Janus Spindler Møller

Indexical meanings of [s+] among Copenhagen youth: Social perception of a phonetic variant in different prosodic contexts

It is well documented that the same sociolinguistic feature can be used as a sociolinguistic resource with different indexical potentials in different linguistic as well as social contexts. Often, however, indexical meanings of a specific feature are related to or derived from one another. In this article we present the results of a perceptual study of indexical meanings of alveolar versus fronted (s)—[s] versus [sþ]—in different registers. The data consist of responses to male speakers’ use of [s] and [sþ] respectively, in two different registers that may be labelled “modern Copenhagen speech” and “street language.” Results show that the [sþ] indexes femininity and gayness when it occurs in “modern Copenhagen,” whereas the (s)-variation has a different and less significant effect when occurring in “street language.” We discuss the implications for theories of indexical fields and the relation between features and clusters of features in speakers’ perceptions. (Indexical meaning, phonetic variation, fronted /s/, perception of sexual orientation and ethnicity, matched guise technique).

Polylingual Performance among Turkish-Danes in Late-Modern Copenhagen.

Abstract This paper deals with linguistic diversity as it occurs in a conversation over dinner between three young Turkish–Danish men living in Denmark. I argue that terms like bilingual or multilingual are inappropriate in order to describe this verbal interaction because these terms presuppose that linguistic production is divided in categories in advance. Instead I suggest the term polylingual as more sufficient in describing the fluent use of linguistic features which are locally constructed as categories of linguistic features, regardless of how linguistic features are categorised in society at large. Using sequentially based micro analysis I show how polylingual behaviour is used for a range of linguistic purposes. I focus on the interplay between polylingual behaviour and other linguistic resources used in e.g. performance in order to negotiate local identity and power relations.This paper deals with linguistic diversity as it occurs in a conversation over dinner between three young Turkish–Danish men living in Denmark. I argue that terms like bilingual or multilingual are inappropriate in order to describe this verbal interaction because these terms presuppose that linguistic production is divided in categories in advance. Instead I suggest the term polylingual as more sufficient in describing the fluent use of linguistic features which are locally constructed as categories of linguistic features, regardless of how linguistic features are categorised in society at large. Using sequentially based micro analysis I show how polylingual behaviour is used for a range of linguistic purposes. I focus on the interplay between polylingual behaviour and other linguistic resources used in e.g. performance in order to negotiate local identity and power relations.

Learning to live with “Languages”

Abstract In this paper I describe how a group of speakers participating in a longitudinal study develop patterns of linguistic practices as well as norms for their use over time. The group at issue consists of speakers with a Turkish minority background living in Denmark. Data were collected from this group during their nine years of compulsory school and again in their mid-twenties. From a very early age this group of speakers acquires linguistic repertoires which involve features associated with several “languages”, of which the most influential are Turkish and Danish. I will show how they develop ways of employing large parts of those repertoires in their languaging practices and how at the same time they increasingly express an awareness of the fact that they are living in languagised world. I will do so by analysing instances where the participants explicitly refer to languages in peer group interactions, discuss observations concerning patterns of languaging in the same types of interactions, and consider the development of both phenomena.

Everyday languaging : collaborative research on the language use of children and youth

This book contributes to current theory building within applied linguistics and sociolinguistics by looking at the role of language in the lives, realities, and understandings of real children and youth in an urban setting. Collectively the studies amount to a comprehensive account of how urban children and youth construct, reactivate, negotiate, contest, and navigate between different linguistic and sociocultural norms and resources.

Sideways: five methodological studies of sociolinguistic interviews

Abstract Five interlocking case studies of variation in and between situations are reported. In all cases a sociolinguistic interview is contrasted with another speech event. The material is from the LANCHART panel study of variation in the Danish speech community in real time. Contrasting speech events are characterized using a genre classification and focusing in each case on the genre dispersion as a measure of how varied the speech event was. Two different phonetic variables are studied, the short (æ) and the (ɛŋ) variable. Four of the five case studies involve adults who also participated in interviews approximately 20 years later. For those informants, a comparison is made with the new recordings in order to evaluate claims of change in real time. Both auditory results and acoustic measurements are documented. The fifth case study concerns youngsters recorded in the new round of recordings (the S2), hence there is no newer recording to compare with. In all cases the older (æ) variable is sensitive to a change in situation whereas the newer (ɛŋ) variable only varies with situation for the young informants. In the final section, we discuss possible consequences for comparability and for the methodology of empirical (socio)linguistics.