to have a strong personal (role) power according to Wareing's types of power. However we can tell particularly in this text that that power is questioned when Alex challenges her and tries to gain some influential power by defying the rule of relevance in Grice's Maxims. Although his reply is still weakly linked to the previous conversation, as it is about answering the question, he still does not answer it and shifts the agenda of the conversation, which is usually seen in powerful roles. This gives him more social power, according to Wareing's types of power, due to the affect that flouting the rule had on the dynamics of power roles in the classroom.

Language and Power Question

Language and Power

Language and Power Question Plan

·         Overview – Use ‘because’ and ‘although’. Evaluate context, Barrister has more instrumental power due to nature of the court, Mr Niel has less instrumental power. Power asymmetry, why? How? Barrister sets agenda due to personal (role) power. Non-fluency features indicate natural, spontaneous speech where power roles could be more natural as people are not thinking about what they are saying as much. However could suggest that Barrister has planned questions before and may be displaying more power due to preparation

·         Paragraph 1 – Mr Neil tries to use influential power to battle for status in order to not make himself look stupid and avoid face threatening acts (FTAs), because he laughs, and also interrupts on two occasions. Cooperative or competitive overlap? He also does so in order to look respectable, so that he doesn’t look guilty.

 

Barrister uses emphasis which patronises the witness, ‘so many times Mr Neil’, ‘two and two together’ and ‘police’ which he has thought about carefully so that the people listening recognise the emphasised lexis which may give negative conceptions of Mr Neil and make him look guilty. Tries to achieve ultimate goal, for Mr Neil to be found guilty. Uses repetition of personal pronoun ‘you’ to make Mr Neil feel intimidated and impeded upon. Barrister displays influential power by use of language as well as displaying instrumental power.

 

Language and Power Answer

Because of the nature of the court setting, there is an obvious differentiation of the power roles between the barrister and Mr Niel. The barrister has much more instrumental power due to his status in court, and Mr Niel has much less instrumental power as he is the one being questioned. However this does not take away the fact that Mr Niel may or may not display some influential power, based on his answers to persuade or influence the judge's view on his guilty position. The relationship between the two, displays obvious power asymmetry because the barrister uses leading questions like "when er you had er (.) done something to the gate he wanted you to repair a gate?", because in fact he knows that is the case but he is trying to get Mr Niel to admit that is true in order to make him look guilty in front of the court. The barrister also sets the agenda by asking the questions, which is using Wareing's types of power, personal power. This uses his role to display how he is more powerful and therefore the less powerful participant, Mr Niel, must answer to him.

The non-fluency features by both of the participants can be interpreted in different ways, as of course it indicates natural, spontaneous speech which we recognise from the context siutation, but also that Mr Niel pauses a lot before speaking, as he is almost being imposed upon by being asked questions and this can be seen as a Face Threatening Act (FTA) as it flouts Goffman's face needs. In contrast, we could question why the barrister uses more non-fluency features such as pauses and fillers, as it is likely that he would have prepared his questions beforehand, and this is why he has more of an advantage when it comes to displaying power. But however does not explain why he uses more non-fluency features, and so I would suggest that it could purely be due to his idiolect or the fact that he has pressure on himself to ask the right questions and make Mr Niel look guilty.

There are several occasions when Mr Niel uses influential power to battle for status in order to make himself seem truthful and honest and perhaps to avoid FTA's. He laughs after he is asked a question by the barrister and follows with "that's not true no", and this bald, on record way of replying to the barrister coincides with Brown and Levinsons politeness strategies, and gives a straight answer and also shows that he doesn't really care what the barrister thinks of him. Mr Niel also interrupts on two occasions, when the barrister says "you can't remember whether they came to see you or not?" he interrupts and says "I don't think they did no". This could be seen as competitive overlap as he may be trying to gain power and get his point across, but however I think it could be more of a co-operative overlap, because he may have not realised that the barrister was going to continue talking.

The barrister uses emphasis on regularly when interrogating Mr Niel, which can be seen as a tool to patronise him. He uses it when saying "so many times Mr Niel", "two and two together" and "police". He carefully selects the lexis or phrases to emphasise in order to trigger ideas in the audience's mind that could have negative connotations assosciated with Mr Niel's guilt. The barrister does so in order to achieve his ultimate goal, for Mr Niel to be found guilty, and so these techniques are used along with use of influential power that he has, due to his choice of lexis like "suspected" and "incident" in order to influence the judge's opinion. He also combines this with his personal power to create a strong powerful role, which contributes towards Fairclough's unequal encounter theory, as he shows he is the most dominant participant and furthermore more superior to Mr Niel.