English Linguistics 3

English in its social contexts

Míša Hejná
['miːʃa 'ɦɛɪnaː]

Course guide – Spring 2018

Wyatt, Daisy. 2015. “‘Lost’ songs from My Fair Lady to be performed for the first
time.” The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-
entertainment/theatre-dance/news/lost-songs-from-my-fair-lady-to-be-performed-
for-the-first-time-10260439.html (Accessed December 2nd, 2016).

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Contact:
Teacher: Míša Hejná (or Michaela Hejná)
Office hours: building 1481, room 328; Mondays 10-11am (teaching weeks)
Email: misa.hejna@cc.au.dk

If you cannot make these times to come and see me, please email me to make an
appointment (not the night before the ideal meeting time).

Classroom sessions:
Three-hour classroom sessions take place weekly.

Venue: Building 1484, room 204

Time: 8:15-11:00, Wednesdays, weeks 5-12 & 14-18

Course description:
The course deals with language usage, including how the language is used in a
range of different social and regional contexts. The course provides an introduction
to pragmatics and to sociolinguistic and dialectal approaches to the study of
language variation. The course applies selected theories and methods to the study
of how various contexts are relevant to the interpretation of linguistic utterances as
well as to how linguistic, social and regional variables interact within various
speech communities.

The following provide overall information on the course

in English (http://kursuskatalog.au.dk/en/course/70331)
and Danish (http://kursuskatalog.au.dk/da/course/70331).

The Danish version of the studieordning is the legally binding one.

Prerequisites:
The course and the examination is structured on the assumption that students
know, understand and master the content of English Linguistics 1: Phonetics,
phonology, morphology, semantics and syntax, as well as the content of English
Linguistics 2: The history of the English language and advanced syntax. The course
is based on the knowledge and skills acquired by students in the courses taught
during the first three semesters, both in the linguistic disciplines as well as those
in history and social conditions.

Assessment:
The examination consists of a written take-home assignment (fri hjemmeopgave) on
a topic of the student’s choice of 9-11 standard pages (1 standard page = 2,400
characters including spaces, excluding graphs, tables, and diagrams). The topic
and method used in the assignment must be relevant to the content of the course
and are subject to approval by the course instructor/supervisor.

See the Assessment document on Blackboard (under the Assessment menu

button). Note that there is also a discussion board on blackboard to post questions
related to the assessment (under the Discussion Board menu button).

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 WEEKLY PROGRAMME (WITH REQUIRED READING & ASSIGNMENT DEADLINES)
WHEN SEMINAR ASSIGNED READING

BASIC CONCEPTS AND METHODS

1 Intro to LVC Set reading:

- intro to this course Trousdale (2010, chapter 1)
31st Jan - aims & methods of LVC
(W5) - traditional & urban dialectology If you want more:
Chambers & Trudgill 1980:
- set reading questions (Qs) chapter 2 (P1) BB
- identifying levels of variation (set Chambers & Trudgill 1980:
laptops needed exercises) chapter 4 (P2) BB

HWK for next week:

Each group will conduct a
dialectological online survey with
5 native English speakers by the
beginning of the next session
2 The Labovian Paradigm Set reading:
P1: example of a 1st wave study Labov (1984)
7th Feb P2: example of a 2nd wave study
(W6) Presentation reading:
- discussion of Ps & reading P1: Labov (1972a) BB
laptops needed - types of variables - exercises P2: Dubois & Horvath (1999)
- analysing your survey data
If you want more:
HWK for next week: Labov (1972b)
Each group will conduct a Eckert (2012)
sociolinguistic interview with 1 Esposito (2015)
native English speaker by the
beginning of the next session

CONSTRAINTS ON LINGUISTIC VARIATION

3 Styles, registers & sociolects Set reading:

P1: 3rd-wave studies
14th Feb P2: Accommodation Theory
(W7) P3: Audience Design
laptops & headphones needed - discussion of Ps & reading
- your interviewing experience
- analysis of different speech
styles
4 Gender, sex, and sexuality
P1: Gender as a concept: what it
21st Feb is and what it isn’t
(W8) P2: Linguistic approaches to
gender, sex, and sexuality
Kvindemuseet (The Women’s - discussion of Ps & reading
Museum) excursion on Saturday, - practising argumentation
24th)
5 Looking into language change
P1: Generational change
28th Feb P2: Change within lifespan
(W9) P3: Real-time and apparent-time
studies – is apparent time good
Trousdale (2010, chapter 2)
Trousdale (2010, 53-57)
Presentation reading:
P1: Podesva (2007)
P2: Giles & Powesland (1989)
P3: Bell (1989)
Set reading:
Hall (1995); 1/2 of you – see
instrs.; BB
Eckert (1989); 1/2 of you
Presentation reading:
P1: McElhinny (2003) BB
P2: Romaine (2003) BB
Set reading:
Trousdale (2010, chapters 5 & 6)
Presentation reading:
Sankoff (2006)

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laptops & headphones needed enough?
If you want more:
- discussion of Ps Boberg (2004)
- set reading questions (Qs) Wagner (2012)
- analysing speech across the
lifespan
6 Further aspects of identity Set reading:
P1: Musicians and accent change Hall-Lew et al. (2017)
7th March P2: Bilingualism, ethnicity, and
(W10) identity in Wales Presentation reading:
- guest lecture on political stances P1: Trudgill (1989)
laptops needed and LVC by Anna Jespersen P2: Madoc-Jones (2013)

- discussion of presentations If you want more:

- designing a project Trousdale (2010, chapter 7)
- tackling confounding variables Hall-Lew (2010)

APPLIED USES OF LVC

7 Applied uses of LVC - overview Set reading:

P1: Forensic uses of LVC
14th March P2: Diversity & language planning
(W11)
- discussion of Ps & reading
laptops needed - linguistic discrimination and
ways to combat it – exercises
8 Perceptual dialectology
P1: Perceptual dialectology: intro
21st March & methods
(W12) P2: Language attitudes & the
evaluation problem
- discussion of Ps & reading
- drawing perceptual maps
- further work with data
Lippi-Green (2012) BB
Presentation reading:
P1: Rock (2011)
P2: Trousdale (2010, chapter 3)
If you want more:
Perkins & Howard (2011)
Pichler (2016)
Set reading:
Trousdale (2010, chapter 8)
Presentation reading:
P1: Preston (2010)
P2: Kristiansen (1989)
If you want more:
Hall-Lew & Stephens (2012)

W12 EASTER BREAK

PRAGMATICS

9 Pragmatics & LVC Set reading:

P1: What is context and why is it Bergmann et al. (2007a) BB, also
4th April important in sociolinguistics? P1
(W14) P2: Linguistic theory and Trousdale (2010, chapter 9), also
sociolinguistics P2

laptops & headphones needed - discussion of Ps & reading

- analysing discourse variation
10 Politeness as a linguistic
variable
11th April P1: Politeness phenomena
(W15) P2: Impolite politeness
- discussion of Ps & reading
- discussion of short extracts
Set reading:
Meyerhoff (2011, chapter 5)
Presentation reading
P1: Grundy (2000, chapter 9)
P2: Bayraktaroǧlu & Sifianou
(2012)

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11 Speech acts Set reading:
P1: Maxims of conversation Wierzbicka (1985)
18st April P2: Speech acts
(W16) Presentation reading:
- discussion of Ps & reading P1: Bergmann et al. 2007BB
laptops & headphones needed - practising argumentation & P2: videos
project design
If you want more:
Grundy (2000, chapter 11)

12 Implicatures and Set reading:

presuppositions Glass (2015)
25th April P1: What are implicatures &
(W17) presuppositions? Presentation reading:
P2: Implicatures in LVC P1: Bergmann et al. (2007) BB
P2: videos
- discussion of Ps& reading
- project design If you want more:
Grundy (2000, chapter 3)

WRAPPING-UP

13 Shut up & write

2nd May
(W18)

P = presentation

BB = if the reading is a bit trickier to access (e.g. one hard copy in the library), you will be able to find it
on Blackboard in the folder for the relevant week; this also applies to sources the library doesn’t have

Set reading = reading compulsory for everyone

Presentation reading = reading compulsory only for those who present during the relevant week

What to expect in the classes?

1. two (occasionally 3) brief student presentations of 10 minutes

2. the course is heavily reading-based, which means that it is essential that you do the
reading – otherwise we will be wasting a lot of our time. If you are worried about the
amount of the reading in some of the weeks, note that many of the readings are
relatively short, sometimes you will be asked to read only some passages, and there will
always be questions that will direct you to the important passages
3. working with databases and software; this means that you will have to bring your
laptops and often also headphones for such weeks and you will be instructed to do so in
the preceding week (this is also marked in the syllabus)
4. discussion of exercises that have to be done prior to the class most of the time: these can
be questions related to the reading(s) or other activities
5. your participation is absolutely crucial – make sure to be prepared and to bring all the
materials to the sessions
6. support one another and be collegial; we’re here to learn interesting and useful things
from one another, and the more friendly the environment, the easier and the more fun
this is going to be!
7. cake (study group rota) & tea (Míša)

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Specific instructions for each week’s session will appear on blackboard by the end of the
preceding teaching week. This means that you will be able to start preparing e.g. for session 2
at the weekend of week when session 1 took place. You are expected to read and follow these
instructions.

Study groups & presentations:

Study groups will be established in Session 1. Ideally, groups should have 5 members,
including 1 international student (if applicable). However, two groups will have to consist of 4
members only due to the number of enrolled students (23).

Beginning with Session 2, one to three study groups will be responsible for a presentation that
will serve as a brief introduction to two/three topics to the rest of the class. These
presentations will be based on a reading in most cases (see the syllabus for details).

The presentation will be additional work for the group(s) in question in the relevant weeks. We
will have 24 presentations in total, which means that every group has to sign up for 4-5
presentations (this will be done during the first session). As long as every student presents at
least once, you can divide the presentation work across the semester in whatever way works
best for your group.

It is certainly a good idea to do the presentation in pairs if the reading is longer. It is also a
good idea to select presentations on similar topics within your group if you want less work.

Pick topics which are of interest to you. It is likely that this will help you to choose your final
assignment topic as well and the invested time will certainly not be lost.

In the presentation, your task will be to acquaint your colleagues with the presentation reading
within 10 minutes. The presentations are aimed to set up the overall topic of each session and
start off the discussion. I always provide instructions for each presentation topic in the relevant
week’s handout, which will help you focus on what’s important. If there is anything you find
problematic, intriguing, or confusing, certainly bring that up during the presentation and/or
during the discussion following the presentations. Remember that it’s ok not to understand
everything. That’s why we have the sessions.

Make a handout for the class (24 copies), which you can use also as your notes, and post it
on Blackboard. This will be a good preparation for your essay writing. Assume that no one else
in the class has read what you did and introduce the key issues/problems/topics as such.

Emails:

I am more than happy to work with you outside of our weekly session. However, there are two
points to note. Firstly, you should not expect me to answer emails beyond 9-5 on working days
and certainly not at the weekend. Secondly, if you know that you may have several questions
you want to email me about, send just one email with more questions rather than several
emails. If you think the question would be of interest to the whole class, you can (and should)
post that question on the Discussion Board on Blackboard, which I will monitor regularly.

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Required course book:

We will be using the following course book, which you are asked to buy:

Trousdale, Graeme. 2010. An Introduction to English Sociolinguistics. Edinburgh:

Edinburgh University Press.

This is an introductory book, which nevertheless introduces some important basic

concepts from the field of language variation and change with English as the
language of focus.

List of set readings, presentation readings, and additional readings:

Most of the sources we will be using are available through the State and University
Library (Statbiblioteket: http://library.au.dk/) and you are expected to look them
up yourselves. Looking these up yourselves will be good practice for your final
essays. Crucially, however, if you look up the sources via the library yourselves,
this will support future journal subscriptions.

Baugh, John, and Joel Sherzer (eds). 1984. Language in Use. Englewood Cliffs:
Prentice Hall.

Bayraktaroǧlu, Arɪn, and Maria Sifianou. 2012. “The iron fist in a velvet glove: how
politeness can contribute to impoliteness.” Journal of Politeness Research 8: 143-
60.

Bell, Allan. 1989. “Language style as Audience Design.” In Sociolinguistics, A

Reader and Coursebook, edited by Nikolas Coupland and Adam Jaworski, 240-
50. New York: Palgrave.

Bergmann, Anouschka, Kathleen C. Hall, and Sharon M. Ross. 2007. “Language in

context.” Language Files: Materials for an Introduction to Language and
Linguistics. 10th ed. Columbus: Ohio State University Press.

Bergmann, Anouschka, Kathleen C. Hall, and Sharon M. Ross. 2007. “Rules of

conversation.” Language Files: Materials for an Introduction to Language and
Linguistics. 10th ed. Columbus: Ohio State University Press.

Boberg, Charles. 2004. “Real and apparent time in language change: late adoption
of changes in Montreal English.” American Speech 79 (3): 250-69.

Chambers, Jenny K., and Peter Trudgill. 1980. Dialectology. Cambridge: CUP.

Coupland, Nikolas, and Adam Jaworski (ed.). 1989. Sociolinguistics, A Reader and
Coursebook. New York: Palgrave.

Dubois, Sylvie, and Barbara Horvath. 1999. “When the music changes, you change
too: gender and language change in Cajun English.” Language Variation and
Change 11 (3): 287-313.

Eckert, Penelope. 1989. “The whole woman: sex and gender differences in
variation.” In Sociolinguistics, A Reader and Coursebook, edited by Nikolas
Coupland and Adam Jaworski, 212-28. New York: Palgrave.

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Eckert, Penelope. 2012. “Three waves of variation study: the emergence of meaning
in the study of sociolinguistic variation.” Annual Review of Anthropology 41: 87-
100.

Esposito, Lewis G. 2015. ‘I am a Perpetual Underdog’: Lady Gaga’s Use of Creaky

Voice in the Construction of a Sincere Pop Star Persona. BA thesis, Swathmore
College. Available at
https://scholarship.tricolib.brynmawr.edu/handle/10066/17558.

Giles, Howard, and Peter Powesland. 1989. “Accommodation Theory.” In

Sociolinguistics, A Reader and Coursebook, edited by Nikolas Coupland and
Adam Jaworski, 232-9. New York: Palgrave.

Glass, Lelia. 2015. “Strong necessity modals: four socio-pragmatic corpus studies.”
University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics 43, 21 (2): 79-88.

Grundy, Peter. 2000. Doing Pragmatics. 3rd ed. London: Hodder Education.

Hall, Kira. 1995. “Lip service on the fantasy lines.” In Gender Articulated: Language
and the Socially Constructed Self, edited by Kira Hall and Mary Bucholtz, 183-
226. New York: Routledge.

Hall-Lew, Lauren. 2010. “Ethnicity and sociolinguistic variation in San Francisco.”

Language and Linguistics Compass 4(7): 458-72.

Hall-Lew, Lauren, and Nola Stephens. 2012. “Country Talk.” Journal of English
Linguistics 40(3): 256-80.

Hall-Lew, Lauren, Ruth Friskley, and James Scobbie. 2017. “Accommodation or

political identity.” Language Variation and Change 29(3): 341-63.

Holmes, Janet, and Miriam Meyerhoff (ed.). 2003. The Handbook of Language and
Gender. Berlin: Blackwell. https://is.muni.cz/el/1423/podzim2012/SAN230/um/the_handbook_of_language_and_gender.pdf

Krstiansen, Tore. 1989. “Language attitudes in a Danish cinema.” In

Sociolinguistics, A Reader and Coursebook, edited by Nikolas Coupland and
Adam Jaworski, 291-305. New York: Palgrave.

Labov, William. 1972a. “The social stratification of (r) in New York City department
stores.” In Sociolinguistic Patterns, edited by W. Labov, 168-78. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press.

Labov, William. 1972b. “Some principles of linguistic methodology.” Language in

Society 1 (1): 97-120.

Labov, William. 1984. “Field methods of the Project on Linguistic Change and
Variation.” In Language in Use, edited by J. Baugh and J. Sherzer, 28-53.
Englewood Cliffs: Prentince Hall.

Labov, William. 1997. “The social stratification of (r) in New York City department
stores.” In Sociolinguistics, A Reader and Coursebook, edited by Nikolas
Coupland and Adam Jaworski, 168-78. New York: Palgrave.

Lippi-Green, Rosina. 2012. English with an Accent: Language, Ideology, and

Discrimination in the United States. London/New York: Routledge.

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Madoc-Jones, Iolo, Odette Parry, and Dawn Jones. 2013. “The ‘chip shop Welsh’:
aspects of ‘Welsh speaking’ identity in contemporary Wales.” Studies in Ethnicity
and Nationalism 13(3): 394-411.

McElhinny, Bonnie. 2003. “Theorizing gender in sociolinguistics and linguistic

anthropology.” In The Handbook of Language and Gender, edited by Janet
Holmes and Miriam Meyerhoff, 21-42. Berlin: Blackwell.

Meyerhoff, Miriam. 2011. Introducing Sociolinguistics. 2nd ed. Abingdon: Routledge.

Perkins, Mick, and Sara Howard. 2011. “Clinical linguistics.” In The Routledge
Handbook of Applied Linguistics, edited by James Simpson, 111-23. New York:
Routledge.

Pichler, Heike. 2016. “Discourse-pragmatic variation across situations, varieties,

ages: I don’t know in sociolinguistic and medical interviews.” Language &
Communication 49: 1-18.

Podesva, Robert J. 2007. “Phonation type as a stylistic variable: the use of falsetto
in constructing a persona.” Journal of Sociolinguistics 11 (4): 478-504.

Preston, Dennis R. 2010. “Language, people, salience, space: perceptual

dialectology and language regard.” Dialectología 5: 87-131.

Rock, Frances. 2011. “Forensic linguistics.” In The Routledge Handbook of Applied

Linguistics, edited by James Simpson, 138-52. New York: Routledge.

Romaine, Suzanne. 2003. “Variation in language and gender.” In The Handbook of

Language and Gender, edited by Janet Holmes and Miriam Meyerhoff, 98-118.
Berlin: Blackwell.

Sankoff, Gillian. 2006. “Age: apparent time and real time.” In Elsevier Encyclopedia
of Language and Linguistics. 2nd ed. Article number LALI 01479,
http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~gillian/PAPERS/Sankoff.Age,AT,RT.pdf

Schneider, Kevin P. 2010. “Variational pragmatics.” In Variation and Change.

Pragmatic Perspectives, edited by Mirjam Fried, Jan-Ola Östman and Jef
Verschueren, 239-67. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Simpson, James (ed.). 2011. The Routledge Handbook of Applied Linguistics. New
York: Routledge.

Trousdale, Graeme. 2010. An Introduction to English Sociolinguistics. Edinburgh:

Edinburgh University Press.
Trudgill, Peter. 1989. “Acts of conflicting identity: the sociolinguistics of British
pop-song pronunciation.” In Sociolinguistics, A Reader and Coursebook, edited by
Nikolas Coupland and Adam Jaworski, 251-65. New York: Palgrave.

Wagner, Suzanne E. 2012. “Age Grading in sociolinguistic theory.” Language and

Linguistics Compass 6 (6): 371-382.

Wierzbicka, Anna. 1985. “Different cultures, different languages, different speech

acts.” Journal of Pragmatics 9: 145-78.