Aims and objectives of the course
This course provides students with an introduction to key concepts in Sociolinguistics. The aims of this course are to introduce students to ways of thinking about the relationship between language, culture and society; to develop ways of analysing the relationship between language and society; to outline key areas of debate in studies of the relationship between language, culture and society.
By the end of the course, students will have:
- acquired a repertoire of relevant terms in the field of sociolinguistics;
- become familiar with some of the most important and influential concepts in the field;
- acquired and improved their ability to analyze language with respect to culture and society;
- acquired the basic knowledge to develop and apply their competencies in future research in the field.
Mode of assessment:
- Active participation in seminar discussions – 25%
- Quizzes and assignments in the e-course – 25%
- End-term Quiz – 30%
- Exam – 20% (the first three may lead to exam exemption)
Weekly organization of topics & reading assignments:
Topics for the lectures:
I. Sociolinguistics and the Sociolinguist.
II. An alternative approach to register: the ethnography of communication.
III. Dialect, Register, and Genre: Working Assumptions About Conventionalization.
IV. Language and regional variation: accent and dialect.
V. Language and gender.
VI. Language and ethnic identity.
VII. Language and culture.
VIII. Language and social interaction.
Topics for the seminars:
1. Language and situation. The concept of register.
2. Ethnographic analysis of communicative events.
3. Analysing the behaviour of a sociolinguistic marker.
4. Class and gender differences in pronunciation.
5. Language and representation.
6. Cross-cultural differences in speaking practices.
7. The study of verbal interaction.
- Преподавател: Полина Петкова