This document provides an overview of the key concepts and methodological issues covered in the first lecture of a sociolinguistics course. It introduces sociolinguistics as the description of language that takes social context into consideration, and assumes that language and social context influence each other. The lecture covers scope, concepts like accent, dialect, register and social variables like class, gender, age. It also discusses methodological issues in sociolinguistic research like obtaining credible and systematic data through representative samples and the relationship between social and linguistic variables.

1. 12/10/2009 Copyright Mats Deutschmann PhD

2. 12/10/2009 Copyright Mats Deutschmann PhD English C: Linguistics Part 2: Sociolinguistics Lecture 1/4: Overall Framework Reading reference: Peter Stockwell 2002: Sociolinguistics: A Resource Book for Students, Part A. pp 1-25. Routledge: London.

3. 3 Overview Scope: What is Sociolinguistics? Methodological Issues Key Concepts Accent and Dialect Register and Style Ethnicity and Multilingualism Social Class Gender Age Pidgins and Creoles Politeness

4. What is Sociolinguistics Description of language taking the social context into consideration Assumptions All language events have a social context The social context determines the form of the language The language used determines the nature of a social event

5. Methodological Issues The object of investigation Credible object, regular feature, that it is possible to investigate, that it can be described systematically Data- methodological issues Qualitative vs. quantitative data Covert vs. overt collection (observer’s paradox) Sampling methods – representative samples Social variable – linguistic variable