Although the phenomenon of Dialect Levelling does not centre its attention on people we can say that it is correlated to the phenomenon of accommodation theory. Dialect Levelling occurs when the differences between regional varieties of two languages over time are reduced. This causes the disappearance of distinctive features while new features that emerge are adopted by speakers over the regional area. So this phenomenon focuses mainly on the variation between two languages of specific areas. The accommodation theory has as its main subject speakers and the reason why these naturally converge (changing of speech) towards the people that are listening.
To understand the relationship between Dialect Levelling and Accommodation theory we …show more content…
This was initially used in the London and Glasgow areas but nowadays it is used in most of Britain. Also, the TH-fronting where the /Ɵ/ and /ð/ sounds are substituted by the /f/ and /v/ sounds. In the last couple of decades this type of change has spread throughout all of the UK and while it used to be considered unusual it is now one of the most common pronunciation errors {Smith, A. Dialects and Levelling, Slide 17-19}.
An example of a language that was born from the phenomenon of Dialect Levelling is “Estuary English” this is a levelled dialect in the areas around London. As John Wells, a British linguist, says it can also be called “London English” because it is an intermediate between RP or Standard English and Cockney characteristics.
This levelling was caused by the adapting of the working class to a way of speaking with more RP features and the middle class lowering their speech to the more ‘ordinary language’. Although the social classes changed their speech habits for different specific reasons (lower class to expand their social connections while upper class to avoid sounding too educated and ‘posh’), they both adapted to reduce the gap between the different groups within the country and creating a stronger …show more content…
This theory tries to explain why speakers naturally converge their speech styles towards their listeners. By nature we have always been more attracted to people who are more similar to us, so we try and make ourselves similar to whom we want to interact with.
There are also cultural differences involved in this phenomenon, so for example, in mixed-sex conversations, both sexes tend to use less gender-specific features and try to find a common ground. In the UK though it is men that tend to accommodate women, while in the USA it is the opposite so it is women who move more towards the male gender features.
There are two principals by which speech is modified {Holmes,Janet; p261-264}:
- Convergence: When people shift to be more like their listener. This can either be ‘upward’ so elevating language or ‘downward’ so making our language easier to understand. There are both benefits and costs of this principle, because whilst on one side differences are reduced therefore we increase the efficiency of our conversation, on the other side we lose identity and
To understand the relationship between Dialect Levelling and Accommodation theory we …show more content…
This was initially used in the London and Glasgow areas but nowadays it is used in most of Britain. Also, the TH-fronting where the /Ɵ/ and /ð/ sounds are substituted by the /f/ and /v/ sounds. In the last couple of decades this type of change has spread throughout all of the UK and while it used to be considered unusual it is now one of the most common pronunciation errors {Smith, A. Dialects and Levelling, Slide 17-19}.
An example of a language that was born from the phenomenon of Dialect Levelling is “Estuary English” this is a levelled dialect in the areas around London. As John Wells, a British linguist, says it can also be called “London English” because it is an intermediate between RP or Standard English and Cockney characteristics.
This levelling was caused by the adapting of the working class to a way of speaking with more RP features and the middle class lowering their speech to the more ‘ordinary language’. Although the social classes changed their speech habits for different specific reasons (lower class to expand their social connections while upper class to avoid sounding too educated and ‘posh’), they both adapted to reduce the gap between the different groups within the country and creating a stronger …show more content…
This theory tries to explain why speakers naturally converge their speech styles towards their listeners. By nature we have always been more attracted to people who are more similar to us, so we try and make ourselves similar to whom we want to interact with.
There are also cultural differences involved in this phenomenon, so for example, in mixed-sex conversations, both sexes tend to use less gender-specific features and try to find a common ground. In the UK though it is men that tend to accommodate women, while in the USA it is the opposite so it is women who move more towards the male gender features.
There are two principals by which speech is modified {Holmes,Janet; p261-264}:
- Convergence: When people shift to be more like their listener. This can either be ‘upward’ so elevating language or ‘downward’ so making our language easier to understand. There are both benefits and costs of this principle, because whilst on one side differences are reduced therefore we increase the efficiency of our conversation, on the other side we lose identity and