Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 694

Part of General Poster Session (Other abstracts in this session)

Language identity construction in Dublin

Authors: O'Dwyer, Fergus James
Submitted by: O'Dwyer, Fergus James (Osaka University, Japan)

The urban and suburban combine to make up the linguistic landscape of the capital city of Ireland. The boom and bust years have, no doubt, had an influence on the language used there. Hickey (2005) hypothesized significant phonological changes motivated by local disassociation. However, to date we know very little about social distribution of the features, the functions that they perform, and how they relate to social identities in Dublin. This poster deals with an ethnographic study of language use among adolescents in a Dublin suburb. The results of the study will have implications for an urban variety of English that has not been explored in much depth, along with aiming to extend and enhance methodological practices dealing when engaging with social networks.

The heterogeneous area in question, 7 miles from the centre of the city, can be seen to represent the changing face of Dublin and Ireland. The intention is to identify salient variable linguistic patterns at the sociopragmatic (humour), phonological and sociopragmatic etc levels,n and to understand the social meanings of variation: the relationship between linguistic behaviour and adolescent speech communities. As mMale respondents will be the predominant focus, as by exploring other contexts and focusing on features such as humour,, it may be possible to enhance understanding of the nature of masculine identities hitherto developed by Kiesling (2005) among others.　

Observation and free recording techniques, successfully employed by Eckert (2000), lead to general interviews that provide linguistic data, and language ideology attitudinal information. It is possible to gain insights on identity construction, orientation and affiliations which reflect respondents’ social and cultural positions, and give insights into inter-group relationships and identity negotiation. In order to verify this data, the methodology tools of the Survey of Regional English (SuRE, see Asprey, Burbano-Elizondo & Wallace, 2006), such as the Identification Questionnaires (IdQ) and an Affiliation Score Index (ASI), can be suitably employed.

Identity construction can involve several often overlapping complementary relations, a series of boundaries and symbols (e.g. values, beliefs, ways of talking etc.) that distinguish speech communities in a context (Bucholtz and Hall 2010). I aim to create a thick sociolinguistic description of linguistic realities for the adolescents in question.The significant sociolinguistic processes and sociocultural factors that contribute to the construction of local identity will be examined alongside indexical fields, and other factors that determine employment of linguistic resources. The poster will conclude with implications for variation and change within Dublin.

Asprey, Esther, Burbano-Elizondo, Lourdes & Wallace, Kate (2006) The Survey of Regional English and its Methodology: Conception, Refinement, and Implementation. In Corpus Linguistics: Applications for the study of English. Edited by Ana Maria Hornero, Maria Jose Luzón & Silvia Murillo. Frankfurt: Peter Lang, pp. 431-450.

Bucholtz, Mary & Hall, Kira (2010) Locating Identity in Language. In Language and Identities. Edited by Carmen Llamas & Dominic Watt. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 18-28.

Hickey, Raymond (2005) Dublin English. Evolution and change. Amsterdam: John Benjamins

Kiesling, Scott F. (2005) Homosocial desire in men's talk: Balancing and re-creating cultural discourses of masculinity. Language in Society, 34 (5), 695-726

Sociolinguistics Symposium 19

Programme: accepted abstracts

Language identity construction in Dublin