Languages & Linguistics
Social Network Theory
Social Network Theory in linguistics refers to the study of how social structures and relationships influence language use and change. It focuses on the connections between individuals and groups and how these connections impact the spread of linguistic features, dialects, and language variation. This theory helps to understand how social interactions shape language patterns and evolution.
Written by Perlego with AI-assistance
Related key terms
1 of 5
7 Key excerpts on "Social Network Theory"
eBook - PDF- Graeme Trousdale(Author)
- 2010(Publication Date)
- EUP(Publisher)
This intersection of network and social class is highly relevant to our discussion of the speech com-munity. In work on Belfast English (for example, Milroy 1992), it was argued that strong working-class networks have rather different norms from strong upper-class networks (with middle-class networks rather caught in between, with some loyalties to both). Furthermore, it was clear that disruption to the social fabric of the network correlated with linguistic changes (particularly the incursion of supra-local forms into a group of speakers who regularly used vernacular variants). This points not to a consensus model of social class, but rather to a conflict model. The different norms held by different networks suggest a number of things: • Norms (both social and linguistic) are regulated at highly local levels. • Different norms held by a working-class community may explain the persistence of non-standard varieties of English, despite the wider cultural dominance of the standard variety. • Social changes which may disrupt strong network ties will allow for linguistic changes to take place and/or a shift in the distribution of variants across other social groupings within the various networks (for example, males and females, or members of different ethnic groups). 22 AN INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH SOCIOLINGUISTICS The social network model therefore poses a challenge to Labov’s con-ception of the English speech community, since it argues for a series of subgroups of English speakers, who hold differing (and perhaps even opposing) norms. Gumperz (1996) proposes a model in which aspects of linguistic behaviour are said to be connected to social meaning in some way. In this model, speakers might use a variety of English in order to index a series of social relationships in the group. We will explore this in more detail in Chapter 4, but it is important to raise this here as it provides us with another way of thinking about a speech community.
eBook - PDFLanguage Change
Advances in Historical Sociolinguistics
- Ernst Håkon Jahr(Author)
- 2011(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter Mouton(Publisher)
It is not my aim to discuss the various concepts of social networks; there is no theory and uniform definition for them, cf. the critical discussion of the network concepts by Rindler Schjerve (1990) and Kischkat (1987). Networks are usually described by means of two factors: density and multiplexity. For the research of language change they would be interesting as disseminators of innovations if they could include aspects of dynamics and various kinds of relations between the members. As the social relation as an entity of the analysis of networks does not account for the behavior of the individuals and the situation of interaction, the variability of linguistic behavior cannot be determined by the social roles alone. All network types are static, they describe, but do not explain (Kischkat 1987). The concept of Milroy (1980), in spite of being a socio-geographic entity, at least comprises specific types of interaction and can be defined through the roles of its members. As multilinguals in a country have social networks with specific types of interaction caused by code switching possibilities and innovations, it is nec-essary to include these aspects into the network concept. I have shown in earlier publications (Oksaar 1972, 1974) that it is not simply the position of an individual within the network that influences the use of his linguistic va-rieties, but it is his interactional competence in more than one language, the possibility to choose between various linguistic entities, that gives him a cer-tain position in his relationship to those with whom he communicates. In this relationship it is above all the linguistic status of the listener, the partner in the communicative act, that not only influences the choice of language in a spe-cific situation but also makes the speaker create new elements, according to the goals of speaking and the interactional competence of the listener.
eBook - PDFDiscovering Sociolinguistics
From Theory to Practice
- Dick Smakman(Author)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- Bloomsbury Academic(Publisher)
Our web of social relations is called our ‘social network’ (Granovetter 1973 ). It is a group of people that is predominantly interconnected through social con-tacts. With some people we have more frequent contact than with others, and the intensity and quality of interaction will also vary. Some networks start early in life and some start later, and this also affects the strength of the network. The individual speaker adjusts their speech to this direct social environment and is affected by it. The more intense and stable the network, the more an individual will adjust their speech to it. The most well-known early investigation into social networks was by Milroy and Milroy ( 1978 ). This investigation was on the speech in a Belfast (Northern Ireland) neighbourhood. They distinguished between dense and more loose networks and found that close-knit networks are where most vernacular speech CONCLUSION 65 is used. Networks in their investigation were mainly based on religious affilia-tion (Protestant or Catholic) and neighbourhood. But the effects of all kinds of network-related factors turned out to be as important as these two features; for instance, one’s family size, the frequency of visits to neighbours, weekly hobby activities, and degree of care for the weaker members in a network. To find out the effects on language of these factors, extensive interviews and a systematic scoring system for each of the network-related behaviours were used. Today, new types of networks are becoming more common. The Belfast study represents a very traditional network, which is constrained by geography and by socioeconomic sameness. Digital communities are nowadays equally common and their number and size are growing. People are often part of more networks than before because of this. Gaming communities and digital social network communities contain friends and acquaintances, and networks over-lap and interconnect to almost extreme degrees.
eBook - PDFUnderstanding Criminal Networks
A Research Guide
- Prof. Gisela Bichler(Author)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- University of California Press(Publisher)
26 3 . Social Network Theory 101 Most of us are already aware of the direct effect we have on our friends and family; our actions can make them happy or sad, healthy or sick, even rich or poor. But we rarely consider that everything we think, feel, do, or say can spread far beyond the people we know. Conversely, our friends and family serve as conduits for us to be influenced by hundreds or even thousands of other people. In a kind of social chain reaction, we can be deeply affected by events we do not witness that happen to people we do not know. . . . As part of a social network, we transcend ourselves, for good or ill, and become part of something much larger. We are connected. christakis and fowler, Connected Social networks generate the living fabric of a society. With each person embedded in a unique constellation of relations, investigating human behavior requires considering how direct and indirect influences—for example, the friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend—shape decision making, con-trol access to opportunities, and generate belief systems. As with all disci-plines, network explanations of social phenomena begin with a common set of assumptions on which theories are built. Chapter 3 provides a general understanding of discipline axioms and essential theories used in social net-work research. I selected the most commonly discussed ideas that have rel-evance for crime applications. My intention is to lay a foundation that read-ers can build on. A series of graphics illustrates concepts, and a list of “must reads” identifies reference books and articles written by notable social net-work analysis (SNA) scholars. assumptions of social network analysis SNA is an interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary field of study concerned with exploring the regularities and patterns of social relations and their effects, both immediate and distal, on behavior, perceptions, beliefs, and decisions (Christakis and Fowler 2009 ; Knoke and Yang 2008 ; Wasserman and Faust 1994 ).
eBook - PDF- Alison Sealey, Bob Carter(Authors)
- 2004(Publication Date)
- Continuum(Publisher)
1 key issues in social theory and applied linguistics Introduction In this chapter, we introduce some of the key terms and concepts we shall be employing in subsequent chapters to examine the relationship between language and society. Part 1 (which, as we have indicated, contains material likely to be more familiar to sociologists) considers the structure-agency debate, outlining the different ways in which the relationship between structure and agency has been explained; the key concept of emergence is also introduced. The question of the possi-bility of objectivity in knowing the social world is then discussed, before we sketch out the implications of a realist account of structure and agency for the study of language, to be developed in subsequent chapters. Part 2 (containing material which will be more familiar to applied linguists) provides an outline of the issues with which the discipline of linguistics is currently concerned, as a context for an interpretation of applied linguistics. Undertaking these summaries is an invidious task, since each of the topics sketched so briefly here is a large area of study in its own right, which means that the discussion will necessarily be simplified and very introductory. However, many of the issues raised are revisited at greater length in subsequent chapters. Part 1: Some key issues in social theory Structure and agency One of the major themes of sociological debate since the discipline was established in the late nineteenth century has been the relationship between human beings and the social context within which they seek to realize their intentions, aspirations, needs and desires. This social context, made up of political and legal relations, institutions, dis-tributions of wealth and income and so on, may frustrate or enable people's efforts to achieve what they want. The desire to go to makig contionsom
eBook - PDFCultural Anthropology
An Applied Perspective
- Gary Ferraro, Susan Andreatta(Authors)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- Cengage Learning EMEA(Publisher)
Sociolinguistics Anthropological linguistics has devoted much of its time and energy to the study of languages as logical systems of knowledge and communica-tion. Recently, however, linguists have taken a keen interest in how people actually speak to one another in any given society. Whereas other linguists tended to focus on uniform structures (morphology, phonology, and syntax), sociolin-guists concentrate on variations in language use depending on the social situation or context in which the speaker is operating. In much the same way that entire speech communities adapt their language to chang-ing situations, so do the individuals in those speech communities. Bilingualism and multilingualism are obvious examples of the situational use of language. A Hispanic junior high school student in Miami, for example, may speak English in the classroom and Spanish at home. But often people who are mono-lingual speak different forms of the same language depending on the social situation. To illustrate, the language that a college sophomore might use with a roommate is appreciably different from the language used when talking to grandparents; the expressions heard in a football locker room would hardly be appropriate to use in a job interview. In short, what is said and how it is said are often influenced by variables such as the age, sex, and relative social status of the people involved. The major focus of sociolinguistics is the relationships between language and social structure (see Figure 6.10). What can we tell about the social relationships between two people from the language they use with each other? Analyzing terms of address can be particularly useful in this regard. Professor Green, for example, could be addressed as Dr. Green, Ma’am, Professor, Ms. Green, Elizabeth, Darling, Doc, Prof, or Beth, depending on who is doing the addressing. One would not expect that her mother or husband would refer to her as Ma’am or that her students would call her Beth.
eBook - PDF- Marcel Danesi(Author)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- University of Toronto Press(Publisher)
While it is still too early to tell what the overall psychological and social impact of online networking will be, there is little doubt that networking sites will continue to expand for the simple reason that they make interpersonal communication rapid and efficient. They also provide virtual ‘hang-out spaces’ in which to indulge our ever-present urge for gregariousness. Mariana Bockarova Bibliography Boyd, Danah M., and Nicole Ellison. Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Schol-arship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Commu-nication 13 (2007). http://jcmc.indiana.edu/ vol13/issue1/boyd.ellison.html. Van Dijk, Jan. The Network Society . London: Sage, 1999. SOCIOLOGY OF THE MEDIA [See also: Anthropology of the Media; Digital Di-vide; Propaganda Theory ] Various contemporary studies and inves-tigations of the relation between the mass media and people’s attitudes and world views come under the general rubric of the sociology of the media . This term refers primarily to the main theories and methods used by sociologists rather than to the use of sociological theory, in itself, to analyse the mass media. Sociology is the study of the people and institutions that make up human society and how they interrelate. One of the most commonly used tools of sociologists is demographic analysis , which is a systematic, statistically based study of the size, make-up, and distribution of human groups. The analysis is based on collecting information such as people’s ages, birth and mortality rates, marriage rates, ethnic backgrounds, migration patterns, and the like. Demo-graphics now also include data on roles and status of individuals. Two common techniques for gathering such information are the survey and the interview . These are intended to measure people’s attitudes on various subjects.
Index pages curate the most relevant extracts from our library of academic textbooks. They’ve been created using an in-house natural language model (NLM), each adding context and meaning to key research topics.
