sociolinguistics

Also known as socio-linguistics, socio linguistics

Sociolinguistics is the descriptive and scientific study of how language is shaped by and used differently within any given society. The field largely looks at how a language varies between distinct social groups and under the influence of assorted cultural norms, expectations, and contexts, including how that variation plays a role in language change. Sociolinguistics combines the older field of dialectology with the social sciences in order to identify regional dialects, sociolects, ethnolects, and other sub-varieties and styles within a language.

AI overview

Sociolinguistics is the scientific study of how language varies among different social groups within a society and how cultural norms, expectations, and contexts shape the way people speak. The field matters because it helps us understand the patterns behind language variation—like regional dialects and different speech styles—and explains how these differences contribute to language change over time.

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Commons category: Sociolinguistics
Stack Exchange tag: linguistics.stackexchange.com/tags/sociolinguistics
P13411: Mecklenburgische Seenplatte District

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Article

21 sections

Contents

Sociolinguistics in history
Beginnings
Western contributions
Applications
Fundamental concepts
Speech community
High-prestige and low-prestige varieties
Social network
Comparison of frameworks
Differences according to class
Class aspiration
Social language codes
Restricted code
Elaborated code
The codes and child development
Contradictions
Sociolinguistic variation
See also
References
Further reading
External links

A major branch of linguistics since the second half of the 20th century, sociolinguistics is closely related to and can partly overlap with pragmatics, linguistic anthropology, and sociology of language, the latter focusing on the effect of language back on society. Sociolinguistics' historical interrelation with anthropology can be observed in studies of how language varieties differ between groups separated by social variables (e.g., ethnicity, religion, status, gender, level of education, age, etc.) or geographical barriers (a mountain range, a desert, a river, etc.). Such studies also examine how such differences in usage and in beliefs about usage produce and reflect social or socioeconomic classes. As the usage of a language varies from place to place, language usage also varies among social classes, and some sociolinguists study these sociolects.