Section A Theorists

Question 1

Petyt’s study

Answer 1

Direct connection between social class and h-drop in Bradford (1985)

Question 2

Petyt’s findings

Answer 2

Lower-working class h-drop the most, upper-middle class the least

Question 3

Labov’s study

Answer 3

Prestige of the rhotic /r/ in New York (1962)

Question 4

Labov’s findings

Answer 4

Upper class more likely to use more prestigious forms at all times
Middle class more likely to use less prestigious forms in casual speech but more prestigious forms in careful speech
Working class more likely to use less prestigious forms at all times

Question 5

Giles: ‘convergence’ (definition)

Answer 5

Meeting in the middle, shifting to accommodate the person you are speaking to

Question 6

Giles: ‘upward convergence’ (definition)

Answer 6

Making your accent more prestigious to accommodate a person of a socially more acceptable accent (RP)

Question 7

Giles’s ‘Downward Convergence’

Answer 7

Making your accent more regional to accommodate a speaker with a socially less acceptable accent (a country simpleton)

Question 8

Giles: ‘mutual convergence’ (definition)

Answer 8

Each speaker slightly changes their accent to accommodate the other so that they sort of meet in the middle

Question 9

Honey’s perspective

Answer 9

Prescriptivist
Teaching children that there is no ‘correct’ form of English only the standard and the non-standard is harmful and slowly devolves the language

Question 10

Trudgill’s perspective

Answer 10

Descriptivist
No language or dialect can be said to be better than another
All languages and all dialects are equally complex, structured, and valid linguistic systems

Question 11

Milroy’s study

Answer 11

Strong networks promote local linguistic features (e.g. Belfast)
Loose networks are conduits for social change

Question 12

Bernstein: ‘restricted code’ (definition)

Answer 12

Simple, short sentences, limited vocabulary, few descriptive modifiers, little to no abstract concepts expressable
Used mainly by working class

Question 13

Bernstein: ‘elaborated code’ (definition)

Answer 13

Complex, long sentences, wide vocabulary, abundance of descriptive modifiers and abstract concepts
Used by middle and upper class

Question 14

Kerswill’s findings

Answer 14

Many regional accents around the UK have been mixing with RP and creating hybrids in a process called dialect levelling

Question 15

Rosewarne quote

Answer 15

“If one imagines a continuum with RP and London speech at either end, ‘Estuary English’ speakers are to be found grouped in the middle”

Question 16

Rosewarne: features of EE

Answer 16

• /l/-vocalisation
• Glottals in final and media positions
• Yod coalescence (Tuesday -> tchoosday)
• Stylistic variability (cheers or good day both acceptable)
  (John Wells - ‘happY-tensing’ (/hæpi:/ instead of /hæpi/)

Question 17

John Wells on EE

Answer 17

“Estuary English is a new name. But it is not a new phenomenon. It is the continuation of a trend that has been going on for five hundred years or more - the tendency for features of popular London speech to spread out geographically (to other parts of the country) and socially (to higher social classes). But the erosion of the British class system and the greater social mobility in Britain today means that this trend is more clearly noticeable than once was the case.”

Question 18

Aitchison on double negatives

Answer 18

Double negatives are not an affront to the glory of English, but are used as a means of making a point and can be found in other languages

Question 19

Aitchison on the crumbling castle

Answer 19

The English language is often portrayed as a glorious castle crumbling into ruin, but Aitchison says that these glorifications of the past are highly inaccurate and that ‘no year can be found when language achieved some peak of perfection’.

Question 20

Aitchison on the damp spoon

Answer 20

The damp spoon is the concept that speakers have gotten lazy much like the laziness of leaving a damp spoon in sugar. Aitchison says the only lazy speech is drunk speech, and that fast speech is exactly the opposite of lazy

Question 21

Aitchison on the infectious disease

Answer 21

The fact that changes are caught and spread is technically true, but people only adopt changes they choose to take on, and unwanted changes don’t spread

Question 22

David Crystal and the tide metaphor

Answer 22

Language is like a tide, it ebbs and flows and constantly changes, but the change is never good or bad, just different

Question 23

Dennis Freeborn’s study

Answer 23

Three arguments are made against regional accents by perscriptivists: the ugliness, impreciseness, and incorrectness views

Question 24

Freeborn on the incorrectness view

Answer 24

“If a large enough number of people agree that one form of behaviour is the correct form, then that behaviour becomes the standard by which they judge others. However, it is important to remember that such standards are matters of fashion and convention.”

e.g. Rhotic /r/ sounds were once considered more prestigious, where nowadays they are only pronounced before vowels.

Question 25

Freeborn on ugliness

Answer 25

British English-speakers rate accents from industrial cities as sounding 'harsh' or 'flat', and RP as the most melodious. However, non-Brtis often rate industrial-city accents as nicer to listen to, suggesting the British are reacting to the social connotations of the origin of the accent, rather than the accent itself.

Question 26

Freeborn on imperciseness

Answer 26

Often people cite the replacement of /t/ with a glottal here, and Fi