Accent, dialect, sociolect, idiolect

Distinguish these precisely — examiners reward accuracy:

• Accent — features of pronunciation only (e.g. Received Pronunciation, Geordie, Scouse).
• Dialect — distinctive vocabulary and grammar of a region or group (bairn, owt, we was).
• Sociolect — the variety of a social group (class, age, interest).
• Idiolect — an individual's personal language style.
• Ethnolect — a variety associated with an ethnic group (e.g. Multicultural London English).

Common slip: accent is pronunciation; dialect is words and grammar. Keep them separate.

Accent or dialect?

Regional variation and prestige

Regional varieties carry social judgements. Two key ideas:

• Overt prestige — status from using the standard, high-status form (RP, Standard English).
• Covert prestige — status from using a non-standard form to signal group loyalty and identity (Trudgill's work on Norwich).

Labov's Martha's Vineyard and New York department-store studies showed pronunciation varies with social identity and class. Giles's accommodation theory explains how speakers converge towards or diverge from others to build rapport or distance.

Attribute: covert prestige and Norwich = Trudgill; accommodation (convergence/divergence) = Giles; social stratification of accent = Labov.

Occupation and language

Occupations develop their own varieties. Key features:

• Jargon — specialist terminology that speeds up communication for insiders but excludes outsiders.
• Occupational register — shared conventions of formality and structure.
• Drew & Heritage described workplace talk and the idea of a community of practice (Lave & Wenger) — a group bonded by shared activity and language.

Power link: occupational language can express expert power and control, e.g. a doctor or lawyer managing an interaction.

Sort each example to the variety it shows

Tap an example, then tap the type of variation it best illustrates.

Language and gender

Three influential models of gender and language:

• Deficit — Lakoff claimed women's language showed features such as hedges, tag questions and empty adjectives, implying it was weaker. Widely critiqued as based on assumption.
• Dominance — Zimmerman & West found men interrupted more in mixed talk, framing differences as male power.
• Difference — Tannen argued men and women have different conversational styles (e.g. report vs rapport talk) learned as subcultures.

Crucial study: O'Barr & Atkins studied courtroom speech and argued Lakoff's features reflect powerlessness and status, not gender — hence powerless language.

Which gender model?

Language and power

Fairclough analyses how language enacts power:

• Instrumental power — authority built into a role and enforced directly (law, workplace rules, a teacher's instructions).
• Influential power — power that persuades and shapes attitudes (advertising, media, politics).
• Synthetic personalisation — addressing a mass audience as if each person were an individual.

Also: unequal encounters give one participant more discoursal power — controlling topics, turns and questions.

Match theorist to concept

Tap a theorist on the left, then their concept on the right.

Instrumental or influential?

The big ideas to take away

You can now analyse variation by region, group, occupation, gender and power. Press Finish to see your score.