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Elsevier

Sociolinguistic Metatheory

  • 1st Edition - July 22, 1994
  • Latest edition
  • Author: E. Figueroa
  • Language: English

Linguistics is a discipline with ever expanding boundaries and interests. Despite the narrow definition of linguistics which dominates academia, sub-fields continue to flourish and… Read more

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Description

Linguistics is a discipline with ever expanding boundaries and interests. Despite the narrow definition of linguistics which dominates academia, sub-fields continue to flourish and ways of doing linguistics continue to expand. As ways to do linguistics increase, and as approaches to linguistics accumulate over time, it becomes increasingly necessary for students of linguistics to have ways of understanding and comparing developments in linguistics.

Sociolinguistic Metatheory is a book which explains foundational developments in linguistics by taking the past three decades of developments in sociolinguistics and relating them to contemporaneous developments in received linguistics. Sociolinguistic Metatheory takes the reader through the basic philosophical questions which drive linguistic research. It looks in detail at three models of sociolinguistics - Dell Hymes and the Ethnography of Communication, William Labov and Sociolinguistic Realism, and John Gumperz and Interactional Sociolinguistics - and focuses on such questions as: Where is language located? How is an utterance-based approach to linguistics different from a sentence-based approach? How do metatheoretical paradigm assumptions such as realism or relativism affect the development of linguistic theory? What interesting developments in linguistic theory and analysis have sociolinguistics provided?

Readership

For linguistic students and scholars within the fields of sociolinguistics, anthropological linguistics, functional linguistics, pragmatics and discourse analysis, as well as linguists of any persuasion interested in theoretical and historical development in linguistics. The book is also of interest to non-linguists in the areas of philosophy, theory, and historiography.

Table of contents

Acknowledgements. Introduction. The problem. The approach. Overview of study. Part One - Paradigms: The Metaphysical Level. Foundations of Sociolinguistic Theory. The need for "metaworries". Markova's frameworks. The formalist and functionalist linguistic paradigms. Sociolinguistic metatheory. Conclusion. Part Two - Paradigms: The Disciplinary Matrix Level Sociolinguistic Disciplinary Matrixes. Dell Hymes and the Ethnography of Communication - Sociolinguistic Relativism. Sociolinguistics according to Dell Hymes. Sociolinguistic theory and linguistic theory. Ethnography of communication as linguistic theory. Conclusion. William Labov and Sociolinguistic Realism. Sociolinguistics according to William Labov. Sociolinguistic theory and linguistic theory. Labovian sociolinguistics as linguistic theory. Conclusion. John Gumperz and Interactional Sociolinguistics - Intentionality, Interpretation and Social Meaning. Sociolinguistics according to John Gumperz. Sociolinguistic theory and linguistic theory. Interactional sociolinguistics as linguistic theory. Conclusion. Part Three - Paradigms: The Construct Level. Sociolinguistics and Utterance. Introduction. Sociolinguistics and utterance. Utterance and linguistic theory. Utterance and linguistics of particularity. Linguistics of particularity. Conclusion. Sociolinguistic disciplinary matrixes: a comparison. Sociolinguistics revisited. References. Index.

Product details

  • Edition: 1
  • Latest edition
  • Published: June 28, 2014
  • Language: English

About the author

EF

E. Figueroa

Affiliations and expertise
USA

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