The Concept Of Linguistic Variation

The Concept Of Linguistic Variation The ability of spoken language is believed (by many) to be attributed uniquely to humanity. Despite this evidently phenomenal existence the exact date of languages birth remains unknown and yet it continues to evolve. (Klein, 2009) The study of this ever mutable method of communication has come to be known as linguistics. However due to the communal and social nature of the human race the study of sociolinguistics could be said to more accurately represent language within human societies. Furthermore Linguists have known for some time that differences in language are tied to social class (Ross, 1954) Sociolinguistics is the study of the way in which language varies and changes in social groups (communities) of speakers, focusing primarily on the impacts of linguistic structures (such as sounds, grammatical forms, intonation features, words, etc) and social factors (such as a speakers gender, ethnicity, age, degree of integration into their community, etc). (Reference) The study of sociolinguistics has ancestry in dialectology, beginning in the 1960s (reference) partly due to the existence of inadequate methods associated with previous approaches to the study of dialect. Sociolinguistics uses recordings of informal conversations as its data; taking a significantly more scientific approach relying on quantitative analysis to highlighting dialect differences. How language changes (meme Theory) One possible reason for this change and transition of language through social groups may be attributed to a unit of cultural evolution, the Meme. A meme is defined as an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture. (Dawkins,) By this definition a Meme acts as an evolutionary/replicatory unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, allowing transmission from one mind to another through an act of imitation such as writing, speech, gestures or rituals. This description of the Meme and its transmission can be applied to the Learning of language. Such learning requires, at its foundation, the ability to imitate sounds (Tomasello, Kruger, Ratner, 1993). One may be uncomfortable in describing something as complex as language as imitation, however, language clearly fit the evolutionary theory in regards to Memes. Information is copied from person to person, variation is introduced both by degradation (due to failures of human memory and communication) and by the creative recombination of different memes. Selection of this variation is then a potential result of limitations on time, memory, transmission rates and other kinds of storage space. Variation between Social Classes As described sociolinguistics is built on the foundations the presence dialect variation is from random, but are determined by what Weinreich, Labov and Herzog (1968) defined as orderly heterogeneity structured variation. This structure can be shown in a number of ways, particularly interesting from the sociolinguist perspective is the correlation often exhibited between linguistic structure and social status. Varieties of English can be identified into two groups referring to the changes of the variable (Figure 1). The variable (t) refers to the use of a glottal stop instead of [t], such as in the word bottle, which can be written botle to represent the changed pronunciation of the medial (middle) [t]. Most English speakers appear to glottalise final [t] in words such as cat, with no/little correlation to social class. This is not the case however for the use of glottal stops in the medial position, e.g., bottle (botle), butter (buter). This variant is associated with a social stigma. Table 1 shows the occurrence of glottal stops corresponding to social class in Glasgow for all positions within a word (including the final [t]) compared with that occurring only in medial position (Macaulay 1977). Upper class (Professionals) is represented by Class I whilst the working class is represented by Class III (unskilled workers). When considering the glottal stop in the medial position, the highes t social class show zero occurrences, while the lowest class uses 68.8%. The above linguistic variation is not isolated in its relation to social classes; there are of course many other variables in English which show similar sociolinguistically significant distributions. Trudgill (1974) showed the relationship for variables (ing) and (h) in a Norwich based urban dialect study (Table 2). Once gain the values show the percentage of variant forms used by different classes. The variable (ing) refers to variations of alveolar [n] and a velar nasal [ng] in words ending with -ing for example breeding and cooling. Once again a lower social status is associated a higher percentage of nonstandard variation (alveolar) rather than standard (velar nasal) endings. In common terms this variants is known as `dropping ones gs, and is a commonly recognised marker of social status over the English-speaking world. The variable (h) refers to the presence between [h] and lack of [h] at the beginning of for example heart (eart) and hand (and). This particular variation is slightly more complicated as most urban accents in England do not have initial [h]and as such no variable of it. However in regions that do represent both variants (present of and lack of initial [h]) a similar pattern is shown. The lower the individuals social status, the more likely he/she is to drop hs. As shown in all the examples above a common pattern appears to form (these cases have dealt with stable linguistic features) this can be plotted affectively as an s-shape curve. Figure 2 shows the correlation for the absence of present tense markers (she play rather than she plays) with social classes (Trudgill 1974) once again the lower the social class, the higher the variation from standard. As shown in figure 2 the data represents a continuum (s-shaped curve) despite differences between classes, this can be consider once again in a broadly evolutionary sense. Just as the transmission of linguistic features (memes) may be stopped by physical geographical barriers (i.e. mountain ranges, oceans), it may also be hindered by social class. This limitation results in boundaries between social dialects that tend not to be perfect. As such sociolinguistics has should be considered a quantitative approach not a qualitative method. Future Developments The above approach outlined for analysing language variation has been popular, being used across many speaking communities worldwide. However, whilst these studies have accepted the basic guidance (the linguistic variable), some have suggested (reference) that sociolinguistic studies have been naive by correlating social facts about the subject in isolation (gender, ethnicity and social class), rather than observing how social groups come to be and change over time, and subsequently analysing the variants that emerge as a result. As a result some studies have become to approach studies form a bottom up perspective, examining self-forming social groups and see linguistic structure reflect these grouping rather than starting with a broad social category, and look at the language use within it (a top-down approach). Research

Macroeconomic Issue Paper Essay

Financial crisis has changed our vision of the future. We are scared by the growing unemployment rates and are not confident whether tomorrow economy will bring any positive changes. Non-economists use unemployment rates to determine, how well international and the U. S. economy performs; in simple terms, the growing unemployment rates suggest that we are at the edge of the deepening economic recession. Many of us keep to a misleading opinion that the growing unemployment is the direct result of the current financial collapse. In its recent article, the Economist (2008) sheds the light onto the major unemployment controversies that also impact real GDP, consumption, and speed up the development of the credit crisis spiral. Macroeconomics of the growing unemployment in the U. S. The Economist (2008) provides the detailed review of statistics and economic implications of the growing unemployment in the U. S. â€Å"On Friday November 7th he [Barack Obama] got the news that unemployment had shot up to a 14-year high of 6. 5% in October and non-farm employment had plunged by 240,000 from September† (The Economist, 2008). The figures are threatening, but despite the persistent opinion that the current financial crisis is the direct cause of unemployment, the Economist (2008) suggests that â€Å"whereas it had been thought that the financial crisis pushed a teetering economy over the edge, it now looks like the crisis kicked an economy that was already down†. In other words, unemployment rates had been gradually rising even before the notorious bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. What makes current unemployment different from all previous crises is that those losing their jobs do not leave labor force as quickly as they used to; â€Å"that may be because losses on retirement savings and homes have deprived many of the option of sitting out of the workforce for a spell† (The Economist, 2008). In any case, the growing unemployment may threaten the stability of the U. S. economy in short- and long-run, and macroeconomic consequences of the growing employment instability may slow down the process of economic recovery in the United States. From the macroeconomic viewpoint, â€Å"a person who is able and willing to work yet is unable to find a paying job is considered unemployed. The unemployment rate is the number of unemployed workers divided by the total civilian labor force, which includes both employed and unemployed and those with jobs (all those willing and able to work for pay) – (Layard, 2005). Although the majority of the U. S. population tends to evaluate the quality of national economic performance through the prism of the changing unemployment rates, these rates are notoriously difficult to measure. As a result, we frequently lack objective view of the way unemployment impacts our economic achievements. Unemployment tends to produce irreversible macroeconomic effects and requires that state authorities and financial institutions develop sound macroeconomic policies, to minimize and prevent the long-term consequences of the deepening economic recession. In general terms, poverty, crime, and healthcare issues are the three direct consequences of the growing unemployment. In terms of economics, unemployment severely impacts purchasing activity and leads to long-term real GDP decrease. Under the growing unemployment pressures, we are unlikely to use all available financial and non-financial resources to the fullest. â€Å"Much unemployment – called deficient-demand or cyclical unemployment – thus represents a profound form of inefficiency, sometimes called Keynesian inefficiency† (Layard, 2005). The results of profound statistical analysis imply that we have not yet hit the bottom of the economic crisis (The Economist, 2008); simultaneously, it is very probable that statistical figures are at least distorted and do not form an objective and realistic vision of what processes are currently taking place in the national economy. The problem is not in that the United States is going to become the largest international source of potential job-seekers. The problem is in that the United States cannot produce relevant and reliable statistical figures that would help address the growing unemployment rates before they hit the record. Macroeconomics lacks one single universal method for measuring unemployment rates. The U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics counts employment and unemployment on the basis of the weekly survey; â€Å"people are considered employed if they did any work at all for pay or profit during the survey week† (Layard, 2005). As a result, the BLS does not account full-time students and prisoners as employed. Furthermore, those who are jobless but are actively involved into job search are also considered as unemployed. Economic professionals seem to omit the whole population layer, including students, retired, and people with mental and physical disabilities – according to BLS these people are neither employed, nor unemployed. When we hear that unemployment rates have reached 6. 5%, what does that mean? Does that mean that 6. 5% of the American population is no longer willing to work? Does that mean that 6. 5% of population is actively looking for new jobs? Does that mean that 6. 5 percent of the U. S. population is likely to remain unemployed in the long-term period? Statistical research does not provide the answers to these questions. That is why it is very probable that the Economist (2008) operates unreliable measurements and risks distorting the real picture of the American labor market. Macroeconomics lacks agreement as for the causes and the consequences of unemployment. When the Economist (2008) implies that we are facing the challenges of cyclical unemployment, the real causes of unemployment may vary. According to Keynesian theory, â€Å"the main causes of unemployment result from insufficient effective demand for goods and economy† (Layard, 2005). Some economists are confident that the current economic crisis can hardly be the direct cause of the growing unemployment, and that structural unemployment does not threaten economic stability. From the viewpoint of classical macroeconomics, minimum wages and taxes may severely change the balance of forces in the U. S. labor markets. Regardless the exact cause of unemployment in the U. S. , non-economic population lacks relevant instruments that would help re-interpret statistics. We are used to the thought that statistical analysis is the source of reliable and unbiased information and that statistics may open the gateway to understanding the real causes and economic implications of the current financial difficulties; yet, the time has come when the methodology and analytical instruments behind statistics need to be reconsidered. I am confident that while statistical unemployment may cross all reasonable boundaries, the real picture of unemployment may be completely different. Certainly, thousands of people are being laid off and drown in the unemployment pool against their will, but the existing methods of economic and statistical analysis must also be refined; otherwise the coming years are unlikely to being economic relief to the American labor markets. Conclusion Statistical research suggests that the rates of unemployment in the U. S. have reached unbelievable 6. 5%. The Economist (2008) writes that the current financial crisis may not necessarily be the direct cause of the current unemployment shakes. Regardless the specific causes and consequences of unemployment in the U. S. , the national economy lacks relevant economic instruments that could be used to measure statistical variations in labor markets. Macroeconomic theorists lack unanimous agreement on the way unemployment should be defined and measured. The time has come when the major macroeconomic indicators and the means of measuring them should be refined. Non-economists are misled by inaccurate statistical data that causes panics in the labor markets. Unless we are able to evaluate the full labor market potential, and until we are confident that the results of the statistical analysis are at least close to reality, we will not be able to develop reasonable macroeconomic policies, and will fail to protect national economy from the deepening crisis. References Layard, R. (2005). Unemployment: macroeconomic performance and the labor market. Oxford University Press. The Economist. (2008). A painful job to do. November 7th. Retrieved November 18, 2008 from http://www. economist. com/research/articlesBySubject/displaystory. cfm? subjectid=348876&story_id=12583077

Experience in Los Angeles Personal Narrative - 636 Words

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Ficticious Recount of Professional Profficiency - 799 Words

As asserted, I am known worldwide and one well respected writer as a published author and expert editor by countless publishers, business entities, and to my vast, and pervasive readership I have acquired over the many years within writing successes. With an awe aspiring success have I resoundingly with great effort to date published with great diligence insomuch as profound endurance haven again, of me--to date renowned in the publishing domain in both the United States and in Germany and other Europe countries like England. Thus far to date I have published fifty-seven (57) books and play scripts on and about those imagined of any one writer who created and them considered an established poet laureate to volumes of poetry, one as well of writer for children books, who with their name built up their reputation with such of them being a writer of the horror genre, and proudly one of an American novelist of love and romance suspense books, and having a passion and devotion to h is having a tenure of twenty-five years being devout playwright--where last year I finally after twenty-years of work and producing the play script--with thus allowing me as the original playwright to complete Heaven Only Knows--The Professional Theatrical Production Play Script for On-Broadway and Off-Broadway performances. I wish to firstly share with my reader a quote I my-soon-to-be-published four volume series of books--a quote from my upcoming--four volume