Generations of London English: Language and Social Change in Real Time
Lead Research Organisation:
Queen Mary University of London
Department Name: School of Languages Linguistics and Film
Abstract
RATIONALE
Standard and vernacular speech have long been among the cornerstones of social status and social mobility in the UK. London has always been a source of both 'high' and 'low' register British English speech forms, and the last 25 years have been a particularly dramatic period of change, spurred by new waves of migration and social contact. The recent availability of a second generation of speakers of these new London varieties represents a unique opportunity to address both theoretical and real-world challenges. These fall into three broad areas: (i) large-scale change, (ii) individual cognition, and (iii) perception and bias. Due to the recency of new London speech varieties, it has so far been impossible to conduct large-scale, real-time analysis (unlike multi-generational dialectological work in the US, New Zealand, and Australia). Vernacular features sometimes spread and become the new standard over time, but in other cases remain socially restricted, with potential social stereotyping or marginalisation. The availability of the first two generations of new London dialect forms is a unique opportunity to examine these large-scale social and linguistic changes. Theoretical debates that the large-scale societal analysis can advance include formal linguistic models of phonetic, prosodic, and grammatical change, the role of different age groups in language change, and assessing competing models of change in complex social environments. At a smaller scale, individual dialect cognition is a newer and less well-understood area. Our real-time data across age groups offers new potential to address this "research lacuna in variationist sociolinguistics" (Schreier 2021). Unresolved theoretical questions that our study of individual cognition can address include how much control people have over dialect features, what determines that control, and how individuals develop their speech repertoire over their lifespan, a crucial factor in social mobility. We take a particular interest in the under-studied question of whether children pick up on ambient social meanings of speech forms at a very young age. And finally, our longitudinal perspective allows a deeper investigation of not just language use but (un)changing perceptions of those speakers, with implications for fair access and life outcomes.
RESEARCH PLAN
In order to document real-time change along these parallel tracks - both generational and lifespan - we pursue three distinct linguistic data types (naturalistic, perceptual, and experimental) across all the main age groups available. Naturalistic data will derive from three sampling formats, the first two of which are real-time: panel data (resampling speakers recorded 15 years ago), trend data (recording a new sample of the same age group), and apparent time data (different age groups at the present time). Naturalistic data will also include cross-situational recordings for the focus on individual repertoire development. Elicited data will be gathered to document changing social perceptions of accent forms as well as changing grammaticality judgements. Finally, experimental data will be gathered using novel designs to study control and recall (e.g. whether accent stereotypes lead to selective recall about a person) in adults, adolescents, and children. These three data types will be gathered in parallel, drawing on the complementary expertise of the research team in working with sociolinguistic interviews, child language experiments, and corpus construction. Our advisory panel includes representatives from key educational and cultural stakeholder groups: primary schools, SENCOs, secondary schools, and the British Library. Findings will be disseminated to academic colleagues via conferences, seminars and articles; to stakeholders through teacher workshops, online unconscious bias recommendations, and a Changing London English festival; and to the general public via the project and London English Corpus website.
Standard and vernacular speech have long been among the cornerstones of social status and social mobility in the UK. London has always been a source of both 'high' and 'low' register British English speech forms, and the last 25 years have been a particularly dramatic period of change, spurred by new waves of migration and social contact. The recent availability of a second generation of speakers of these new London varieties represents a unique opportunity to address both theoretical and real-world challenges. These fall into three broad areas: (i) large-scale change, (ii) individual cognition, and (iii) perception and bias. Due to the recency of new London speech varieties, it has so far been impossible to conduct large-scale, real-time analysis (unlike multi-generational dialectological work in the US, New Zealand, and Australia). Vernacular features sometimes spread and become the new standard over time, but in other cases remain socially restricted, with potential social stereotyping or marginalisation. The availability of the first two generations of new London dialect forms is a unique opportunity to examine these large-scale social and linguistic changes. Theoretical debates that the large-scale societal analysis can advance include formal linguistic models of phonetic, prosodic, and grammatical change, the role of different age groups in language change, and assessing competing models of change in complex social environments. At a smaller scale, individual dialect cognition is a newer and less well-understood area. Our real-time data across age groups offers new potential to address this "research lacuna in variationist sociolinguistics" (Schreier 2021). Unresolved theoretical questions that our study of individual cognition can address include how much control people have over dialect features, what determines that control, and how individuals develop their speech repertoire over their lifespan, a crucial factor in social mobility. We take a particular interest in the under-studied question of whether children pick up on ambient social meanings of speech forms at a very young age. And finally, our longitudinal perspective allows a deeper investigation of not just language use but (un)changing perceptions of those speakers, with implications for fair access and life outcomes.
RESEARCH PLAN
In order to document real-time change along these parallel tracks - both generational and lifespan - we pursue three distinct linguistic data types (naturalistic, perceptual, and experimental) across all the main age groups available. Naturalistic data will derive from three sampling formats, the first two of which are real-time: panel data (resampling speakers recorded 15 years ago), trend data (recording a new sample of the same age group), and apparent time data (different age groups at the present time). Naturalistic data will also include cross-situational recordings for the focus on individual repertoire development. Elicited data will be gathered to document changing social perceptions of accent forms as well as changing grammaticality judgements. Finally, experimental data will be gathered using novel designs to study control and recall (e.g. whether accent stereotypes lead to selective recall about a person) in adults, adolescents, and children. These three data types will be gathered in parallel, drawing on the complementary expertise of the research team in working with sociolinguistic interviews, child language experiments, and corpus construction. Our advisory panel includes representatives from key educational and cultural stakeholder groups: primary schools, SENCOs, secondary schools, and the British Library. Findings will be disseminated to academic colleagues via conferences, seminars and articles; to stakeholders through teacher workshops, online unconscious bias recommendations, and a Changing London English festival; and to the general public via the project and London English Corpus website.