Group 9

Name : Alma Savanah (21018051)

Alfina Elsya (21018050)

Subject: Introduction to Sociolinguistic

Language variations: Focus on users

1. Regional
A. Regional variations
There are vocabulary differences in the varieties spoken in different regions too.
Pronunciation and vocabulary changes are possibly the most noticeable distinctions
between different dialects of English, but there are also grammatical variations. The
distinctions between dialects are sometimes due to the frequency with which certain
features occur, rather than entirely different ways of saying things.
B. Intra-national or intra-continental variation
The way English is pronounced in Tyneside is extremely unusual, particularly
the intonation patterns. Dialectologists in the United States can also identify
differentiating aspects of people's speech from different locations. The high amount
of intra-national contact, along with these countries' small populations, may have
hampered the development of distinct regional differences. Maori dialects are more
common than English dialects, reflecting the longer time of settlement and more
limited ways of contact between people from different Maori tribes before European
immigrants arrived. The pronunciation of words beginning with a wh, for example,
varies from location to place. The Maori name for 'fi sh' is ika in most locations but
ngohi in the extreme north, and kirikiri means 'gravel' in the west but'sand' in the
east.
C. Cross-continental variations: dialect chains
Dialect chains are quite prevalent throughout Europe. One chain connects all
German, Dutch, and Flemish dialects from Switzerland via Austria and Germany to
the Netherlands and Belgium, while another connects Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan,
French, and Italian dialects. They demonstrate the arbitrary nature of the distinction
between 'language' and 'dialect'. Language traits overlap, as usage in one area blends
into the next. Intelligence is also useless. Although two unique languages are
involved, most Norwegians claim to comprehend Swedish, while Chinese who
 speak just Cantonese cannot understand those who speak Mandarin, despite the fact
that both are described as dialects of the Chinese language.
D. Social Variations
In the early twentieth century, a person with a regional accent in England was
unlikely to be high class. Upper-class persons received upper-class education,
which often entailed attending a public (i.e. private!) school and learning to speak
RP (social accent)-the accent of the best educated and most prestigious members of
English society. She will hear far less variance from the lower-middle and medium
classes. Most well-educated Scots, Irish, and Welsh speakers do not employ RP, and
these countries have more than one socially prominent accent. This type of
unfavourable reaction to RP has also been documented in the United Kingdom,
particularly among young Londoners, many of whom speak with an accent known
as 'Estuary English.'

2. Social dialects
A. Standard English
In the early twentieth century, a person who communicated using the
dialect we call standard English is spoken with a variety of accents. However,
as discussed in the section on regional dialects, there are several standard
Englishes. US standard English differs from South African and Australian
standard English, for example, and all three differ from the British standard
dialect. Linguistic forms that are not part of standard English are considered
non-standard in social terms. Because the standard dialect is always the first to
be codified, defining other dialects without contrasting them with the standard
is difficult.
B. Caste dialects
People can be categorized based on comparable social and economic
factors. Their language generally reflects these divisions; they speak in several
social dialects. The evidence is most visible in social dialects such as Indonesia
and India, where socioeconomic distinctions are very obvious.
C. Social class dialects
These dialects reflect how language use can be influenced by a person's
social and economic background. Social class dialects encompass differences in
pronunciation (phonology), grammar (syntax), and vocabulary (lexicon).
3. Age and Gender
Women use more standard grammatical forms than men across all social classes
in Western societies, whereas males use more vernacular forms than women. When
women employ more of a linguistic form than males in many speech communities, it is
usually the standard form - the outwardly prestigious form - that women prefer. Some
linguists believe that because women are more status aware than men, they adopt more
standard speech forms. According to the claim, women are more aware that the way
they speak indicates their social class background or social status in the community.
Language may become especially important as a social resource for building a
professional identity where women have few other sources of respect.
Across There are designs that are good for 10-year-olds or teenagers, but they
fade as they become older. Middle-class Glaswegians learn to substitute [t] for the
vernacular glottal stop variant in terms like water and matter between the ages of 10
and 15, usually with encouragement from their teachers and parents. Some teenagers'
extensive swear word vocabulary is also likely to evolve over time. Another area of
speech that reflects a person's age is slang. Current slang is the linguistic domain of
young people and typically sounds strange when spoken by an older person. It denotes
membership in a specific group - the young.
4. Ethnicity and social networks
In the United States, despite the fact that their distinct languages vanished centuries
ago, African Americans do not require a special variety or code to distinguish
themselves from the majority group. AAVE (African American Vernacular English) is
commonly heard in the northern cities of the United States. One of its most
distinguishing characteristics is the absence of the copula verb be in several social and
linguistic settings. In most speaking circumstances, normal English speakers utilize
shorter or reduced forms of the verb be.
5. Language change
Within a monolingual community, it is possible that everyone speaks the same
language. Everyone in a tiny town appears to speak the same language. However, a
little thought will quickly reveal areas of variance, most notably in vocabulary and
pronunciation. All language change stems from variance. When a new form emerges
and begins to coexist with an old form, the prospect of linguistic change exists. If the
new form spreads, the transformation has begun. Thus, the pronunciation of [r] in
English-speaking societies demonstrates the complexities of linguistic diversity and
language change, as well as the arbitrariness of the forms that happen to be typical in
any group.
'Changes from above' have been used to indicate changes that individuals are
aware of. These are the modifications that occur when people become aware of their
social significance as desirable or prestige qualities of speech. Another meaning of
'change from above' is the source of the change. 'Above' in this context alludes to the
notion that a feature is generally spreading downwards through the social groups in a
speech community. Changes in vowel pronunciation are frequently changes from
below, in that they occur below people's conscious awareness. It is vital to remember
that another interpretation relates to a transformation that extends from lower social
groupings to higher social groups. People may adopt new speech features, and
especially slang, from lower social groups relatively consciously.
 References
holmes, J. (2013). An Introduction to Sociolinguistic 4th edition. New York: Routledge.