Sociolinguistic Variables
Studies in the field of sociolinguistics typically take a sample population and interview them, assessing the realisation of certain sociolinguistic variables. Labov specifies the ideal sociolinguistic variable to
- be high in frequency,
- have a certain immunity from conscious suppression,
- be an integral part of larger structures, and
- be easily quantified on a linear scale.
Phonetic variables tend to meet these criteria and are often used, as are grammatical variables and, more rarely, lexical variables. Examples for phonetic variables are: the frequency of the glottal stop, the height or backness of a vowel or the realisation of word-endings. An example of a grammatical variable is the frequency of negative concord (known colloquially as a double negative).
Read more about this topic: Variation (linguistics)
Famous quotes containing the word variables:
“The variables are surprisingly few.... One can whip or be whipped; one can eat excrement or quaff urine; mouth and private part can be meet in this or that commerce. After which there is the gray of morning and the sour knowledge that things have remained fairly generally the same since man first met goat and woman.”
—George Steiner (b. 1929)