Regional patterns influence the way all Americans speak.
Some dialects, like that of Midwestern Americans, have few stigmatized
linguistic variants.
Language
Language is our primary means of communication.
Language (like culture in general) is transmitted through learning,
as part of enculturation.
Language is based on arbitrary, learned associations between
words and the things they stand for.
Only humans have the linguistic capacity to discuss the past
and future, share their experiences with others, and benefit from
their experiences.
Anthropologists study language in its social and cultural context.
Nonverbal Communication
Kinesics is the study of communication through body movements, stances,
gestures, and facial expressions.
Although our gestures, facial expressions, and body stance have roots
in our primate heritage, and can be seen in the monkeys and the apes,
they have not escaped the influence of culture.
The prevalence and meaning of body movements, facial expressions,
and gestures vary cross-culturally.
Body movements communicate social differences.
Language, which is highly symbolic, is the domain of communication
in which culture plays the strongest role.
The Structure of Language
The scientific study of a spoken language (descriptive linguistics)
involves several interrelated areas of analysis: phonology, morphology,
lexicon, and syntax.
Phonology, the study of speech sounds, considers which sounds
are present and significant in a given language.
Morphology studies the forms in which sounds combine to form
morphemes—words and their meaningful parts.
A language's lexicon is a dictionary containing all of its morphemes
and their meanings.
Syntax refers to the arrangement and order of words in phrases
and sentences.
Speech Sounds
A phoneme is a sound contrast that makes a difference, that differentiates
meaning.
The number of phonemes varies from language to language, as well
as between dialects of a given language.
Phonetics is the study of speech sounds in general, what people
actually say in various languages.
Phonemics studies only the significant sound contrasts (phonemes)
of a given language.
Language, Thought, and Culture
Chomsky argues that the human brain contains a limited set of rules
(universal grammar) for organizing language, so that all languages have
a common structural basis.
Chomsky's argument that all humans have similar linguistic abilities
and thought processes is supported by the facts that people can learn
foreign languages and that words and ideas translate from one language
to another.
The fact that all creole languages share certain features further
supports the idea that these languages are based on universal grammar.
The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
Sapir and Whorf argued that the grammatical categories of particular
languages lead their speakers to think about things in different ways.
Language may shape thought, but it does not tightly restrict
it, because cultural changes can produce changes in thought and in
language.
Focal Vocabulary
Lexicon (or vocabulary) influences perception.
Focal vocabulary are specialized sets of terms and distinctions
that are particularly important to certain groups (those with particular
foci of experience or activity).
Vocabulary is the area of language that changes most readily.
While language, culture, and thought are interrelated, it might
be more accurate to argue (contrary to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis)
that changes in culture produce changes in language and thought than
to argue the reverse.
Cultural contrasts and changes affect lexical distinctions (e.g.,
peach versus salmon) within semantic domains (e.g., color terminology).
Semantics refers to a language's meaning system.
The ways in which people divide up the world—the lexical
contrasts they perceive as meaningful or significant—reflect
their experiences.
Sociolinguistics
Sociolinguistics investigates relationships between social and linguistic
variation.
Linguistic Diversity within Nations
Ethnic diversity in nation-states, including the United States,
is mirrored by linguistic diversity.
All people style shift—that is, they vary their speech
in different social contexts.
Regular shifting between dialects (e.g., "high" and "low" variants
of a language) is known as diglossia.
Different dialects are equally effective as systems of communication.
Thinking of particular dialects as cruder or more sophisticated
than others is a social rather than a linguistic judgment.
People rank certain speech patterns as better or worse because
they are associated with groups that are also socially ranked.
Gender Speech Contrasts
Men and women tend to differ in the phonology, grammar, and vocabulary
they use, as well as in the body stances and movements that accompany
their speech.
American women's use of certain types of words and expressions
has been associated with their traditional lesser power in society.
According to Tannen, women typically use language and associated
body movements to build rapport, social connections with others.
In contrast, men tend to make reports, reciting information that
serves to establish a place for themselves in a hierarchy, as they
also attempt to determine the relative ranks of their conversation
mates.
Stratification and Symbolic Domination
People use and evaluate speech in the context of social, political,
and economic forces.
The speech of low-status groups may be evaluated negatively (e.g.,
labeled as "uneducated speech") not because it is bad in itself but
because it has come to symbolize low status.
Because speech habits help determine access to employment and
other material resources, "proper language" itself becomes a strategic
resource—and a path to wealth, prestige, and power.
According to Bourdieu, linguistic practices are a kind of "symbolic
capital" which properly trained people may convert into economic and
social capital.
As a result of what Bourdieu calls "symbolic domination," even
people who do not use a prestigious dialect come to accept its authority
and correctness.
Black English Vernacular (BEV), a.k.a. Ebonics
Stigmatized speech may be linked to region, class, educational
background, gender, ethnicity, or "race."
Most linguists view BEV as a dialect of American English rather
than a separate language.
BEV is a complex linguistic system with its own phonology and
syntax, similar in some ways to those of southern dialects.
Although linguists disagree about the origin of BEV, it may stem
from an early creole (resulting from the fusion of English and African
languages).
There are clear phonological and grammatical differences between
ebonics and Standard English (SE).
SE is not superior to BEV as a linguistic system, but it is the
prestige dialect—the one used in the mass media, in writing,
and in most public and professional contexts—and therefore has
the most "symbolic capital."
Historical Linguistics
Historical linguistics studies long-term linguistic change.
Historical linguists can reconstruct many features of past languages
by studying contemporary daughter languages—languages that descend
from the same parent language (protolanguage) and that have been changing
separately for hundreds or even thousands of years.
Historical linguists classify languages according to their degree
of relationship.
Subgroups are languages within a taxonomy of related languages
that are most closely related.
A close relationship between languages does not necessarily mean
that their speakers are closely related biologically or culturally, because
people can adopt new languages.
Anthropologists are interested in historical linguistics because
cultural features sometimes correlate with the distribution of language
families.
Box: Using Modern Technology to Preserve Linguistic and Cultural Diversity
Half of the world's 6,000 languages are endangered.
A number of anthropologists are teaching native speakers of endangered
languages to use computers so they can write books in their own languages.
