‘Oh gurl, you Sassy’

‘Slay’, ‘yaas kween’, ‘squad’ – if you’re a keen social media, you might be familiar with some of these words. Originally from African American Vernacular English (AAVE) – a variety of English spoken by some Black Americans – these terms have quickly become part of the internet grammar. But, how and why have these terms entered our lexicon and what does the use of AAVE in internet communication mean? This and other questions are examined by Christian Ilbury in his recent paper.

Recent sociolinguistic work has often used social media data to examine patterns of written variation – such as whether you spell the word working as <working> or <workin> - in relation to the distribution of the spoken language feature. An example of this is Grieve’s recent paper which we discuss in detail in a previous post. In that paper he uses social media data to explore lexical (i.e., words) variation across different areas of the UK. This work demonstrates the enormous potential of using social media data to explore general patterns of accent variation. However, whilst these approaches appear promising, Ilbury suggests that these analyses often miss a fundamental quality of online interaction: That users often use elements of language that are not part of their own speech for certain purposes, such as to adopt a different identity or signal that the message is humorous.

To investigate this issue, Ilbury turns to tweets from gay men in the UK to examine the ways in which this community use elements of African American Vernacular English. He argues that the gay community in the UK are well suited to examining this phenomenon because aspects of AAVE feature prominently in mainstream gay culture and form much of contemporary gay slang. For instance, drag queens in the UK frequently use aspects of AAVE such as copula absence as in ‘she going’ for ‘she is going’ or the use of completive done as in ‘she done used all the good ones’ in their performance. Turning to Twitter, he extracted 15,804 tweets from the timelines of 10 self-identifying gay men who reside in the UK and trawled through their tweets to identify features that are typically associated with AAVE.

His analysis shows that several features characteristic of AAVE are widespread in the gay men’s tweets. This includes lexical features, including words such as ‘slay’, ‘yaas’, and ‘y’all’; the representation of sound features such as ‘dat’ for ‘that’, ‘ma’ for ‘my, as well as several grammatical features such as copula absence in ‘you nasty’ for ‘you are nasty’ and demonstrative them as in ‘working them boots’.

He argues that the appearance of these features can’t be accounted for by the men trying to represent their own dialect since they are likely to speak a variety of British English that is very different to AAVE. This is in contrast to Grieve’s analysis where the users appear to be representing aspects of their own dialect. This suggests that the men in Ilbury’s study are not attempting to represent their own voices but are rather using elements of AAVE to adopt or perform an altogether different identity.

To investigate what this identity may be, Ilbury looks to popular memes to see how African Americans and AAVE are represented in digital contexts. This includes exploring two memes that reference aspects of AAVE. The first refers to Kimberly ‘Sweet Brown’ Wilkins and the second is entitled the ‘strong independent Black woman who don't need no man’.

'I am a strong independent Black woman who don't need no man' meme (L) &
Kimberly 'Sweet Brown' Wilkins 'Ain't nobody got time for that meme' (R)

He argues that these memes feed into ideological and stereotypical representations of African American women as ‘sassy’. However, this imagery is not new. African American women have frequently been depicted as ‘fierce’ or ‘sassy’, even in very old media representations of this community. These representations are obviously very problematic since they are based on racialised and essentialised ideas about the personal qualities of African American women.

Returning to the Twitter data, Ilbury argues that these representations are helpful in explaining why the men are using features of AAVE. He suggests that it is exactly that this ‘sassy’ meaning that the men are ‘activating’ by using components of AAVE. In other words, the men appropriate aspects of AAVE to perform an identity that is non-local and to evoke the essentialised associations of that style to present themselves as ‘sassy’ – a quality that has become appreciated in mainstream UK gay culture. He argues that they are not attempting to present themselves as ‘Black women’ but are rather using features of AAVE to appropriate the associations of that variety and perform a gay identity that he refers to as the ‘Sassy Queen’ – where ‘Queen’ is a gay slang term that refers to an effeminate gay man.

Such types of language play, Ilbury argues, are particularly useful in contexts where there is some threat that the user may be read as rude or direct, such as disagreements. In these contexts, the use of this style allows the user to avoid the negative outcomes of the disagreement because the receiver is aware that the user is performing a style that is inauthentic. 

So, whilst social media can tell us a lot about dialectal variation (e.g., Grieve – previous post), it is important to acknowledge that some users will appropriate aspects of other linguistic varieties to perform other identities and utilise the meanings associated with that variety. What users do with that style depends on how it is used in interactions and may differ from community to community.

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Ilbury, Christian (Online First/2019) “Sassy Queens”: Stylistic orthographic variation in Twitter and the enregisterment of AAVE. Journal of Sociolinguistics.

This summary was written by Christian Ilbury

https://doi.org/10.1111/josl.12366

Authenticity in the Hood

Whether it’s in friends, designer handbags, or website security, one quality people always want is authenticity. Their fake counterparts are shoddy at best and damaging at worst, whether that be for your emotional health, your belongings, or the contents of your bank account.

The music is real, even if the wool on the collar is not.

In a recent paper, Pia Pichler and Nathanael Williams look specifically at the way identity is authenticated by four young men from South London. Nathanael was one of these four men, and he recorded over five hours of conversation between him and the three others. The conversation covered a range of topics, including class, race, language, fatherhood, and the US; however, the focus of this research specifically covered their discussion of hip-hop.

In order to investigate the links between identity and authenticity, Pichler and Williams draw on Silverstein’s “cultural concepts”, which describe people’s use of linguistic elements that do not have a straightforward interpretation. In order to access the meaning of those elements, you need to be part of a shared cultural sphere with the person who is using them. One example they give is that of a wine connoisseur, who uses certain terms to describe wine which might otherwise mean something different. Using these terms to convey these cultural meanings is therefore a way to indicate your affiliation with that sphere, and make it a part of your identity.

In the conversation that Nathaniel analysed, the four men frequently positioned authentic aspects of hip-hop culture against inauthentic intruders. One example is during a discussion of World Star Hip Hop, a website which features regular content about the genre, from both contributors and users. One of the men, Les, was complaining about some girls fighting on the website, specifically referring to them as “white girls from The Hills”. “The Hills” was a series that focused on the lives of white, upper-middle class women in Los Angeles; by referencing them, Les positions them against the working class and non-white culture of the website. The men also reference cultural concepts within the UK to position things. For example, Les also complains about white kids from Oxford or Cambridge proffering extended opinions on hip-hop. Given the reputation of Oxford and Cambridge as wealthy university towns, this indexes the white person he is complaining about to a middle-class background that is at odds with his supposed knowledge about a predominantly black and working-class genre. This therefore renders the person and their opinions on the best hip-hop artists as inauthentic.

Pichler and Williams also note linguistic features used by the men that are just as important to the construction of their identities. For example, when discussing his brother’s membership in a South London gang, Les says dey and dem as opposed to they and them – a feature known as DH-stopping. He also uses yout and bruv; while the use of such lexical items is not specific to the Englishes typically spoken in hip-hop, they still index an authentic background, as they are features of MLE, or Multicultural London English. As a dialect usually spoken by working class people, often of colour, in inner-city London, it is not at odds with hip-hop culture, which often draws on local dialects.

These are just some of the ways in which the participants authenticated themselves. Now consider the conversations that you have – how do you position things against one another, and what features do you use if and when you do so? You may be doing the exact same thing.

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Pichler, P., & Williams, N. (2016). Hipsters in the hood: Authenticating indexicalities in young men's hip-hop talk. Language in Society 45(4): 557-581.

This summary was written by Marina Merryweather

The truth about grammar books: do they actually influence language use?

Everyone is familiar with prescriptive grammars – books containing ‘the rules of correct language use’. But have you ever wondered whether these volumes have any actual impact on the way we speak and write? Lieselotte Anderwald was determined to find out.

As an object of study she chose the progressive passive construction (for example, the summary is being read). This emerged as an innovative form in the late 18th century and then spread over the course of the 19^th century. Previous research on this construction found considerable differences in use in the 19^th century between American and British English. Indeed, corpus studies showed that Americans were somewhat reluctant to use this form, compared to the British.

Anderwald hypothesized that perhaps this is because the progressive passive was treated differently by American prescriptivists. To test her idea she compiled a collection of 260 19^th century grammar books from Britain and the USA. At first, like any incoming form, the progressive passive was frowned on by both British and American grammarians. In both countries it was judged as ‘ugly’ and ‘not pure’. However, attitudes to this construction gradually changed, and after 1870 British grammar books simply described it, without criticizing it. In America, in contrast, criticism was harsher and lasted longer – until almost the beginning of the 20^th century – so it seemed that Americans were really discouraged from using the form.

Next, Anderwald checked the Corpus of Historical American English (COHA) – a language database containing 400 million words from both the 19^th and the 20^th centuries. She was surprised to find that the progressive passive was used with pretty much the same frequency in the USA as in Britain! The reason why previous studies had found a difference between the USA and Britain was that they had mostly analysed private letters. The progressive passive was strongly preferred in fiction texts, which were better represented in COHA. So the differences in use were not so much between the national varieties, but rather between different types of texts. Passive constructions were particularly popular in newspapers, magazines and academic writing.

Poring over the frequency graphs, Anderwald spotted another peculiarity: after 1940, use of the progressive passive in American English has been declining, especially in the press, whereas in Britain the construction has been spreading. This was surprising, given that prescriptive grammars in the 20^th century are thought to be much less influential than they were in the 19^th century.

Anderwald’s explanation is elegant and simple. In 1959 “Elements of style”, a little pamphlet by Strunk &White, was published. Not only was it extremely popular among different groups of Americans, but it also contained an unequivocal tip “avoid the passive”, which included the progressive passive. The chances are that newspaper editors, who must have come across this popular pamphlet, followed its advice and simply wiped out any instances of the passive. This would explain its decline in frequency in newspapers after 1940.

To sum up, this study showed two things. Firstly, that differences between text types were greater than differences between national varieties of English. Secondly, in the 20^th century the influence of a single guide to good usage in America seems to have outdone the efforts of numerous 19^th  century grammars.

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Anderwald, Lieselotte (2014) Measuring the success of prescritptivism: quantitative grammaticography, corpus linguistics and the progressive passive. English Language and Linguistics 18 (1): 1-21.

doi. 10.1017/S1360674313000257

This summary was written by Maryna Myntsykovska

‘Have a global day!’

Is the world becoming more or less polite?

As the global population grows, our world has somehow seemed to shrink.  Walk down the main streets of London, Paris, New York or Tokyo and you will see many of the same brand names –MacDonalds and Starbucks immediately spring to mind.  This process of ‘globalisation’ refers to the way in which the world is becoming more uniform or ‘homogenised’.  This has been attributed to the influence of American culture and one aspect which is of interest to linguists is the expression of politeness and impoliteness.  This has been explored in some service industries in Britain where typically American expressions like Hi, how are you? and Have a nice day! and customers’ first names are being more widely used.   Such innovations are often disliked as they seem counter to our traditional British reserve and are often thought to be impolite.

Maria Sifianou explores this issue in great detail in a recent paper, arguing that globalisation cannot be seen simply in terms of homogenisation, especially with regard to the issue of politeness and impoliteness. Having carried out her own investigations in the Greek and English contexts, she makes some interesting observations:

• ·       The emphasis that American culture puts on a casual approach to business interactions is perceived as impolite in some societies where politeness has traditionally been associated with formality.  American English is therefore blamed for introducing impoliteness.  However, could it be that culture itself is changing in such places?  For example, in Britain there has been a cultural shift towards emotional expression and openness and a rise in the popularity of psychology. Maybe this is just being reflected in our more informal language use?

• ·       The supposed influence of globalisation may really be dependent on context.  For example, recently Greek politicians have been adopting less formal and more personalised speaking styles, attributed by some to globalisation.  However, it could be that they are actually trying to distract their audience’s attention from sensitive political issues by ‘casualising’ their speech.

• ·       Sifianou feels that cultural context is especially important.  She notes how, unlike in Britain and the US, it would be unthinkable for a Greek student to use informal language or to address University lecturers by their first names.  In Greece there is a deep seated culture of formality which not only indicates politeness, respect and distance but is also a sign of refinement and good education.  Formal language use indicates authority, expert knowledge and seriousness, so that Greek weather forecasts are highly formalised affairs unlike their English equivalents which tend to use informal expressions like ‘It’s somewhat of a mixed bag weatherwise.’ So it seems that in Greek politeness strategies may not be following American English’s lead of becoming more informal.

• ·       Multinational companies like Boots, MacDonalds and IKEA have their own training programmes that literally teach their employees what to say to their customers, so that interactions are scripted.  Many believe that these linguistic norms are then spread across the world as the company grows and ‘travels’.  However, Sifianou disputes whether this is really a true threat to local politeness practices.  For example, employees of IKEA in Sweden are instructed to address customers with the informal form of ‘you’, du, and with employees worldwide receiving such prescriptive training we would expect this usage to transfer to other contexts.  However, in Greece this has not happened.  In fact Sifianou says that it would actually be ‘unthinkable’ and impolite for an employee to address a customer with the informal ‘you’.  So language use is still culture bound, even under the influence of globalisation. 

• ·       Sifianou sees globalisation as a ‘process’ which is just one element affecting language change.  She feels it has been misrepresented as a threat to local languages as linguistic change has taken place throughout history.  She argues that linguistic changes being witnessed currently in communities across the world should be examined within their own socio-historical context.  Just as in the case of the Greek politicians trying to steer attention away from politics, what may at first appear to reflect the influence of globalisation may on closer inspection reveal a very different story.

So I hope, dear reader, that you may graciously agree with me when I say that globalisation is just one factor at work with regard to how polite or impolite we are becoming.

Have a nice day! 

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Sifianou, Maria (2013) The impact of globalisation on politeness and impoliteness. Journal of Pragmatics 55: 86—102

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2013.05.016

      This summary was written by Gemma Stoyle

For  a suggested English A level language investigation related to this topic 

click here