The
Fifteen Online Questions
Below you will find fifteen questions, 14 of which correspond to the chapters in An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. Question 15 is for General Education and does not correspond to any particular chapter, and all students must answer it.
You are required to answer only five of the fifteen below. You will actually submit your answers in Blackboard, but the questions are duplicated below so that you can decide in advance which ones you would like to answer.
I strongly recommend that among your five you do Questions 1, 3, and 9. You will find them especially interesting.
Write your answers to five questions outside of Blackboard, and then paste your answer into the textbox that corresponds to the question. Your answers should be between one and two pages. Make sure that you carefully edit your answers before submitting them.
I will grade only five questions, and one of those must be Question 15 because it is required by General Education.
As speakers of a language, we vary our speech depending upon whom
we are speaking to. Try this simple experiment. Find a person whom you are
close to--spouse, child, or significant other--and in your next conversation
speak in complete and grammatical sentences. You should observe a
reaction of some sort in a short period of time. Keep up this behavior for a
little while.
After you finish, tell your subject what you were doing and ask him/her to
explain the reaction that he/she had.
Now write the results of your study and send it to me. Include the following:
Identify the person in the conversation.
Describe the scene and topic of conversation.
Describe and discuss the person's reaction.
Why did the person have that reaction?
What did you learn about how you speak to someone you are close to?
What is a standard dialect? How does the standard dialect differ from non-standard dialects? In other words, do the two types of dialects differ grammatically? How are the dialects evaluated by the society? Who speaks the dialects? And how are they learned?� To more effectively answer this question, watch the short movie, American Tongues.
Reread the section on networks in your textbook. Now list the six people with whom you communicate most frequently. Designate yourself "A" and draw lines from A to the other six people. Now draw lines between those of the six who communicate frequently with each other. You can easily draw this figure in Word.
Are you a member of a dense or loose network?
Are you involved in a simplex or multiplex network?
Defend your answers to the previous two questions.
If you were not able to draw the figure, carefully describe your network, and then answer the questions above.
Some speech communities have three codes that they can use, essentially two languages and intra-sentential code mixing.� Why wouldn't people in a diglossic situation, such as that of German speakers in Switzerland, practice intra-sentential code mixing?
Explain how pidgins arise and describe at least five grammatical features that characterize them.
or
Explain how creoles arise from pidgins and describe at least five grammatical differences between the two.
Studies in quantitative sociolinguistics are correlational. In such studies the dependent variable is always the linguistic variable.� What are some of the independent variables used by sociolinguistics? Explain why the same independent variables are not of equal importance in all societies.
Although the studies reviewed in this chapter are from different speech communities, certain similarities in the findings are evident. Briefly discuss these similarities. Particularly think about socio-economic class and contextual styles.
Briefly summarize Labov�s findings from his research on Martha�s Vineyard. How can a study conducted at a single point in time show linguistic change over time? Explain how subsequent studies have validated or invalidated Labov�s original findings.
Think of a communicative event that you have participated in with another individual and describe it according to the eight factors proposed by Hymes.
Two Japanese speakers can show their relative social positions to each other through the use of honorifics. Even though English does not have grammatical honorifics, can two English speakers still show an awareness of their relative social status through the use of language?� Use examples to support your answer.
Answer Question 2 on pages
303-304 in An Introduction to Sociolinguistics.
Answer Question 1 on pages
332-333 in An Introduction to Linguistics.
Briefly discuss Bernstein's major claims on the relationship between language and social structure (class). How have linguists criticized these claims?
Are multilingual nations
attempting to protect the linguistic rights of language minorities?
How? Which countries seem to be more successful? Which are least
successful?
This
question is required for General Education and must be answered by all
students.� Follow the instructions below.
Instructions
For each of the following passages below, answer these three prompts.
a) State the conclusion (or main point) of the passage.
b) Does the author of the passage provide good support for the conclusion?
c) In 2-3 sentences, provide support for your answer to question b.
1. If you drop out of college, you don�t make much money. Chris doesn�t make
much money. So, he must have dropped out of college.
2. You think that putting armed guards in schools will reduce gun violence?
I don�t think so. That�s just more NRA propaganda.
3. On August 23, 2009, Desiree Jennings, a healthy, vibrant woman, was administered the seasonal flu shot at a local grocery store. Ten days later, she came down with the flu and began having seizures. She now has difficulty speaking, walking, and eating. Doctors have diagnosed Ms. Jennings with a neurological condition called dystonia. Given that Desiree Jennings was perfectly healthy before getting the flu shot, it looks like her dystonia was caused by a severe reaction to the seasonal flu vaccine.