The Concept of Language Variation and Change What language variation and change share in common How Does Language Change? Labov’s Principles and types of language variation Geographical variation Social variation contextual variation Bi/multilingualism Speech Accommodation Gender

1. University of Gondar
College of Social Sciences and Humanities
Department of English Language and Literature
Postgraduate Program (PhD in Applied Linguistics)
Course Title: Issues in Sociolinguistics
(APLI 712)
Presentation on:
“Language variation and change'' and ''Monolingualism, Bilingualism and
Multilingualism''
By
Destaw Wagnew
Course Instructor: Zelalem Leyew (Prof.)
Nov, 2023
Gondar,Ethiopia

2. Presentation Outline
 Introduction
 The Concept of Language Variation and Change
 What language variation and change share in common
 How Does Language Change?
 Labov’s Principles and Assumptions
 Common types of language variation
 Geographical variation
 Social variation
 contextual variation
 Language Contact
 Bi/multilingualism
 Code Switching
 Borrowing
 Monolingualism
 Conclusion

3. Introduction
 Many fields had role for today’s language variation
study(Historical L., Generative grammar , applied L…)
 Dialectologists -interested in registering language use –
were being sociolinguists.
 However, many of its research aspects were
unacceptable to modern sociolinguists.
 B/c of sampling: only older, male, rural speakers were
informants.
 This went against the basic principle of all sociolinguists:
the choice of informants be random and thus unbiased

4. Intro…cont’d
Characteristic of sociolinguistic methods are the following
features:
1) The prior definition of one's area of investigation
2) The impartial choice of informants
3) The choice of optimal methods of investigation (e.g.
tape recording rather than questionnaire)
Human language boasts over 6,900 living varieties,
This lets linguists to question around :the variable
qualities of human languages, and language contact
(Sankoff 2013).

5. Intro…cont’d
 The study of language variation works in harmony with
synchronic and diachronic explanations of how
language variation works in society:
(with reference to social factors) and in the mind
 The fundamental unit of change is not the rule but the
environmental constraint within the rule(Labov 1982)
 Eg.In many part of the England and Wales, Standard
English has lost the pronunciation of post vocalic /r/.
 Accents with post vocalic /r/ are regarded as rural and
uneducated;

6.  In cities like New York , pronouncing/ r/
is regarded as prestigious.
Variationist Sociolinguistics views the
behavior of the dependent variable as it
distributes across a series of external
(social) or internal (grammatical)factors.
i.e. How the choice of a particular variant is
influenced by different aspects of the contexts
in which it occurs (Sankoff 1988b: 985) is more
in concern

7. The Concept of Language Variation and
Change
Language variation: the diversity of language use
within and across speech communities.
Influenced by many factors, such as geography,
ethnicity, age, gender, education, occupation, and
style.
For example, speakers of English may use different
accents, words, grammar, and expressions
depending on where they live, who they interact
with, and what situation they are in.
The variable : an abstract representation of the
source of variation, realised by two or more variants,
e.g ‘think’ // :[],[f].

8.  Language change: historical development and
transformation of language over time.
 Can be caused by internal factors, such as linguistic
innovation, analogy and simplification and by
external factors, such as language contact, diffusion
and shift.
 Eg. English has changed significantly from its origins
as a Germanic languages to its current status
 Also influenced by various languages such as Latin,
French, and Arabic.
Language change can be traced through different
sources, such as historical documents, comparative
methods, and reconstruction techniques.

9.  language change is unpredictable(David ,1996)
 A static view on language : standard language is fixed,
with little or no variability at all.
 There are certain prescribed rules which cannot be
neglected,
 The standard allows of one variant of grammatical
feature, and speakers may conclude that only one
alternative is the correct choice.
 However, “a dynamic view on language recognizes the
existence of change, informs us about it and focuses
on those areas where change is ongoing“ (Croft, 2000:
45).

10. What language variation and change share in
common
• Language variation and language change are
closely related phenomena
• variation is often the source and result of
change.
• Variation provides the potential for change, as
speakers may adopt or create new forms of
language to express their identity, attitude, or
preference.
• Some forms of language may become more
widespread, dominant, or standard over time,
while others not

11.  change starts variably in a limited, natural
linguistic environment and then spread from it
to other environments (Bailey, 1973).
The variable change in the earliest
environment would ideally show greater
variability than changes in other environments
where the change started later (Wolfram 2006)
The variation we observe in today’s speech
might be a cause of tomorrow’s change.
change is to be found in variation, at all
linguistic levels.

12. How Does Language Change?
• Labov proposed three phases on language change:
1) origin, a period in which many variants exist for one
and the same phenomenon,
2) propagation, the period in which one of the
variants establish itself
3) conclusion in which the remaining variants are
done away with.
• External factors can accelerate the process of
language change: social pressure from above or
below.
• These three phases correspond to the beginning,
middle and end of language change

13. • Linguists generally divide language variation and change
between two overarching areas:
 diachronic variation : the differences found in one
language variety at two different points in time
• examined over the span of centuries to trace their
developments.
• predominant form of language variation analysis until a
shift in linguistic priorities, fostered by de Saussure
(1916) and Bloomfield (1933),
• turned linguists’ attention to synchronic study.
 synchronic language variation examine the qualities of
one or more varieties at a single point in time.
• eg W. Labov’s study

14. • Labov proved his theories on language variation
and language change by investigating (in an
anonymous manner) the English of various
employees in New York department stores.
• Informants from differing social status.
• Results:
• the employees with higher socioeconomic status
pronounced the rhotic / r / more frequently than
the lower ones.
• Hence, linguistic variable (r) was an indicator of
social stratification in all the three stores

15. Labov’s Principles and Assumptions
1) Linguistic variation was socially determined (
Basic assumption)
2) Speakers were in a double bind :through the use
of a local variety, they show identification with
their locality and aspire to social acceptability
3)Employs Covert interview methods minimized
observers’ paradox
( Behavior of informants changes under
observation)

16. Common types of language variation
Geographical variation
• Early dialectologists focused study of language variation on
geographical dialects of rural areas.
• concerned to record many dialect features before they were lost.
• Assumption : real and ‘pure’ dialects were in the rural speech of
older and uneducated speakers unlike in the city ‘
• shift- all language varieties are subject to variation and change.
• Dialectologists, then, began to incorporate social as well as
geographical information into their dialect surveys.
• This paved the way for urban dialectology which lead to
‘sociolinguistics’.
• A form of a language that people speak in a particular part of a
country, containing some different words and grammar, is
termed as dialect.
• Eg . Gondar, Gojam and Wollo dialects of Amharic language

17. Social variation
Social organizations
Two opposing approaches :social network and social
stratification.
SOCIAL STRATIFICATION
• concerns the hierarchical structure of a society, arising
from inequalities of wealth, power and other status
• It gives rise linguistically to social-class dialects.
• Social mobility is possible, the movement up or down
the social hierarchy
• Social classes are not clearly defined or labeled
entities.
• They are simply aggregates of people with similar
socioeconomic characteristics

18. SOCIAL NETWORK
• Linguistic variation can be analyzed in terms of social networks: i.e
the grouping of people based on the frequency and quality of interaction.
• The relationships individuals contract with others
• Social networks are defined by who your friends are,
• who lives near, who you work with
• A researcher can build a network from all these answers
• Net works can be distinguished in terms of the quality of the ties between
individuals.
• Uniplex tie: if the network tie between individuals is based on one
relationship, e.g. the two people work together, or are family members, or
have children in the same club.
• Multiplex tie: if two people know each other in several different roles, e.g
best friends, and they take the same courses at university, work together on
weekends.
• A dense social network is one where all members know each other. If you ask
five people, each one should mention the other four.
• Loose social network: not all members know each other

19. Social Class Dialects
(Sociolects)
• We will be able to tell a speaker’s social status on the basis of
the variety of language he/she uses- in western world
• The variety of language that is used by a particular social class is
called a sociolect.
• A sociolect may include phonological, grammatical, lexical, and
phonetic (accent) differences.
• The different classes of society are separated by social barriers
and distance, similar to ‘geographical ones’.
• So, the diffusion of linguistic features may be halted by barriers
of social class, age, race, religion, etc, and social distance may
also have the same effect as geographical distance.
• This type of social differentiation is known as social
stratification.

20. • Sociolect (or social dialect): a socially distinct
variety.
• Speaker A speaker B
‘I done it yesterday’ ‘I did it yesterday’
‘He ain’t got it‘ ‘He hasn’t got it’
• Grammatical, phonetic, phonological
differences give us clues about their social
background.
• Social class accents

21. • The suffix –ing of English, as in coming, is pronounced /ɪn/ and
/ɪŋ /, as in / kʌmɪn/ and /ˈkʌmɪŋ/
• the two pronunciations have different social distributions:
• the former is a typical standard pronunciation and the latter a
typical non-standard pronunciation.
• The English suffixes /ɪŋ /,and /ɪn/ are different linguistic items.
• How it appeared in such a way is that:
• In the end of the 18th century, members of the new middle class
started using the pronunciation /- ɪŋ / instead of the traditional
• /ɪn/
• the upper class and the lower class used the conservative
pronunciation /- ɪn /,
• Today, the pronunciation /- ɪŋ / has been adopted also by the
upper class,
• /- ɪn / pronunciation is nowadays regarded as «careless» and as
belonging to lower class sociolects.

22. Language and Gender
• Gender’ has replaced ‘sex’ in sociolinguistics.
• Sex: biologically or physiologically based
distinction between males and females.
• Gender: a social and cultural notion.
• It indicates the social identity constructed
through social action, and obedience to certain
cultural norms and prescriptions.
• Women tend to use a more standard type of
language than their male counterparts
Genderlect

23. Language and Ethnicity
• Ethnic-group differentiation -social differentiation
-has linguistic differentiation associated with it.
• Separate identity of ethnic groups is signaled by
distinct varieties of the same language,
• Ethnic groups tend to form separate communities
within a country.
e.g. Jewish, Italians in New York.
• Ethiopian society is a good example for this as
different ethnics use d/t accents of the same
language as manifestation of identity.
• Ethnolect –a variety of a language spoken by a
certain ethnic/cultural subgroup

24. Contextual Variation
• Contextual variation is variation within the individual:
we all vary our language between contexts.
Style
• Refers to the distinctive way of speaking or writing.
• People adopt different styles in different contexts.
• The influence of the addressee on the speaker’s
language
• Solidarity (social closeness) between participants is an
important influence on speech style.
• Casual, relaxed, vernacular forms with friends
• Standard forms with strangers
• Many factors affect social distancesolidarity between
people

25. Slang and Jargon
Slang -very informal language variety
 Includes new and sometimes not polite words and meanings.
 used among particular groups of people,
 eg.teen-agers
 Not used in serious speech or writing.
Eg . kerb crawler=person who drives slowly to view street
prostitutes
Jargon is a set of vocabulary items used by members of particular
professions/jobs, that is, their technical terms.
 For example, linguists have a large vocabulary that is not well
understood by non-linguists
 All professions/jobs have their own jargons.
Accountant's jargon , farmer’s jargon ,jargon of shepherds.

26. Speech Accommodation
• The notion of accommodation developed from the work of
Howard Giles and his associates.
• To approximate one’s speech to that of the partner in
conversation for a variety of reasons: to make him feel at
ease, in order to be accepted,
• Speakers tend to change the way they are speaking
depending on who they are talking to.
• Speakers may Converge (modify their speech to sound
similar)or diverge (maintain linguistic distinctiveness to
distinguish themselves from interlocutor e.g. some minority
ethnic groups).
• Motivation: in the case of convergence to express solidarity or
reduce social distance, polite speech strategy, .
• Upward / downward convergence
• Short-term / long term accommodation

27. Bi/multilingualism
• A bilingual is an individual who speaks two
languages and uses them in everyday
communication
• one language nearly always predominates with
any given individual.
• True bilingualism is rare to get
• Not all bilinguals speak two languages at the same
level

28. • Multilingualism is the ability to use three
or more languages either separately or in
various degrees of code-mixing.
• Competence in each language varies
according to such factors as occupation, and
education.
• Degree of proficiency is not essential; basic
speaking and listening skills (communicative
skills) of the speaker(s) are all it takes to be
considered as bilingual or multilingual.

29. Diglossia:
• A situation in which two forms of the same
language co-exist in a complementary
relationship in a society.
• High variety, low variety.
• Both forms are grammatically distinct, don’t
overlap.
• Each variety has its domains,
• The term is extended to refer to any two
languages, even related ones, that has this kind of
social and functional distribution.
Polyglossia: several H, M and L varieties of
languages co-exist in a complex multilingual
society,

30. Context of Bilingual Language Acquisition
• Primary context / natural bilingualism: situations in which a child
acquires both languages in a naturalistic setting without any
structured instruction
• Secondary context / school bilingualism: situations in which a
child acquires one of the languages in a structured setting,
usually school.
• Naturalistic fused setting: no separation of context for both
languages; child is exposed to both languages in the same
context.
• Naturalistic separate setting: one parent, one language model;
but also applies to other interlocutors, i.e., siblings, peers,
grandparents, etc.
• Elective bilinguals: individuals who have some element of choice
about learning a second language.
• Circumstantial bilinguals: individuals who have no choice about
learning a second language; indigenous colonized or minority
groups.

31. Age of Acquisition
• critical period
• We have a superior language learning capacity early in
life which will disappear or decline with maturation.
– Some exceptions
– no clear cut-off age
• Possible factors:
– neurological
– aptitudes
– attitude
– motivation
– nature of exposure

32. Importance of Being Bi/Multilingual
• Tolerance and respect towards other
cultures
• Employment opportunities
• Abroad study
• Effectiveness of speech
• Personal growth

33. Monolingualism
• Monolingual is one who does not have access to more than
one linguistic code as a means of social communication.
• Monolingual mindset: seeing everything in terms of a
single language ,seeing plurilingualism as deviant, out of
the norm(Clyne 2004)
• South Korea, one of the most linguistically homogenous
in the world .
• View English as un-Korean: incompatible with Korean national
identity, and self-deprecation, a view that Koreans are unable to
acquire English to a high degree of communicative competence.
• Similarly Australia and Britain claim that they have no aptitude for
foreign language learning(Edwards ,1994).

34. Attitude of monolinguals to bi/multilinguals
 There is a general view that monolingual is a norm in
most societies, viewing multilingualism out of the
norm.
 Monolinguals have generally a negative attitude to
bi/multilinguals
 choosing the right language is quite a important to
convey our message
 Bi/multilinguals are known in code switching ,and
People usually feel uncomfortable when they are
engaged in a conversation where mixing is
unreasonable.
 Monolinguals usually consider the speaker as boasting
and underestimating them.
 Not only monolinguals but also bilinguals themselves
also feel uncomfortable by their switching (zelalem
,1998)

35. Summary
• In the observable world, it is a constant fact that change
is continual and inevitable; the situation is no different
in human language.
• Sociolinguistics deals with an extremely wide range of
observable phenomena that relate to language and
society in ways that call for systematic explanations.
• Variationists quantitatively describe linguistic systems.
• The descriptions contribute to the accurate
explanation of the wide range of human language,
• the observable parts of language must reflect its mental
aspects.

36. • The nature of language change and variation has to
be analyzed, taking into account different contexts
of usages, the attitudes of speakers, as well as
regional and social varieties.
• This clearly places such studies in the area of
sociolinguistics.
• language change may be regarded as the variation
over time.
• All variation and change can be viewed as the
outcome of some form of contact between different
individuals or members of different groups
• Bi/multilingualism, bidialectism, code switching,
dialect labeling are result of mobility, migration,
urbanization, new towns.

37. Thank you!