Style : language variation and identity / Nikolas Coupland.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Coupland, Nikolas, 1950-

Series:

Key topics in sociolinguistics

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Language and languages--Variation.

Language and languages.

Language and languages--Style.

Sociolinguistics.

Identity (Psychology).

Physical Description:

xii, 209 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm.

Other Title:

Language variation and identity

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, UK ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2007.

Summary:

Style refers to ways of speaking - how speakers use the resource of language variation to make meaning in social encounters. This book develops a coherent theoretical approach to style in sociolinguistics, illustrated with copious examples. It explains how speakers project different social identities and create different social relationships through their style choices, and how speech-style and social context inter-relate. Style therefore refers to the wide range of strategic actions and performances that speakers engage in, to construct themselves and their social lives. Coupland draws on and integrates a wide variety of contemporary sociolinguistic research as well as his own extensive research in this field. The emphasis is on how social meanings are made locally, in specific relationships, genres, groups and cultures, and on studying language variation as part of the analysis of spoken discourse.

Contents:

1.1 Locating 'style' 1

1.2 Variationism in sociolinguistics 4

1.3 Style in sociolinguistics and in stylistics 9

1.4 Social meaning 18

1.5 Methods and data for researching sociolinguistic style 24

1.6 Style in late-modernity 29

1.7 Later chapters 31

2 Style and meaning in sociolinguistic structure 32

2.1 Stylistic stratification 32

2.2 Limits of the stratification model for style 37

2.3 'Standard' and 'non-standard' 42

2.4 'Non-standard' speech as 'deviation' 45

2.5 Social structure and social practice 47

3 Style for audiences 54

3.1 Talking heads versus social interaction 54

3.2 Audience design 58

3.3 Communication accommodation theory 62

3.4 Some studies of audience design and speech accommodation 64

3.5 Limits of audience-focused perspectives 74

4 Sociolinguistic resources for styling 82

4.1 Speech repertoires 82

4.2 The ideological basis of variation 85

4.3 Habitus and semantic style 89

4.4 Language attitudes and meanings for variation 93

4.5 Metalanguage, critical distance and performativity 99

4.6 Sociolinguistic resources? 103

5 Styling social identities 106

5.1 Social identity, culture and discourse 106

5.2 Acts of identity 108

5.3 Identity contextualisation processes 111

5.4 Framing social class in the travel agency 115

5.5 Styling place 121

5.6 Voicing ethnicities 126

5.7 Indexing gender and sexuality 132

5.8 Crossing 137

5.9 Omissions 145

6 High performance and identity stylisation 146

6.1 Theorising high performance 146

6.2 Stylisation 149

6.3 Decontextualisation 155

6.4 Voicing political antagonism - Nye 156

6.5 Drag and cross-dressing performances 163

6.6 Exposed dialects 171

7 Coda: Style and social reality 177

7.1 Change within change 177

7.2 The authentic speaker 180

7.3 The media(tisa)tion of style 184.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 189-205) and index.

ISBN:

0521853036

0521618142

9780521853033

9780521618144

OCLC:

76836110

Online:

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