Evaluate the idea that a person’s language is affected by the social group they belong to
The language that people use makes up a central part of their identity; only a few words need to be said before
information on social class, age and communities of practice are revealed. This is because there can be great
variation in how someone speaks based on these factors.
Everyone belongs to a community of practice; this could be, for example, gamers, goths or football fans, as well as
broader social groups such as gender, age and class. Swales proposed the idea of a ‘discourse community’ in which
members of a group who share common goals also share a discourse with specific language that they use to
communicate. For example gamers use lexis such as ‘bot’ to describe a computer controlled character and ‘’nade’ to
describe a certain type of weapon. Not everyone outside of this discourse community would understand this lexis
and Swales also suggested that a certain level of knowledge is needed to participate in the communication exchange;
if we don’t belong to the social group we may feel alienated by their language.
It is presumed that more working class people use more nonstandard features such as slang and swearing. This is
often the case because slang goes against the mainstream and is associated with behaviours that deviate from social
norms such as drugs and crime. Michael Halliday described slang as an ‘anti-language’ because of its covert prestige
and links to deviant behaviour. The working classes who use slang tend to live on the margins of society and hold
little power; yet slang gives them power through covert prestige. For example someone interested in the grime
music industry may converge their language closer to the top grime artists such as Stormzy in order to gain respect
from fellow listeners and to show off a part of their identity and belonging to the group. This could cause them to
use MLE lexis such as ‘bare’ and ‘beef’ similar to that of top artists.
However, Jenny Cheshire’s research challenges the notion that slang is mostly used by working class young people.
She categorised young girls in Reading into middle and working class by their attitudes to minor crime, those who
tolerated minor crime were working class and those that disapproved of minor crimes were middle class. She found
that working class girls used more of the nonstandard ‘come’ whilst middle class girls actually used the most
nonstandard ‘what’. This suggests that there is not such a clear cut difference between social group and slang use
and that there is more variation in young people’s language. It seems both social groups appreciated the opportunity
to use slang when interacting with their peers and that social group doesn’t cause polarised language use.
Malcolm Petytt looked at the small regional feature of H dropping in Yorkshire and found that the working class
participants dropped the H in almost all instances whereas the middle class participants only 1 in 10 instances. This
suggests that being part of a working class community changes our language. This higher use of nonstandard
varieties may be due to what Basil Bernstein described as restricted code, a speech style characterised by concrete
nouns, simple co-ordinations and implicit language such as using pronouns.
Similar research investigating a possible link between class and nonstandard usage was carried out by Trudgill, he
looked at the –ing/-in’ variant and found that working class people used the nonstandard feature more frequently.
His research was extended to look at the social group of gender and whether there was a difference in their use of
nonstandard language. He found that women in the experiment used nonstandard features less often than men and
when asked about their language, reported using less than they actually may have. This suggests that in aiming for
higher prestige, women tend to move closer towards hypercorrectness. Furthermore this implies that women are
judged more harshly in society, and are sensitive to this fact, therefore they have to work harder to gain the same
status as men. It would not be enough for them to be successful or intelligent, they also have to speak ‘correctly’.
This does suggest that our language is affected by our social group and women are more conscious about their
language. However with social roles changing in more recent years, a repeat of a study may find that women modify
their speech less since they are now able to gain more prestige through other ways than their speech.
The language that people use makes up a central part of their identity; only a few words need to be said before
information on social class, age and communities of practice are revealed. This is because there can be great
variation in how someone speaks based on these factors.
Everyone belongs to a community of practice; this could be, for example, gamers, goths or football fans, as well as
broader social groups such as gender, age and class. Swales proposed the idea of a ‘discourse community’ in which
members of a group who share common goals also share a discourse with specific language that they use to
communicate. For example gamers use lexis such as ‘bot’ to describe a computer controlled character and ‘’nade’ to
describe a certain type of weapon. Not everyone outside of this discourse community would understand this lexis
and Swales also suggested that a certain level of knowledge is needed to participate in the communication exchange;
if we don’t belong to the social group we may feel alienated by their language.
It is presumed that more working class people use more nonstandard features such as slang and swearing. This is
often the case because slang goes against the mainstream and is associated with behaviours that deviate from social
norms such as drugs and crime. Michael Halliday described slang as an ‘anti-language’ because of its covert prestige
and links to deviant behaviour. The working classes who use slang tend to live on the margins of society and hold
little power; yet slang gives them power through covert prestige. For example someone interested in the grime
music industry may converge their language closer to the top grime artists such as Stormzy in order to gain respect
from fellow listeners and to show off a part of their identity and belonging to the group. This could cause them to
use MLE lexis such as ‘bare’ and ‘beef’ similar to that of top artists.
However, Jenny Cheshire’s research challenges the notion that slang is mostly used by working class young people.
She categorised young girls in Reading into middle and working class by their attitudes to minor crime, those who
tolerated minor crime were working class and those that disapproved of minor crimes were middle class. She found
that working class girls used more of the nonstandard ‘come’ whilst middle class girls actually used the most
nonstandard ‘what’. This suggests that there is not such a clear cut difference between social group and slang use
and that there is more variation in young people’s language. It seems both social groups appreciated the opportunity
to use slang when interacting with their peers and that social group doesn’t cause polarised language use.
Malcolm Petytt looked at the small regional feature of H dropping in Yorkshire and found that the working class
participants dropped the H in almost all instances whereas the middle class participants only 1 in 10 instances. This
suggests that being part of a working class community changes our language. This higher use of nonstandard
varieties may be due to what Basil Bernstein described as restricted code, a speech style characterised by concrete
nouns, simple co-ordinations and implicit language such as using pronouns.
Similar research investigating a possible link between class and nonstandard usage was carried out by Trudgill, he
looked at the –ing/-in’ variant and found that working class people used the nonstandard feature more frequently.
His research was extended to look at the social group of gender and whether there was a difference in their use of
nonstandard language. He found that women in the experiment used nonstandard features less often than men and
when asked about their language, reported using less than they actually may have. This suggests that in aiming for
higher prestige, women tend to move closer towards hypercorrectness. Furthermore this implies that women are
judged more harshly in society, and are sensitive to this fact, therefore they have to work harder to gain the same
status as men. It would not be enough for them to be successful or intelligent, they also have to speak ‘correctly’.
This does suggest that our language is affected by our social group and women are more conscious about their
language. However with social roles changing in more recent years, a repeat of a study may find that women modify
their speech less since they are now able to gain more prestige through other ways than their speech.
