Nikolas Coupland

Accommodating the Elderly: Invoking and Extending a Theory.

The article begins by exploring briefly the role of the elderly in sociolinguistic theory and research. After an outline of the parameters of speech accommodation theory together with a new schematic model, it is argued that speech accommodation theory is a profitable framework for elucidating the sociolinguistic mechanics of, and the social psychological processes underlying, intergenerational encounters. A recent conceptual foray in this direction, which highlights young-to-elderly language strategies, is then overviewed with some illustrations. Contrastive data from a case study are then introduced, a discourse analysis of which allows us to conceptualize various elderly-to-young language strategies. This interpretive analysis suggests important avenues for extending speech accommodation theory itself. A revised, more sociolinguistically elaborated version of this framework is then presented which highlights strategies beyond those of convergence, maintenance, and divergence and leads to the conceptualization of over - and under accommodation. Finally, and on the basis of the foregoing, a new model of intergenerational communication is proposed and Ryan et al.s (1986) “communicative predicament” framework duly revised. (Accommodation theory, elderly, overaccommodation, case studies, discourse management, stereotypes, underaccommodation, interdisciplinary)

Frame Negotiation in Doctor-Elderly Patient Consultations

Institutional discourse typically involves a dialectic between institutional (e.g. medical) frames and socio-relational frames for talk. The paper draws on audio-recorded data from a geriatric outpatients clinic in the UK to show how doctors and elderly patients collaborate in and negotiate the work of entering an apparently medical frame of talk. Particular attention is paid to sequences involving how are you?-type elicitations. Social and medical framings of talk are established and blended in complex discourse patterns. This blending may have a special salience in contexts, such as geriatrics, where holistic care has an explicit priority.

Metalanguage : social and ideological perspectives

Metalanguage brings together new, original contributions on peoples knowledge about language and representations of language, e.g., representations of dialects, styles, utterances, stances and goals in relation to sociolinguistic theory, sociolinguistic accounts of language variation, and accounts of linguistic usage. The book follows from and complements a great tradition of the study of metalanguage, reflexivity, and metapragmatics, and offers a new, integrating perspective from various fields of sociolingustics: perceptual dialectology, variationism, pragmatics, critical discourse analysis, and social semiotics. The broad range of theoretical issues and accessible style of writing will appeal to advanced students and researchers in sociolinguistics and in other disciplines across the social sciences and humanities including linguists, communication researchers, anthropologists, sociologists, social psychologists, critical and social theorists. The book includes chapters by Deborah Cameron, Nikolas Coupland, Dariusz Galasi?ski, Peter Garrett, Adam Jaworski, Tore Kristiansen, Ulrike Hanna Meinhof, Dennis Preston, Theo van Leeuwen, Kay Richardson, Itesh Sachdev, Angie Williams, and John Wilson.

‘Hark, hark, the lark’: Social motivations for phonological style-shifting

As regards the analysis of style in speech, there are grounds for claiming that contemporary sociolinguistics is unduly confined by what have been two of its major advances.’ These are firstly the recognition that situation can dictate or at least constrain speech-choices (Hymes, 1972; Labov, 1972a; Goffman, 1964) and secondly the development of quantitative methods for studying stylistic variation (Labov, 1966, 1972a). These two factors have combined to produce a well established research paradigm for studying so-called stylistic or situational variation in speech, where stylistic variables are identified through quantitative analyses of sociolinguistic variables (often segmental phonological variables) and related to gross situational dimensions such as setting, participants, activity-type, channel and topic.

Formulating age: Dimensions of age identity in elderly talk

It is illuminating to study identity as a dynamic, interactionally achieved process rather than as a static, intraindividual construct. Our article identifies and seeks to overview the diverse means by which the age identities of elderly (aged 70–87) interactants are formulated in a corpus of 40 cross‐generation and within‐generation conversations, based on transcriptions of videorecorded data. We propose an informal taxonomy of age‐identity marking processes in talk, spanning particular age categorization and temporal framing processes. Detailed analysis of individual cases shows how variable identities may be constructed by and for individuals, often bilaterally, and relative to projected identities of others. Finally, we consider theoretical and practical implications of the discursive management of age identity for intergenerational relations and contact.

Evaluating dialect in discourse: Teachers' and teenagers' responses to young English speakers in Wales

School students (15–16 years) in six regions of Wales were recorded telling stories in their local English dialects. Some of these narratives were used as samples representing the main English dialect regions in Wales. Comparable groups of students (n = 169) and a group of teachers (n = 47) rated the audio-recorded speakers on a number of scales of affiliation, status, and Welshness. Statistical analysis of their ratings, employing cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling, made it possible to detect some of the competing or additive effects of dialect and narrative features. Judgments of “Welshness” of the speaker/narratives were grounded in the regional dialect properties; but other judgments, such as the likability of the speakers, tended to draw on features of both dialect and narrative. In addition, comparison of students and teachers revealed differences in their evaluations of particular dialect communities and the characteristics of the narratives. The findings illustrate the importance of approaching the analysis of dialect variation within the broader context of speech and discourse performance.

The Mediated Performance of Vernaculars

Author’s Note: I am very grateful to Ruth King for this opportunity to reflect and comment on the three articles, both at the Sociolinguistics Symposium 17 and here, and of course to the authors themselves for giving me access to their work prepublication. I also thank Anne Curzan and Robin Queen for their suggestions. Journal of English Linguistics Volume 37 Number 3 September 2009 284-300

Affiliation, engagement, language use and vitality: secondary school students' subjective orientations to Welsh and Welshness

The revitalisation of a minority language implies subjective as well as objective (e.g. demographic) criteria of vitality. School students of around age 16 have been identified as a key group for carrying a revitalised Welsh language through into social life. Our research profiles the feelings of ethnic affiliation and cultural engagement, and perceptions of the vitality of Welsh, of students at four secondary schools in Wales, representing different local sociolinguistic environments. Quite high levels of ethnic affiliation to Wales contrast with variable levels of reported engagement and vitality beliefs. The findings are interpreted as qualifying rather widespread positive assumptions in Wales about the revitalisation of the Welsh language among young people.

Bilingualism on display: The framing of Welsh and English in Welsh public spaces

This article develops an interpretive perspective on public displays of bilingualism. Photographic data from contemporary Wales illustrate how public bilingual—Welsh and English—displays are organized in different frames, reflecting historically changing language-ideological priorities and more local symbolic markets. In institutionally driven displays, the Welsh language is framed as an autonomous code in parallel with English, displacing an earlier pattern of representing Welsh subordinated to English norms. In other frames Welsh is constructed as the only legitimate heartland language, or as an impenetrable cultural curiosity. In the most open and least institutionalized frame, Welsh is displayed as part of a culturally distinctive but syncretic cultural system. These framing contests dramatize deeper tensions that surface in attempts to revitalize minority languages under globalization. (Wales, Welsh, bilingualism, language display, language ideology, linguistic landscapes, metaculture)

Linguistic Landscapes, Discursive Frames and Metacultural Performance: The Case of Welsh Patagonia

Abstract Linguistic landscapes have, in the main, been analyzed distributionally, noting the preponderance of different language codes in particular settings. In contrast, we develop a qualitative, critical, frame-analytic account of Welsh language and culture, as displayed in texts in public spaces in Patagonia, the site of a Welsh colonial experiment in the mid-19th century. We identify three frames through which cultural values are ascribed to Wales and to the Welsh language: the colonial history frame, the reflexive cultural Welshness frame, and the Welsh heritage frame. The last of these frames dominates in the visible landscape in Gaiman, Patagonia, where Welshness is associated with commercial heritage tourism initiatives, and particularly casas de té galesas (‘Welsh tea houses’). We comment on language choice (mainly Welsh and Spanish), but also on multimodal and stylistic resources, used in framing Welshness, and constituting it metaculturally, in various types of public signs and displays.