Children begin acquiring sociolinguistic variation at a young age, as early as 3-5 years old. Studies have found that preschoolers demonstrate sensitivity to social factors like formality of context and apply linguistic constraints in a similar way to adults. While phonological constraints may emerge before age 6, sensitivity to social meaning and ability to vary speech styles continues developing through childhood. Observation of one child's development suggests variable postvocalic R and short I tensing emerge between 17-36 months, indicating sociolinguistic competence develops early in parallel with other language skills.
1. 1
• Speaker Variable: Age
Interactions with Gender
Sociolinguistic competence in Children
Today
2. 2
Sex-related variability: Differentiation of speech behavior
between males and females related to physiological,
neurological and biological factors.
Gender-related variability: Differentiation of speech
behavior between males and females related to gender
roles.
Key terms
3. 3
• Speaker Variable: Gender
•Articles:
Eckert, 1998: “Gender and Sociolinguistic
Variation
Eckert, 1988: “Adolescent social structure and
the spread of linguistic change”
Gal, 1997: “Peasant men can’t get wives”
Today
4. 4
Review:
Traditional generalization regarding gender differences in speech:
“Women use fewer stigmatized and non-standard variants than do
men of the same social group in the same circumstances. “
Chambers, p. 102
Traditional explanations for the generalization
On what basis do authors relate women to “standard variants”?
Data
Studies
5. 5
The last word?
Studies of Language Variation:
Men and women in different cultures stand in different relations to
linguistic markets.
Exclusion from workplace
Obtain jobs where required to be “technicians of language”
Given responsibilities for representing an organization
A clear delineation of gender roles in society becomes associated with clear
distinctions in male and female use of sociolinguistic markers
Where gender roles also signal differences in social mobility, we may
expect other factors to interact with gender: e.g., education, social class
6. 6
Eckert:
Theoretical Goal:
--explain the mechanisms whereby phonological change spreads outward
from urban areas and upward through the socioeconomic hierarchy
Research Goal:
--in a social network study, examine adolescent’s use of innovatory and
conservative linguistic forms
Eckert 1988: Belten High Study
vowels show flux in this dialect:
(ae) bad [Q] to raised variant [e]
(uh) cut ranges from to backed [ç]
(ay) right monopthongizes to [a˘]
advances with proximity to Detroit
advances with proximity to Detroit
advances with distance from Detroit
[√]
7. 7
Sociolinguistic Competence
A fluent speaker’s knowledge (largely tacit) of admissible variation in
language, the types of social meaning that may be embedded in language, and
the rules governing alternative structural choices.
•Language forms index social categories (genders, social classes, ages,
regional origins, social networks) and stylistic registers
e.g., post-vocalic /r/. Variants: {[®], ø} ”transmitter to receiver”
e.g., (ae)-tensing. Variants: {[iQ], [e´], [Q]} ”cat”
e.g., (-ing)-alternation. Variants: {[IN], [In]} ”singin’”
•A comprehensive theory of language accounts for speakers’ knowledge of:
systemic potential (Is Alternation X part of my system?)
appropriateness (Is Alternation X effective or suitable in this context?)
occurrence (Is Alternation X done, and likely to be understood by another speaker?)
feasibility (Is Alternation X possible, given means of implementation available?)
region
region/class
register
8. 8
Milestones in Linguistic
Development
3 months: Linguistic Precursors
Child’s physiology gets ready for speech (lowering of larynx,articulatory control)
5 months: Babbling
Early babbling (5-6 mos) “aaaaa”, “bababababa,” “pppppppp”
Canonical babbling (7-10 mos) “mada,” “dele”
12 months: One-Word Stage
Protowords: consistent phonetic form used to refer to something (e.g., “yaya” juice)
Holophrastic speech: A single word used to convey an entire utterance, e.g. “allgone”
18-24 months: Two-Word Stage
Emergence of syntax, e.g. “Give ball”
>18 months: There’s no Three-Word stage!
Babytalk, Babytalk
Child’s language acquisition is
“The greatest intellectual feat
any one of us is ever required to
perform.”
-- Leonard Bloomfield (1933)
9. 9
Categorical vs. Variable
Features
Linguistic forms may occur categorically, or show fluctuation
Fluctuating forms occur with a likelihood or probability value (non-random, learnable)
(largely) Categorical feature:
In right-branching languages, determiners will appear to the left of the nouns they modify
(“the snowstorm”)
Tensing of short-a (Northern Midwest dialects) ”cat”
(largely) Variable feature:
Postvocalic /r/ deletion in informal settings “Park the car in Harvard yard.”
Double-modal constructions “She might could want to come.”
Can occur at any level of the grammar
10. 10
The issue
Acquisition of variation
child learners expect language to contain and
employ socially meaningful variation
Adults, not children, have been subject of
sociolinguistic studies of variation
But, how does systematic variability develop?
What does it look like?
11. 12
Difficulties Obtaining Child Speech
Chevrot, et al. (2000), Roberts (2002)
Developmental variation due to differences in physiological and cognitive
maturation
Patterns reflecting imitation
Distinguishing word-by-word (“lexical”) learning from rule-based learning
Testing difficulties: attentional fluctuation (often resulting in insufficient
amounts of data to be representative of the speaker)
Low intelligibility of utterances (less so for preschool age)
Possibility of DIFFERENT stylistic or social goals (different form-meaning
mapping than in adults)
12. 13
Early Perspectives
Labov (1964)
Categorical features first
Vernacular (=dialectal) forms predicted to be acquired LATE in
adolescence (10-12)
Standard forms acquired later (around age 14) under contact with other
members of the linguistic community outside of their friends and family.
“By theageof six achild exposed to English will haveconstructed thegrammar of his
language. Thisdoesnot mean that no further development of hisknowledgeof languageis
possible. ...Wealso learn certain lessusual constructionsof thelanguage. These
exceptional or marked patternsof thelanguagearenot taken to bepart of thecore
grammarof thelanguage, they belong to themarked periphery of thegrammar and may
beacquired later. Thenativespeaker will also haveto learn all of thesocial or cultural
conventionsassociated with hislanguage, for instance, that certain wordsbelong to avery
high stylewhereasothersareinformal. Theseconventionsarenot part of thegrammar,
they belong to themoregeneral domain of human behavior.” (Haegeman 2005, p. 17)
13. 14
Crosslinguistic Evidence: studies of
acquisition of variability in children
For what ages has systematic variation been found?
Fischer (1958) British English (t,d), (-ing): social variation ages 3-10
Roberts (1994, 1996, 1997) American English (Philadelphia variety), (t,d): both, ages
3-4
Díaz-Campos (2005) Venezuelan Spanish, intervocalic-d deletion: both, ages 3-5
Sankoff and Blondeau (2006) Montreal French trilled /r/ vs. uvular /R/: both, ages 3;6-
4;11
Purcell (1984) Hawaiian Creole English, various variables: both, 5-12
Chevrot, Beaud & Varga (2000) Southeastern French /R/: both, ages 6-7
Romaine (1978) Scottish English trilled /r/: social and stylistic, ages 6-8
Fischer (1958) British English (t,d): stylistic variation ages 10-11
Reid (1978) Scottish English glottal stop, (-ing) alternation: stylistic, age 11
14. 15
Roberts (1994,6,7)
16 children ages 3;2-4;11
obtained large amounts of data; a range of
styles (6-13 sessions/child)
deletion of final (-t,d) in consonant clusters
adult’s patterns: (most deletion to least
deletion):
Grammatical constraint:
monomorphemes, e.g., next [nEks]
semi-weak verbs, e.g., lost, slept [las]
[slEp]
regular past tense forms missed [mIs]
Phonological constraint:
delete more for a following
consonant>vowel>pause
“past tense”>”past us”> “ran past.”
American English (Philadelphia area)
•Findings:
•Preschoolers similar to adults:
–phonological constraints
mastered
•Rule-based not word-based
pattern:
–semiweak verbs treated
differently from adult
semiweak forms
•Social constraints less-well
mastered
15. 16
Díaz-Campos (2005)
36 children in 2 cohorts: ages 42-53 mos
(3;6 - 4;5) and 54-71 mos (4;6 - 5;11)
Working (WC) and middle (MC) social
classes
Targeted 2 speech styles
Do children's productions fluctuate in a
manner showing sensitivity to formality?
Examined interaction between
socioeconomic class and age (to tease
apart developmental effects)
intervocalic /d/-spirantization
e.g., boda [boDa]
Findings:
Again, preschoolers similar to adults
Both social classes deleted more in
informal than formal styles
Venezuelan Spanish
•Deletion levels in younger
cohort suggest this is not a
maturational, but a
sociolinguistic effect:
WC=28% MC=10%
•Concludes that
preschoolers are showing
adult-like command of a
variable linguistic feature.
16. 17
Chevrot, Beaud & Varga (2000)
60 children ages 6-7, 10-12
Exp. 1: Studied deletion of post-
consonantal, word-final /R/ (e.g., sucre,
vinaigre, coffre)
Exp. 2: Pseudoword experiment tests rule-
vs. lexical-based learning
“bydeincre,” “maullopre”
Factors tested: age, formality of situation,
phonological environment
Findings (Exp. 1):
6-7 yr olds deleted more than 10-12 yr olds
more deletions in informal than in formal
style
Following phonological environment is most
crucial predictor of deletion
Older children show a stronger stylistic
“adaptation”
Southeastern French
Findings (Exp. 2):
written prompts lead to conservation
of /R/, whereas oral learning
associated with style-based
deletions commensurate with Exp. 1
Conclusions: phonological constraint
emerges prior to age 6;
sociolinguistic constraint emerges
around age 6-7
lexical learning ruled out
18. 19
Insights from Rohan
home environment:
English/Sinhalese/Jamaican Creole
first words 10-12 mos (“mama,”
“dada,” “amma”)
68 words, 14 mos
earliest signs of phonological
variation, 17 mos
(17 mos.)
19. 20
Insights from Rohan
(1) postvocalic-r
heart, harbor, mirror*, shark
“Amma says /ha˘t/; you [Mommy] say /ha®t/”
(23 mos.)
“Trevor is at the ‘[ha˘ b´]’ Is it ‘/ha®˘b´®/’,
Mommy?” (23 mos.)
“mirror” [mi®´]
“shark” [Sa˘k] (“babytalk style”, 26 mos. to
present)
(2) tensing of short-(i) (Eastern US)
“locomotive” [ti˘v]
generalized to “detective”
*deletion in syllable-initial contexts prohibited (mi-ROR)
(36 mos.)
20. 21
Current Perspective
Children do acquire socially-influenced variable patterns prior to
adolescence
Children become socially competent language users early--as they acquire
language
Simultaneity of acquisition of variable and categorical features makes it
difficult to defend a view that sociolinguistic competence vis a vis
acquisition of variation is layered on top of or follows “basic acquisition.”
Adult-modeled variation may be instructive for learning styles
Notas del editor
So this is a general map of early language acquisition and pertains to the linguistic competence of the child. What, then is sociolinguistic competence. We can define sociolx comp...
We will be careful to distinguish between specific social meanings that attach themselves to forms in a particular language, and the more general human tendency to ascribe certain types of social meaning to linguistic forms and to understand that linguistic structure, in addition to referential content, conveys social meaning. My focus in this brief talk is to highlight some of the research that shows that children make this assumption from a very early age.
A couple of VERY SIMPLE examples.
WE EXPECT THAT IF SOCIETY IS PARTITIONED INTO IMPORTANT GROUPINGS, THESE GROUPINGS WILL HAVE CHARACTERISTIC LINGUISTIC DIFFERENCES.
(have regional dialects, change over time, and appear to be “mixed” as they change)
We learn that deletion of /r/ as in this example sentence “means something”--what meaning does it carry (class/region). Furthermore, we learn that there are three linguistic constraints (Preceding Vowel, Following Consonant, Pause) that can’t be violated to produce this variation:
-- we never delete word-initially in a cluster “trans”
-- we never delete intervocalically “rec”
--deletion is only possible in “-ter” and “-ver”
we also know that there is ordering of the constraints, so that speakers are more likely to delete before a consonant than prepausally
so “transmittuh” but “receiver”
Variation Theorists are concerned with:
--understanding where variation “resides” in the grammar
--microlinguistic variation at some level of the grammar
- e.g. variation in the use of allophones of a phoneme
--how children learn to command sociolinguistic variation
[[SKIP IF AUDIENCE IS ALL LINGUISTS]]
Holophrastic stage ends at 50 wds
Phonological acquisition research has typically focused on the development of regularities in children's speech--learning of categorical features. Early structuralist accounts, e.g., Jakobson (1968), for instance, focuses on describing a universal order in acquisition of sound units (“m” & ”p" is often earliest consonant). Generative accounts (Smith 1973, Stampe 1979, Macken 1980, 1992) also describe phonological acquisition based on universal grammar principles. They propose an explanation of how the child discovers patterns and makes generalizations. Functional explanations about child phonology (Ingram 1988, 1992, Bernhardt and Stemberger 1998, Stemberger and Bernhardt 1999, Yoneyama, Beckman & Edwards to appear)study the role of frequency in the acquisition of segmental phonology.
Ability to systematically choose among variant forms (or use of variability) is central to the notion of sociolinguistic competence. Different dialects, different speech styles, community-specific norms are central to the ability to express identity, social meaning, attitudinal information, intentions (central, then to the human capacity to use language creatively).
There are few if any linguistic structure types that admit no exceptions, so it’s difficult to make a binary distinction, but we can isolate phenomena that are strong tendencies against variation, and others that are variable. Typically, a fluctuating form abides by the linguistic constraints of the language. You will not violate grammatical rules, but need to know what those rules are, so that the operational constraints can be specified- generalization that not all linguistic forms (syntactic constituents, phonological forms) are subject to variation
-- The fact that all lx forms do not vary is in itself is very interesting, and needs to be explained.
As human children become competent language users, they learn to master the variable features in language as they master the categorical ones. This has not always been known. {Refer back to Haegeman} What have linguists been discovering regarding the child’s learning of variable features (her development as a sociolinguistically competent speaker)?
We have mostly studied variability from the standpoint of the adult (because their systems are presumed to be stable after adolescence and free of the “noise” that is present during development) . Although sociolinguists have asserted that ‘nativelike comand of heterogeneous structures is not a matter of multidialectalism or mere performance, they have rarely observed heterogeneous structures in speakers younger than 9. (WLH, 1968)
But, quoting Manuel Diaz-Campos, “Phonological acquisition as well as other components of linguistic competence necessarily implies variation. The child goes from a newborn with no phonology to having completed the acquisition of the sound system of his/her language.” There is notable variation from one month to the next as the child develops control over perception and production.” In addition, the child is exposed to variation in adult speech, and is actively developing an understanding of the social and linguistic constraints that govern that variation.
Just means that adults tend to emphasize, in their speech to children, those features important for the language system. Their own modeling of variation teaches what is appropriate for different styles and settings, within the larger envelope of possible alternations in the language.”
artic/cognitive: you cannot study variation in a variable that the child cannot yet have fully acquired
Labov (1964) made earliest proposal -- that vernacular varieties (=dialectal forms) would be acquired LATE in adolescence (between the ages of 5 and 12) under the influence of the immediate social context, while more standard forms would be acquired later (around age 14) when the individuals began having contact with other members of the linguistic community outside of their friends and family. This idea that sociolinguistic variation is acquired late in adolescence has been REVISED.
So, sociolinguists reject the view that dialect forms are learned AFTER the child has developed a basic system of standard forms (and later learns a dialect form). We understand the learning of categorical dialect forms to occur as part of the normal process of language acquisition. But what of variable forms? The research on which I will now focus has demonstrated that preschool-aged children have some mechanism allowing them to systematically modulate their utterances as a function of the situation or speaker they are addressing. The questions we want to address are:
is this mechanism part of the system (do kids vary by rule) or do they learn variations on a word-by-word basis?
do they map social and stylistic meanings onto their variations?
do these patterns resemble adult patterns?
So, this is also important for general linguistics, because it suggests strongly that learning of variability is not peripheral to the learning of “core grammar” as has often been argued. That is, we don’t learn “alternate forms” like we learn infrequently used vocabulary items or unusual grammatical structures that are difficult and rare in our system. It’s a fundamental part of how we develop our capacity for language. So current research wants to better understand the role of variation in developing speakers. So, I want to be clear that I’m not saying that categorical forms or basic structures don’t exist--they certainly do, and language acquisition has to have as it’s target a form or feature that is learnable. But the research suggests that we’re able to handle much more variability than perhaps was once thought.
[[omit? This is important for sociolinguists. One assumption made by dialectologists, and early variationists, was that dialect patterns, developing in the individual from childhood to complete attainment in adulthood, do not change across the lifespan. This is an important point because it means that if we wish to look at language change at the level of the speech community, we do best to examine the speech of stable dialect speakers who can show us what the dialect looks like at a single point in time.]]
Slide lists a sampling of the research studies investigating the emergence of lx variation in children. More recent studies, in part because of advances in obtaining large amounts of good data for young speakers, have observed variation in children as young as 3--similar findings reported cross-linguistically, and results of several studies have now been replicated.
- ABW: distinguish social (appropriate forms for their regional or social dialect group, e.g., categorical [kyat]) and stylistic (fluctuation due to addressee or formality of the situation) variation
- overall finding that there is some mechanism enabling children to systematically use variation
- studies differ wrt proposed age of the onset of variation, and the variable studied (some like Purcell, group together speakers of several developmental ranges). Early studies tended to have small sample sizes (2-4 children; today’s studies much larger) Methods for eliciting variation have evolved greatly as well since the 1950s.
- I will highlight select findings from three studies. I am simplifying the issues presented for clarity, hopefully without misrepresenting ideas.
Recall that what’s different in these studies of the acquisition of variation is that they are not assuming there is one and only one target for acquisition. They are looking at the child’s systematic command of alternative variants for the same linguistic form.
Goals of Robert’s study: -- obtain large enough amounts of useable data to conduct statistical tests; obtain a range of styles (freeplay;picture book storytelling; role play; naming task; spontaneous speech) 6-13 sessions per child
...
monomorpheme: (t or d) is part of the stem and carries no separate meaning. In semi-weak vbs, change in vowel (e.g. lose-->lost) together with d signals past tense; regular past tense d’s only role is to signal past tense
...
phon & gramm constraints mastered by all children but 1. Individual children did not differ greatly from each other (they were all similar in their deletion patterns; and these patterns were similar to adults’)--no problem with phonological development. [In some cases, less likely to delete than adults.]
monomorphemes: grammatical constraint acquired (delete most); regular past tenses (delete least)
semi-weak verbs: as likely to delete as in monomorphemes.
the fact that the children are showing a different pattern than adults are modeling suggests they’re learning by rule and not on a word-by-word basis. If learning were word-by-word, we’d see child duplicating the form an adult produced. They’re reanalyzing on the basis of their grammatical categories: monomorpheme or regular verb.
in the operation of social constraints, Roberts found that children had less control of adult-like social variation. In an earlier study of (-ing)-alternation, Roberts and Labov found that children varied their production of -ing by addressee type (most -in with inanimate objects like dolls; less with children; least still with adults). The (t,d) deletion showed less stylistic variation. These preschoolers did show clear gender differences (girls deleted MORE than boys).
This study’s finding are consistent with claims in the language acquisition literature that children generate rules.
Roberts’ also concluded that children learn variation at an early age. They have made great progress toward the acquisition of internal (our grammatical and phonological) constraints by the age of 3. This study does not clearly support the idea that adult-like stylistic or social meanings are mapped to variant forms as early as the internal constraints are learned.
[[study doesn’t break down findings by CS, IS, RP, citation task!]]
This is a study that carefully targeted variation in children’s speech-styles: 2 style-groupings (elicited in 4 tasks ranging in formality from one-on-one interview>role-play>picture-guided storytelling task>unscripted casual conversation (following methods found to trigger style-switching in adults).
Research question was: Do children's productions fluctuate in a manner consistent with adult patterns of sensitivity to formality of the situation?
He examined the interaction between socioeconomic class and age (to tease apart developmental effects). That is, if children of the same age but different socioeconomic classes might perform differently in the tests, this would indicate that the difference was not due to stage in the timecourse of development, but to social factors.
Overall conclusion: preschoolers are showing adult-like command of a variable feature
This study is important because it takes up the issue of lexical learning (learn that word X varies; word Y, etc. rather than a rule that applies to a class of words, a rule that then becomes applied to new forms). 3 groups of children were taught (using oral prompts, a combination of ral and written prompts, or written prompts alone) a set of nonsense words with /R/ in word-final position. In the oral prompts, they were presented the nonsense word 4 times, with the R pronounced 1 out of 4 times. They were asked to speak these in formal and informal situations. Results showed The written prompts appeared to influence conservation of the /R/, whereas the students who learned by oral mode showed deletions by style commensurate with the earlier task using real words.
Point out that attributing age of acq on basis of one variable only is risky b/c acq varies depending on salience of the variable, difficulty to produce, sociolinguistic value in the community (stigmatization).
[[tested addressee effects, by observing children’s in family where some members were WC while others were MC]]
Limitations
studies limited to Germanic and Romance language families (with exception of Hawaiian Creole English)
studies limited to phonological variation
We want to know whether children have variation in their system. To demonstrate this, we would have to rule out the possibility that children learn variation on a word-by-word basis. They would, in the word-by-word case, memorize that a certain word had multiple possible realizations, but would not have to do any deeper analysis or decoding of the language to know how structural elements can vary. Many early studies (those in the 1950s and 60s) cannot show rule-based learning clearly. More recent research targets systematic variability in the system
Click--can’t resist adding a very small, but possibly useful additional datapoint for our own region
“S” on the pajamas is for “becoming” Sociolinguistically competent.
Read entire slide...
Is this just lexical learning? How sure can we be that it’s sociolinguistic competence (part of his knowledge system)?
shows speaker-specific alternation (Fred, for example)--could indicate lexical and not rule-based, learning
tensing of (i) is extended by analogy to new words in the same lexical class--“detective” (occurs not just with high-frequency words, but new ones, as well)
clear awareness that it variation is “effective” sometimes, and not others (won’t do this with papa; also pajama/pajœma); tends, for example, to delete postvocalic r most when in “babytalk mode”
he could be showing stylistic variation, but be encoding different social meanings than his adult caregivers. We still don’t know enough to tell.
We’ve seen that at the age of three, American English, French, Venezuelan-acquiring children know there is more than one variant for one linguistic form. They can systematically choose among their variant forms for different social domains (use one with one speaker, another with another speaker). They have a mechanism for encoding variable units within their emergent phonological systems.
Conclusions: Studies suggest that children do acquire socially-influenced variable patterns prior to adolescence.
- strongly suggestive that children become socially competent language users (i.e. they begin acquiring variation) early--presumably with the acquisition of language.
- while some streams of thought within linguistics have tended to approach variation in the input to children as less than helpful for a child acquiring language (cf. views of acquisition that variation is detrimental, part of the “noise” in degenerate language input that is part of the primary linuguistic data children receive and have to filter out as they acquire the rules of language), children seem to be able to sort out variation quite well--and to be capable of extracting social meaning from it.
- Wassink, Wright and Franklin 2005 show parents’ variable input to be systematic (potentially highlighting the edges of phonetic category boundaries for children learning language; and they’re not just highlighting category boundaries--they’re highlighting category boundaries in a stylistically-constrained, socially-meaningful way -- parents are showing social-register related and appropriate information.
e.g., Foulkes et al (1999) note that variation in the input to young speakers can “enhance the movement from the holistic word level of representation to segmental awareness by producing allophonic examples, which “may serve to highlight the location of permutable components of words.”
Chomsky’s ideal speaker-hearer: when we say a speaker “knows his language perfectly” that knowledge of language includes variation