Language change revision notes

Influences on language change :

Youth culture
mobile communications
newspapers
other languages
television and radio
the internet

Youth culture 1950s

The jazz era of the 50s introduced many familiar slang terms such as ‘cats', ‘chick' and ‘rock 'n' roll' which originally denoted sex. ‘Cool' - denoting ‘good' - is still widely used as a colloquialism today and ‘hot' extends to mean very popular or successful. Many youth slang terms go back further: the American slang term ‘dude' dates back to the 1880s, denoting a smart, fancifully dressed man.

Youth culture 1960s

The ‘Peace and Love' era of the 60s spawned a new youth slang lexicon: the establishment was ‘square' and ‘hippies' ‘turned on, tuned in and dropped out'.

Youth culture today

Youth subcultures develop specialised neologisms. Click Play to hear a clip from ‘Hold the sanity' by Brighton rap band Nonconformists. Try to pick out the following examples of rap slang. ‘Spitting' is rapping. ‘Blessin' is using your skill to good effect. ‘Dropping' refers to how a DJ might "drop a tune" etc. ‘Fat' - as in "Noncons' fat" - just means good/top-quality, etc. (sometimes written "Phat!").

Mobile phone texting

What does YDntUCL mean? Mobile phones are influencing language change. Approximately one billion text messages a month are sent in the UK and with them a ‘mutant' form of English has evolved. Abbreviations are characterised by shortened words where vowels are frequently omitted or substituted for numbers and capitals. You've probably guessed that ‘YDntUCL' is an abbreviation of 'Why didn't you call?'

A text essay

In Scotland much controversy arose in 2003 when a 13 year old girl submitted an exam essay written in abbreviations. The opening read: "My smmr hols wr CWOT. B4, we usd 2go2 NY 2C my bro..." The girl explained she found it "easier than Standard English". Concern was raised by the Scottish Qualifications Authority that users can't differentiate when this kind of usage is appropriate and when it isn't.

Newspaper devices

The language of newspapers influences change. The press is a commercial concern, so many tabloids package news as ‘product' using persuasive techniques borrowed from advertising to entertain and ‘sell' their information through the use of rhetoric. This has led to the development of journalese: puns, clichés, alliteration, emotive language and rhymes are used in headlines for maximum impact.

 Newspaper bias

The 2003 Gulf War, saw references to ‘Chemical Ali' and ‘Comical Ali'. The name ‘Chemical Ali', was earned by an Iraqi leader after his authorisation of chemical warfare. He was dubbed ‘Comical Ali' after his seeming repeated denial of events taking place. This demonstrates the power of language in media use to shape our versions of reality.

Telephone – non-verbal mannerisms

The invention of the telephone has revolutionised verbal communication. Traditional telephone calls lack a visual channel, so facial expressions and eye contact are absent. However, try watching someone make a phone call - most conversations are accompanied by lots of facial expressions, gestures and mannerisms!

Telephone – verbal characteristics

There is greater emphasis on non-verbal features such as prosody - how we emphasise our words, and vary our pitch, stress, intonation and volume. People often develop a ‘telephone voice' marked by an elevated register to signal politeness and social prestige and non-fluency features such as pauses, fillers and stammers sometimes develop when leaving answer phone messages! Click Play to listen to Jill's message.

TV and radio varieties

Television has had a huge influence on contemporary change, exposing people throughout the world to many varieties of English including American and Australian. In 50s Britain, the RP and standard lexis and grammar of ‘BBC English' helped establish a variety associated with prestige and learning though, increasingly, more regional accents are featured.

TV, glottal stops and upspeak

Upspeak, a 'trendy' accent found in youth culture, is characterised by rising intonation. It seems to have spread through the influence of Australian soaps and Californian ‘Valley Girl' speak. Estuary English, a slightly elevated form of cockney, contains the glottal stop. It has spread partly due to soaps like ‘Eastenders'. Click Play to listen to Kat and Alfie in Eastenders. (Listen out for Kat's glottal stop when she says the word ‘matter'.)

The Internet

The Internet could be described as ‘interactive billion-channel TV' allowing people across the globe to communicate instantaneously. There is no editorial control or censorship, so anyone can create a personal webpage, reflecting their individual language style. News Groups, Message Boards and Chat Rooms have allowed the spread of American English (e.g. ‘theater'), specialised slang and jargon across the world.

Email

In most social contexts, email is a mixed mode, blending the spontaneity and fragmentation of speech with the premeditation and planning of writing. Informal email is often characterised by deviant spellings (kewl), acronyms (RAM), abbreviations (BRB, be right back) and smileys or emoticons :o).

David Crystal has argued (1997):
"A world of unchanging linguistic excellence... exists only in fantasy."

Research by Dr Berenice Mahoney in 1997 has revealed that you are twice as likely to be found guilty of a crime if you speak in a broad Birmingham accent

Trudgill (1983): "Different varieties of the same language are objectively as pleasant as each other but are perceived positively or negatively because of particular cultural pressures... Standard and prestige accents acquire their high status directly from the high-status groups that happen to speak them..."