4. Norwich Study 1
Norwich is a city in a relatively isolated
geographical position
It could be an interesting place to study
language change, since the spread of standard
British English is likely to encounter strong
local speech forms
Trudgill was once a native of the city
5. Norwich Study 2
Trudgill interviewed a cross-
section of population: samples of
casual speech, formal speech,
reading passages, reading word
lists (like Labov)
His results were similar to
Labov’s – social class variations
in pronunciations
But one feature illustrated a fine
balance of opposing forces –
whether people did or did not
sound the final g in words like
walkin(g) and talkin(g)
6. Norwich Study 3
In Standard British English the final –ng sound in
words like walking and talking is a ‘velar nasal’ [], but
in Norwich Trudgill found that the local
pronunciation was just [n] – walkin, talkin
This local pronunciation was a remnant of an older
local speech style which up to at least the 1930s was
considered acceptable among many local speakers of
Standard British English – in fact it was widely used
in many parts of Britain, but over time the –in
ending has become non-standard
7. Norwich Study 4
Trudgill’s results:
In all social classes, people were more likely to say walking in careful
speech; walkin was a feature of casual, not careful, speech
Forms like walkin were more common among people from the lower
social groups: LWC people used forms like walkin 100% of the time
in casual speech but they were used only 28% of the time by MC
people
BUT the non-standard forms were used considerably more often by
men in all social classes
ALSO, in interviews, women thought they were using the standard
forms more often than they actually were, whereas men thought they
were using the local, non-standard forms more than they actually
were.
8. Norwich Study 5
Trudgill’s conclusions – in/ing as focus of conflicting forces:
Women tend to pull towards overt prestige forms (i.e. the
Standard British English pronunciations) but men seem
to pull away from them, preferring local speech forms
Women tend to be more status-conscious and more
aware of the social significance of certain speech forms
Men tend to favour local working-class speech forms
which are associated with masculine values like roughness
and toughness
Women tend to lead conscious language change towards
prestige forms – they want to ‘speak better’; men tend to
lead subconscious change towards local WC speech
10. Belfast Study 1
Lesley and Jim Milroy studied some examples of
pronunciation changes going on in 3 inner city Belfast areas,
particularly Ballymacarett (a Protestant district in east Belfast)
and Clonard (a Catholic district in west Belfast)
These areas shared some things: high unemployment, poor
health, juvenile crime BUT they were divided by the
religious/political difference and the tension and violence it
generated
Lesley Milroy joined the close social networks in these
communities by claiming to be ‘a friend of a friend’ and
collected a lot of data including sound recordings
11. Belfast Study 2
Lesley Milroy looked at changes
taking place in some vowel
sounds
The a in words like grass or bad
was shifting towards grawss and
bawd i.e. moving backward in
the mouth
The e in words like wren and desk
was shifting from the local
pronunciation wran and dask
towards wren and desk, i.e.
moving forward in the mouth
12. Belfast Study 3
The shift in the a sound
The most ‘backed’ forms were among the Ballymacarett
men
These men were a kind of ‘labour aristocracy’ – most
were employed and better off than the Clonard men
They were part of a highly integrated social network,
assured of their identity and status
The change in pronouncing the a (e.g. from grass to grawss)
seemed to be radiating out from these inner-city, WC
men
13. Belfast Study 4
The shift in the a sound (continued)
There was a lower incidence of ‘backing’ this sound in
Clonard, suggesting that people here were following
rather than leading this change
BUT the young women in Clonard showed a higher score
than the young men which was odd since women are
usually much less likely to follow the speech forms
originating from WC men
So, how did the backed a initiated by east Belfast males
move across to west Belfast females?
14. Belfast Study 5
The shift in the a sound (continued)
The prominent role young Clonard females had in spreading the
backed a sound is explained by the fact that, unlike the Clonard
young men, most of them were employed – in a city-centre store
This store is used by both Catholics and Protestants and it is likely
that these Catholic women were picking up the backed a sound
from customers – it is well known from research that shop assistants
match their speech to aspects of their customers’ speech
These women had strong social networks at home and work but
their job was a weak point, allowing contact with another group –
change often seeps in at these contact points, crossing over from one
social network to another
15. Belfast Study 6
The shift in the e sound
The shift from an older ‘Irish’ [a] sound (wat) to a
more standard [e] pronunciation (wet) was being
initiated by Ballymacarett women
The [e] sound is characteristic of most outer-city
and middle class speakers, so the Ballymacarett
WC women are leading a move towards standard
speech, which has overt prestige
16. Belfast Study 7
So, the Belfast study appears to show the expected gender divide:
WC women leading change towards more standard speech; WC men
leading change towards a non-standard form
BUT the Clonard young women show that women do not always
veer towards the standard, prestige forms, especially when they have
strong, dense social networks
The Belfast study shows how changes move from one social network
to another: temporary shifts in accent/speech to accommodate the
other person in face-to-face exchanges (e.g. shop assistant &
customer) then become incorporated in normal speech and used
when chatting to friends, so the change has shifted across to become
part of that group’s speech
18. Reading Study 1
Jenny Cheshire’s study looked
at word endings, not
pronunciation
She focused on non-standard
forms like:
“I knows how to handle teddy
boys”
“They calls me all the names
under the sun”
She studied the language of
groups of teenagers hanging
around playgrounds in Reading
19. Reading Study 2
In casual speech, the overall (i.e. boys and girls)
average use of these non-standard forms was 55%
In formal settings (when the children were recorded
with Headteacher present) the use fell to 25%
There was little difference between boys and girls in
casual speech, but girls’ speech showed far fewer
non-standard forms than boys in formal speech
However, gender was not the only factor; more
crucial was the individual’s conformity to the local
adolescent subculture which required ‘toughness’
20. Reading Study 3
Boys seen as ‘tough’ and rebellious, engaged in criminal or anti-social
activities, were accorded high status and seen as ‘core’ members of their
groups: they had high scores (up to 80% in casual speech) for non-
standard forms
The girls did not display nor aspire to ‘toughness’ and their highest
scores for non-standard forms in casual speech were only around 58%
So, the non-standard forms are preferred by males and have covert
prestige; females are much more likely to use standard forms which have
overt prestige
The particular non-standard verb forms they used – I knows, they calls,
etc – are remnants from an old widespread dialect form which added –s
to all present tense forms: these teenagers were in fact continuing an old
tradition
21. SUMMARY
1. Most language changes spring from elements already existing in the
language which get borrowed or exaggerated
2. A change occurs when one group consciously or subconsciously
takes another as a model and copies features of its speech
3. Changes move from group to group possibly via people who casually
come into contact; they accommodate their speech to each other and
pick up features which they then use among their own social network
4. Conscious changes usually tend towards speech forms with overt
prestige such as Standard English – these changes often originate
among the LMC, especially women
5. Subconscious change often moves away from overt prestige forms
towards local, non-standard forms which have covert prestige – these
changes often led by WC men
6. Language change is essentially a social phenomenon.
