Sociolinguistics and Identity

John Edwards argues that “sociolinguistics is essentially about identity， its formation， presentation and maintenance”. As for the term “identity”， Kroskrity （1999， p.111） defines it as “the linguistic construction of membership in one or more social groups or categories”. In many linguistic studies， language is generally considered to be the most important one for identity construction although there are many other means for that purpose.

Sociolinguist Janet Holmes gives plenty of examples in her book： An Introduction to Sociolinguistics to support this claim. Firstly， a persons usage of language often reflects his social identity and education. For instance， pronouncing the letter ‘r as in ‘4th floor is socially prestigious in cities like New York. On the other hand， the situation in London is opposite. Londoners consider the accents with post-vocal |r| as rural and uneducated. （Holmes， 2013， p.147） Similarly， dropping the initial ‘h in ‘house signifies a lower social class in Norwich and West Yorkshire. （Holmes， 2013， p.146）

Secondly， individuals are very possible to signal their ethnic identity by choosing the language/vernacular/dialect they use. Although it is impossible for people to have a complete conversation in an ethnic language， short phrases and linguistic tags may be used to help signal ethnicity. Janet Holmes gives the following examples： in New Zealand， many Maori people use Maori greetings such as ‘kia and ‘ora routinely to signal their ethnicity while they speak in English. （Holmes， 2013， p.187） Another language is called Patois， a kind of British Black English， which is originated from a Jamaican Creole. This variety has mainly been used by Jamaican immigrants in London and young British Blacks in group talks to symbolize their ethnic identity. （Holmes， 2013， p.190） Furthermore， the spread of vernacular forms in some speech communities can be seen as a reflection of ethnic or social identity as well. Labovs study （1972） gives an example， when some summer tourists invaded Marthas Vineyard island， the local fishermen in the island community led the change to a more centralized pronunciation of some word vowels， which was away from the standard to a more vernacular form from the past to mark themselves off from outsiders. （Holmes， 2013， p.224） Moreover， there is a dialect called African American Vernacular English （AAVE） or Black English Vernacular. Although other people have negative attitudes towards some of its characteristics， it does exist as a special “language”. It can be also regarded as a kind of rebelling for colored people in US to signal their differences from the majority group.

Thirdly， the hot topic ‘code-switching in linguistic studies could be used to support John Edwards claim as well. The definition of code-switching is that people usually switch from one code such as language， dialect， or style to another during speech. In fact， one of the reasons for doing that could be to signal solidarity or to reflect dual identities.

Take Hong Kong as an example， its language planning best illustrates the language-identity link. After the sovereignty of HK returned to China， the HK government started to promote the China official language —Mandarin and asking schools to use Mandarin as their instruction medium instead of Cantonese. For example， the HK government attempted to promote Chinese in intellectual context by keeping only a certain number of EMI schools which in turn raised the percentage of CMI schools. The main reason behind the promotion of Putonghua is to preserve cultural identity， and to signal Hong Kong peoples Chinese identity to the world.

Another example is the language choice between Cantonese and Mandarin of Hong Kong people. In some of the arguments between a Mainlander and Hong Kong people， even though the people from Hong Kong can speak fluent Mandarin， they keep using Cantonese in the argument. Normally， it is not effective communication as the Mainlander could not understand Cantonese. However， to stress the Hong Kong identity and to mark themselves off from outsiders， they would prefer Cantonese. This could also be explained as a kind of human instinct to establish and maintain social identity.

To conclude， all linguistic variation studies involve the issue of identity to a certain extent. Sociolinguistics studies many different aspects， language， dialect， vernacular， code-switching， language change， language planning， ethnicity and many others， all of which could be manifestations of identity.

References：

[1]Holmes，Janet.An Introduction to Sociolinguistics.London： Routledge，2013.

[2]Kroskrity，Paul V.（1999）.Identity.Journal of linguistic anthropology 9（1-2）.111- 114.

[3]Labov William.（1972）.Sociolinguistic Patterns.Philadelphia： University of Pennsylvania Press.

作者簡介：王倩（1995-），女，漢族，江蘇南通人，在讀本科，研究方向：英語（金融與投資）。