Looking for an easy-to-use, practical guide to conducting fieldwork in sociolinguistics? This invaluable textbook will give you the skills and knowledge required for carrying out research projects in ...'the field', including:
• How to select and enter a community
• How to design a research sample
• What recording equipment to choose and how to operate it
• How to collect, store and manage data
• How to interact effectively with participants and communities
• What ethical issues you should be aware of.
Carefully designed to be of maximum practical use to students and researchers in sociolinguistics, linguistic anthropology and related fields, the book is packed with useful features, including:
• Helpful checklists for recording techniques and equipment specifications
• Practical examples taken from classic sociolinguistic studies
• Vivid passages in which students recount their own experiences of doing fieldwork in many different parts of the world
Sociolinguistics provides a powerful instrument by which we can interpret the contemporary and near-contemporary use of language in relation to the society in which speakers live. Almost since the ...beginning of the discipline, however, attempts have been made to extrapolate backwards and interpret past linguistic change sociolinguistically. Some of these findings have influenced the discussion of the history of the English language as portrayed in the many textbooks for undergraduate courses. A consistent application of sociolinguistic theory and findings has rarely been attempted, however, despite the specialist literature which demonstrates this connection at specific points in the language's development.
This textbook provides students with a means by which a previously existing knowledge of a linear, narrative, history of English can be deepened by a more profound understanding of the sociolinguistic forces which initiate or encourage language change. Uniquely, it discusses not only the central variationist tendencies present in language change and their analysis but also the macrosociolinguistic forces which act upon all speakers and their language. Chapters investigate the political, cultural and economic forces which affect a society's use of and views on language; language contact, language standardisation and linguistic attrition are also covered. Discussion is illustrated throughout by apposite examples from the history of English. The volume enables students to develop a deeper understanding of both sociolinguistics and historical linguistics; it is also be useful as a primer for postgraduate study in the subjects covered.
In this magisterial study, Peter Burke explores the social and cultural history of the languages spoken or written in Europe between the invention of printing and the French Revolution, arguing that, ...from a linguistic point of view, 1450 to 1789 should be regarded as a distinct period. One major theme of the book is the relation between languages and communities (regions, churches, occupations and genders as well as nations) and the place of language as a way of identifying others as well as a symbol of one's own identity. A second, linked theme is that of competition: between Latin and the vernaculars, between different vernaculars, dominant and subordinate, and finally between different varieties of the same vernacular, such as standard languages and dialects. Written by one of Europe's leading cultural historians, this book restores the history of the many languages of Europe in a large variety of contexts.
Forty years after the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Peoples proclamation, and 54 years after its independence, Algeria officialized tamazight, the mother tongue of nearly 10 million of ...Berbers. But, despite its constitutionalization since 2016, tamazight remains a marginalized, minoritized language, not to say totally ignored. It isthe poor relative of the government. Until nowadays, tamazight has difficulty in finding itself. Ignored by the Administration and Justice, it barely plays the walk-on in education and teaching. However, two years after its constitutionalization (national and official language), it is still in its stammering in the daily life of the natives who speak it (i.e., amazighofones or berberophones). It is only taught for 3,95% of the 9 million registered pupils. Not yet generalized in all of the country, its status remained much more facultative than compulsory. It is still considered just as a language to teach than as a language of instruction and education. Thus, the officialization of tamazight and its concreteapplication on the legal, educational, political, economic fields raise a lot of stakes. Many mentalities are to be reviewed and huge complexes must be overcome. It is not enough to proclaim tamazight “official” to give it back its nobility. As far as Algeria is concerned in the linguistic and democratic fields, alas, much remains to be done in order to build an Algeria of hope, the Algeria of tomorrow.
Yannik Porsché: Public Representations of Immigrants in Museums: Exhibition and Exposure in France and Germany. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. xi+401 pp.
Simon Pickl & Stephan Elspaß (eds.): Historische Soziolinguistik der Stadtsprachen: Kontakt – Variation – Wandel: Beiträge der 34. Jahrestagung des InternationalenArbeitskreises Historische ...Stadtsprachenforschung. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2019. IX+230 pp. Germanistische Bibliothek, 67.
Anna Christou: Žena v českém tradičním obrazu světa: Etnolingvistická studie. Praha: Filozofická fakulta Univerzity Karlovy, 2020. 187 pp. Mnemosyne, 22.
