SOCIOLINGUISTICS
Sociolinguistics is the descriptive study of the effect of any and all aspects of society, including cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the way language is used, and the effects of language use on society. Sociolinguistics differs from sociology of language in that the focus of sociolinguistics is the effect of the society on the language, while the latter's focus is on the language's effect on the society.
1. DIALECTS
All speakers of english can talk to each other and pretty much understand each other, yet no two speak exactly alike. Some difference are die, age, sex, state. Or healht, size, personality, emotional state and pesonal idiosyncrasles. That each person speaks somewhat differently fom all other is shown by our ability to recognize acquaintances by hearin them talk the unic characteristics of the language of an individual speakers are reffered to as the speakers; idiolect. english may then be said to consist of 400.000 idioects , or the number equal o the number of speakers of english.
Beyond these individual differences, the language of a group of people may show regular variations from that used by other group of speakers of thet language. When the english of speakers in different geo graphical regions and from different social groups shows systematic differences, the groups are said to speak different dialects of the same language. The dialects of a single language my thus be defined as mutually intelligible forms of a language that differ in systematic ways from each other.
It is not always easy to decide whether the systematic differences between two speech communities reflect two dialect or two different languages. A rule of thumb definition can be used. When dialect become mutually unintelligible when the speaker of one dialect group can no longer understand the speakers of another dialect group these dialects become different languages. However , to difine “mutualy inteelgible” is become it self difficult task.
2. LINGUA FRANCA
Many areas in the world are populated by people speakin divrgent languages. In such areas, where group desire social or commercial communication, one language is often used by common agreement . such a languge is called a LINGUA FRANCA.
In medieval terms, a trae language came into use in the medditeranian parts. It consisted of italian mixed with frenchy , spanish , greek and arabic , and it was called lingua franca, “frankish language”. The term lingua franca was generalized to other languages similarly used. Thus , any language can be a lingua franca.
English has been called “the lingua franca of the whole world,”french , at one time , was “the lingua franca of diplomacy.”and atin and greek were the lingua francas of cristianity in the west and east,respectively, for a millenium . yiddish has iong served as a lingua franca.
More frequantly, lingua francas serve as “trade languages” east africa is populated by hundred of tribes , each speaking its own language , but most africans of this areas learn at least some swahili as a second language. A similar situation exist in west africa , where hausa is the lingua franca.
Hindi and undu are lingua franca of idia and pakistan,respectively. The linguistic situation of this are of the world is so complex that there are often regional lingua francas. Usualy the popular dialects near commercial centers . the same situation existed in imperial china.
In modern china , the chinnese language a whole is often reffereo to as zhong wen , which technicaly refers to the writen language ,whereas zhonguo refers to the spoken language, ninety four percent of the peope living in the people’s republics of china are said to speaks han language groups that for the most part are the mutualy unintelligible .within each group there are hundred of dialects . in addiction to these han language , there are more than fivty “national minority” languages including the five principal ones , mongolian , ulghur,tibetan ,zhuang, and korean .the situation is clearly complex, and for his reason an extensive language reform policy was inaugurated to spread a standard language called putonghua, which embodies the pronounciation of the beijing (peking) dialects, the grammar of northern chinese dialects, and the vocabulary of modern colloquial chinese. The native languages and dialects are not considered inferior, rather the approach is to spread the common speech. ( the literal meaning of potonghua ) so that all may communicate with each other in this lingua franca.
Certain lingua francas arise naturally, others are developed by goverment policy and intervention. In many places of the world, however, people still cannot speak with neighbors only a few miles away.
3. STYLES
Most speakers of a language know many ‘ dialect’. They use one dialect when out with friends, another when on a job interview of presenting a report in class, and another when talking to their parents. These ‘situation dialects’ are called style.
Nearly everybody has at least an informal and a formal style. In an informal style the rules of contraction are used more often , the syntactic rules of negationand agreement may be altered, and many words are used that do not occur in the formal style. Many speakers have the ability to use a number of different styles, ranging between the two extremes of formal and informal.
Many cultures have rules of social behavior that strictly govern. In some in European language there is the distinction between ‘you (familiar)’ and you (polite). German du and French tu are to be used only with ‘intimate’. Sie and vous are more formal and used with nonintimates. In Indonesia we use kau and anda or saudara and in Javanese we use koe and sampean ; French even has a verb tutoyer, when means to use the to form and german used the verb dozen to express the informal or less horrific style of speaking.
4. SLANG
One mark of an informal style is the frequent occurrence of slang. Almost everyone uses slang on some occasions, but it is not easy to define the word. Slang has been defined as one of those things that everybody can recognize and nobody can define. The use of slang, or colloquial language introduces many new words into the language by recombining old words into new meaning. Spaced out, right on, hang up , and rip off have all galned a degree of acceptance. Slang may also introduce an entirely new word, such as barf, fluh, and pooped. Finally, slang often consists of ascribing totally new meanings to old words. Grass and pot widened their meaning to “marijuana”. Plg and fuzz are derogatory terms for “policeman”,rap, cool,dig, stoned bread and split have all extended their semantic domain.
The words we have cited sound “slangly” because they have not gained total acceptability. Words such as dwindle, freshman, glib, and mob are former slang words that in time overcame their “unsavory” origin. It is not always easy to know where to draw the line between “slang” words and “regular” words. This conclusion seems always to have been around. In 1890, John S. Farmer,coeditor with W.E. Henley of Slang and its Analogues,remarked: “The borderland between slang and the “Queen’s English” is an I’ldefined territory, the limits of which have never been clearly mopped out”.
One generation’s slang is another generation’s standard vocabulary, fan (as in ‘Dodger fan”) was once a slang term, short for fanatic, phone, too, was once a slang clipped version of telephone as tv was of television. In Shakespear’s time, fretful and dwindle were slang and more recently blimp and hot dog were both “hard-core” slang.
The use of slang varies from region to region, so slang in New York and slang in Los Angeles differ. The world slang itself is slang in british English for “scold”. Similarly slang in Jakarta is not the same as slang in Palembang.
5. JARGON OR ARGOT
Practically every conceivable science, profession, trade and occopution has its own set of words, some of which are consideret to be “slang” and others “technical”, depending on the status of the people using these “in” words are sometimes called Jargon or Argot. Linguistic jargon some of which is used in this book, consists of terms such as phonemes ,morpheme, case, lexicon,phrase structure rule and so on.
Because the jargon terms used by different professional groups are so extensive (and so obscure in meaning), Court reporters is the Los Angeles Criminal Courts Building have a library that includes books on medical terms, guns, trade names, and computer jargon as well as street slang.
The computer age not only ushered in a technological revolution. It also introduced a huge jargon of “computerese” used by computer “hackers”, including the words modern (a blend of modulator), bit (a contraction of binary digit), byte (a collection of some number of bits), floppy a noun or adjective referring to a flexible disk), ROM (an acronym for Read only memory) RAM ( AN ACRONYM FOR RANDOM ACCESS MEMORY), and morf (an abbeviation for the question male questions male or female?)
Many jargon tems pass into tothe standart language. Jargon . like slang ,spreads from a narrow group until it is used and understood by a large segments of the population.
Speakers may use different style of their dialects depending on the particular context. Slang is not often used in formal situation or writing , but is widely used in speech.argot and jargon refer to the unique vocabulary used by a professional or trade group and not shared “outside”.
6. DIALECT AND ACCENT
Every person has an individual way of speaking , called an idiolect. The language used by a group of speakers may also show systematic differences called dialect. The dialect of a language are the mutually intelligible forms Of that language that deffer in systematic ways from each other. Dialects develop and are reinforced because languages change, and the changes that occur in one group in area may differ from those that occur In another.
Dialect differences include phonological or pronounciation differences (often called accents), vocabulary distinctions and syntactic rule differences. The differences between dialects are not as great as the similarities, permitting speakers of different dialects to communicate with each other.
7. PUDGIN AND CREOLE
In area where many languages are spoken, one language may become lingua franca to ease communication among the people. In other cases, where traders or rnissionaries or travelers need to communicate with people who speak a language unknown to them, a pidgin may develop, based on one language that is simplified lexically, phonologically, and syntactically. When a pidgin is widely used and is learned by children as their first language, it is creolized. The grammars of creole languages are similar to those of other languages and languages of creole origin now exis in many parts of the world.
8. TABOO AND EUPHEMISM
In all societies certain acts or behaviors are frowned on, forbidden,or consideret taboo. The words or expressions referring to these taboo acts are then also avoided or considered “dirty”. Language itself cannot be obscene or clean. The rejected of specific words of linguistic expressions only reflectcs the culture of a given society. At terms slang words may be taboo, whereas scientific of standard terms with the same meaning are acceptable in polite society. Taboo words andacts give rise to euphemisms, which are words or phrase that replace the expressions to be avolded. Thus, powder roomn is a euphemism for tollet, which itself started as a euphemism for lavatory, which is now more acceptable that it replancement.
9. ARTIFICIAL LANGUAGE
Since the seventeenth century, scholars have been inventing artificiallanguages with the hope that they would achieve universal acceptance and that universal language would bring universal peace. With stubborn regularity the world has rejected every attempt. Perhaps the world has seen too many civil wars to accepts this idea.
One artificial language has enjoyed some success. Esperanto was invented by the polish scholar Zamenhof , who wrote under the pseudonym of Dr. Esperanto (‘one who hopes’) . he gave his “language” the advantages of extreme grammatical regularity ease of pronounciation and a vocabulary based mainly on European languages. Esperanto is spoken by several million speakers throughout the world, including some who learned it as one of their native languages. There is a literature written in it, a number of institutions teach it, and it is officially recognized by some international organizations.
Conclusion
In the sociolinguistic difference in the language of sociology sociolinguistic focus in, the effects of society on language and language effects on society. And in sociolinguistics includes about: dialect, language, social, style, slang, jargon or dialect and accent, pudgin and Creole, taboos and Euphemism, and the language to made. advantages of ease in the community language in the association of formal and informal.
REFERENCES
3. Lingua franca is discussed in these etymology dictionaries: Ernest Weekley Etymology Dictionary (1921), Eric Partridge Etymology Dictionary (1966), Douglas Harper Etymology Dictionary (2001)
4. Eckert, Penelope; Rickford, John (2001). Style and sociolinguistic variation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-59789-7.
