Language and identity

1. Language and identity

2. Aims • To think about communities and how they use language • To think about the connection between identity and language © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

3. What we’ll achieve by the end of today’s class • You’ll have an idea of how people can use language to identify themselves • You’ll start to think about the connection between language and communities © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

4. Who makes up your community? • The SED picked speakers who were ‘representative’ of their community… • But does everyone in the same community speak the same? • Make a list of all of the ‘types’ of people you can think of in your local community • Which of these groups represent your community to you? © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

5. Studying communities • In 1963, William Labov did a study of the island of Martha’s Vineyard © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

6. Where’s Martha’s Vineyard (MV)? • Why was William Labov interested in MV? © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

7. Language change • There was a historical record of language use on Martha’s Vineyard • 1941 ‘SED-like’ study • Allowed comparisons between past and the present-day pronunciations (Labov was interested in accents) © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

8. Language and social groups • Region is not the only factor which affects the language that we use • Different groups in the same region can use language in different ways • Labov wanted to explore the extent of these differences © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

9. Groups on Martha’s Vineyard Down-island English descent (farmers) Portuguese descent American Indian descent Up-island English descent (fisherfolk) © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

10. What is life on MV like? • MV traditionally depended upon farming and fishing • But now depends upon tourism © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

11. What language changes had occurred on Martha’s Vineyard? • Change in how people pronounced the vowels in words like price and mouth • Traditional island pronunciations sounded more like…‘proyce’ and ‘mowth’ © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

12. MV pronunciations • Using the sheet of data you have been given, for each graph, write down which of the social groups uses the traditional pronunciation of ‘price’ the most • Is there anything surprising or interesting about these results? © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

13. What Labov found… • The most traditional pronunciations were from: • The up-islanders • The fishermen • The families of English descent • The 31-45 year olds © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

14. Why? Looking for evidence… “Increasing dependence on the summer trade acts as a threat to [the Vineyarders] personal independence” (1972: 297) “There is no industry on Martha’s Vineyard… for a time commercial fishing in the local waters buoyed up the economy, but the run of fish is no longer what it used to be” (1972: 296) “Farming and dairying have declined sharply because of the ferry rate, which raises the cost of fertilizer but lowers the profit of milk” (1972: 296) “Summer people, who have earned big money in big cities, are buying up the island” (1972: 297) © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

15. Language as a “badge of identity” • Which part of the island is most likely to resist incomers? • Up-island • What is the main occupation of those who resist incomers? • Fishing • Who might have been most affected by the loss of fishing and farming (which started 40 years before the MV study)? • The 31-45 year olds © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

16. The link between traditional pronunciation and positive orientation to MV Using the pronunciation of ‘price’ as a way to identify as a ‘Vineyarder’ © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

17. What the MV study showed us • Language can play a very important role in how we are identified • We can tell who someone is from the language they use • We can show our loyalties by the language we use • Changes that take place in dialects over time can be linked to regions, communities AND identities © The University of Sheffield / Department of Marketing and Communications

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