sociolinguistics – Page 3 – Educational Sociolinguistics

Online Teaching and Learning: Closer or Further?

Bingtong Liu

In the past few decades, the implementation of technology in language education has become a topic of growing interest. If there is one thing that almost all teachers have realized in the past six months of COVID 19, it is that they have to learn how to use technology better.

Van Herk points out that “A change in a social situation will lead to changes in the sociolinguistic situation” (2018, p. 5). During this special period, we build social networks with the world and other people through technology. In order to avoid close contact and protect people, teaching and learning are undertaken remotely and on digital platforms in many countries.

Just at that time, I took a summer courses and had the chance to learn and teach online. As an ESL learner, I found there were some changes in the online class compared with a traditional in-person class. This online learning form brought us plenty of new Internet words and it only made sense for people who had an online class with zoom. For example, instead of using “office hour”, we usually say we have a “zoom meeting”. Moreover, instead of saying “I have a class today”, we are more likely to say “I have a zoom today”. Obviously, “Zoom” has become synonymous with “class”. Without this online learning experiences, I might not understand what people are talking about or use these words in my own repertoire. In addition, I might not be aware of the changes in people’s language and use of words.

As an ESL teacher, my co-worker and I prepared our class together and tried to come up with many forms of interesting ice-breaker activities that could be used online in the virtual classroom. We also learned and explored some new functions of Zoom, like annotation, whiteboard, chatroom, breakout rooms. Under the circumstance, we tried to find more possibilities to build a good affective climate since we could not meet each other in the real classroom. One thing is very interesting that apart from text, our students liked to use the emoji and expressions in the chatroom to communicate with us and others, which was a quite vivid way to interact and express themselves. This illustrates that the current social situation has led to word variation, the use of emojis and expressions, and changes in teaching and learning. Undoubtedly, in this case, I have changed the way I socialize and communicate with people sub-consciously.

After the course, my co-worker said to me, “It was a little bit weird that we took the courses together and taught together, but we never met each other in person. Hhhhh 🙂 ”. But I truly felt that everyone hoped and tried to build a social connection with each other through all kinds of language during this period compared with the in-person class. Actually, language builds a bridge for communication between the real world and the virtual world and makes us closer!

I was wondering whether you think it could bring us closer or further. How can we further make a connection with each other through online courses?

Reference

Herk, G. V. (2018). What is sociolinguistics? Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell.

Welcome to the third (2020) edition of the Educational Sociolinguistics class blog!

I’m very happy to be the instructor for this course – giving me the opportunity to launch this third edition of the class blog. Thanks and a nod to Alison Crump, who envisioned and created this blog back in 2016, and Mela Sarkar who carried on the tradition in 2019. And thanks for your baton-passing post, Mela! Both Alison and Mela are contributing members of our BILD research community (Mela’s brainchild) which has its own blog and an online, peer edited journal (Alison is co-editor). I encourage you to visit the links to these sites for more interactive discussions about all things sociolinguistic. And if you haven’t already (it was assigned reading for our first class!), be sure to read Alison’s research article about blogging as pedagogy (a.k.a. this blog site).

As we are currently living through the Covid-19 pandemic, my sociolinguistic noticing often involves issues related to the current crisis. I want to share a youtube video with you that was sent around in our department at the end of March. At that time, our (Canadian) medical experts were not advising ‘masks for all’ – although masks were suggested or required in specific situations/locations such as on airplanes and in hospitals.

Since then, wearing masks in public has been mandated in Quebec and across the country.

This video impressed me for a number of reasons, apart from the very clear and compelling message, and I can spin some of these as sociolinguistic:

1. The register of this message. (Why did I find the delivery of this message so compelling and appropriate?)

2. The clarity of this message in English, by an ESL speaker. (Why do I think the speaker in the video learned English as a second/foreign/additional language?)

3. What type of speech act or event would you categorize this as?

We have only had one class together so far, but I already have an inkling of the rich language-related experiences that the class brings, and intellectual and creative thinking that this class is capable of. I look forward to being inspired by your blog postings over this term.

Findings during the trip in Toronto

Mengting Liu

I went to Toronto several days ago and I was so impressed by how modern and big Toronto is as an international metropolis (especially how wide and flat the road is). I was also shocked by how different it is compared to Montreal concerning not only the general vibes it gives, but also the language environment. If we say Montreal is a bilingual city where French and English are its official languages, Toronto can also be bilingual to some extent, especially in shopping malls, because Mandarin is EVERYWHERE! When I was walking on the street, I always thought, “Did I just took a 6 hour ride and got back to China?”

With a large amount of Chinese immigrants flooding in Toronto, the society exerts a profound influence on its language. There is no doubt that Chinese culture and language take an indispensable proportion in this multicultural and city. In Yorkdale shopping centre, it is not difficult to find signs written in Chinese. In the MAC cosmetic store, I saw a line of Chinese “魅可樱花全樱绽放系列” follows a line of English which said “MAC Boom Boom Bloom”. Every luxury store in the shopping centre is equipped with at least one shop assistant who is Chinese and provides Mandarin services. This phenomenon, to a large extent, can attribute to the enormous purchasing power of Chinese immigrants or travellers, among whom English may not be the language they are familiar with. I was told that in Vancouver which has more Chinese immigrants because of its more pleasant weather, Chinese people can totally live without using English.

I realize that the protection of French in Quebec is actually protecting the culture. Although I always feel struggled when learning French, I still find it is worthy to do, because it is an essential way to maintain the culture and the uniqueness of Montreal.

A Foray into Foreign Language Comedy

Chris

There’s a new show on Netflix called “Huge in France”, starring French comedian Gad Elmaleh. In the show, he plays a version of himself in which the premise has him moving from Paris to LA, to be closer to his son. The prolific funny man is immediately a fish out of water, as he is relegated to use a language he is more or less comfortable with. His English is good, as he can communicate what he wants, but when it comes to comedy, his character is simply unable to get any laughs. He tries his stuff at a local open mic night (inside a bowling alley), only to bomb miserably; this is from a guy who sells out stadiums in his native France. Afterwards he tells his friend, “I’m just not funny in English”. I wanted to contrast this scenario with a podcast I was listening to, which was promoting an upcoming Netflix special about a comedy gala featuring around 50 comedians from across the globe. The hosts of the podcast mentioned that many of the routines would be done in foreign languages, so people would have to read subtitles. This made me think about Gad, and his inability to be funny in English, yet these comedians had no problem being funny through subtitles. One of the comedians on the podcast said that the subtitles would obviously not capture everything about the performance because comedy is a subtle art, but that didn’t really matter because comedy was ultimately a written work and therefore should be funny on paper. He adds that “there are nuances and vocal inflexions that sometimes push a joke over but for the most part it should be funny on paper if it’s funny spoken.” So for the life of me, I couldn’t understand how Gad Elmaleh couldn’t be funny in English, at least not enough to make a few hillbillies at a bowling alley chuckle. I did a little research and found an article from the Language and Linguistic Compass journal (2009) which characterizes several semantic and pragmatic types of verbal humour. Going through it I realized that Gad’s comedy isn’t predicated at telling “jokes” (with a traditional build-up and punch line) but revolves around what the author calls “conversational humour” (Dynel, 2009). Gad tells stories, which Dynel calls “shaggy dog stories”, which are “lengthy stories without punchlines” (Dynel, 2009). These stories aren’t particularly funny, but hinge on the way Gad tells the story. He does so by weaving language into a rich tapestry and by doing a variety of exaggerated impersonations. In doing so, he also involves the crowd, and kind of feeds off them in what the author calls “spontaneous interactional humour” (Dynel, 2009). I would be very surprised if he ever told a story in his routine the same way twice. His mastery of the French language is very impressive and I can see how his routine cannot be replicated in English. Since his routine goes way beyond telling jokes to invoke humour, it is evident that he would need to be armed with a rich knowledge of the language.

References

Dynel, Marta (2009). Types of Conversational Humour. Language and Linguistics Compass, 3 (5), 1284-1299.

SOCIOLINGUISTICS MAKES MUSIC

Beatrice Cale

Two traits that all humans share, no matter where on earth they live, are language and music. We are all equals in that regard and it can be stated, as a matter of fact, that music is universal.

By learning a folk tune from the most remote corner of the world and singing the words and music, you are given access into that world, a world you may never have known otherwise.

Today, orbiting 10 billion miles from earth, the Voyager space probe contains a most precious cargo hurtling through the universe, a 90-minute mixtape of music from every part of the globe. It includes such music as Mozart, Peruvian panpipes, Bulgarian chants and Indian raga vocals, amongst many other recordings. If extraterrestrials want to get to know us earthlings, it will be through our music.

How to translate the untranslatable thing

By Yunjie

I remember, last week, as we were doing the class activity on Style & Interaction, one thing impressed me—when Dr. Kerekes asked Yuri to translate “お疲れ様でした” into English, Yuri said there isn’t any appropriate English equivalent for it.

The interesting thing is, there is an almost correct Chinese equivalent for it—“你(Ni)辛(Xin)苦(Ku)了(Le)”, and I am faced with the same situation with Yuri— until now, I still don’t know how to translate this phrase into English accurately. Someone says it could be translated simply into “Thank you so much”, but it is not just an expression of gratitude. It is more versatile and adaptive linguistically and could be used in more complicated situations. You could say “你辛苦了” to your parents who support the family for a long time, to your teacher who gives an excellent three-hour class, to your classmate who has just finished a great presentation, or to your colleague who worked overtime yesterday. It is more like an acknowledgment of someone’s hard work or efforts, showing that you are empathizing with that person. Therefore, someone suggests it could be translated into “I appreciate what you have done ”, but it would be too formal and serious, not suitable for daily communication. Imagine your friend helped you buy something from the supermarket, would you say “I appreciate what you have done” to that person?

My round, red face.

Chris

Sometimes I wish I was a trim, proper looking chap from the European continent, who could be a native speaker of any number of languages. The type where people paused and wondered, “I wonder what language he speaks ? Could it be French, German, Portuguese ? Could it be Dutch ?” I wish there was something ambiguous about my appearance that didn’t shout my native language from a mountain top. However, I’m a burly, ginger bearded man (the unfortunate genetic makeup of someone from Northern England), whose round, red face screams SPEAK TO ME IN ENGLISH. Since the majority of native English speakers don’t speak a second language, it’s fair to look at me and think I don’t either. Except that I do. I grew up speaking French, and I’ve spent years learning Spanish.

Mama + Louisiana

Max Jack-Monroe

Preparing to co-facilitate a group discussion on the connection between ethnicity and language brought up a lot for me. The readings helped me to think about how I situate myself in terms of ethnicity and language and how these intersecting forces have impacted my life.

I begin with my family history, specifically on my mother’s side. My mother was perhaps the first person in centuries on either side of her family to be born outside of the state of Louisiana (my grandfather’s side was from New Orleans proper and my grandmother’s side from the neighboring countryside). Before my mother’s birth, my maternal grandparents had moved to Nashville, Tennessee so my grandfather (Pop-Pop) could complete his medical residency at Meharry Medical College. A couple of years after my mother was born in Nashville, the family moved to a place, coincidentally, not too far from Montreal–Buffalo, New York. By the time the family made their way to Harford County, Maryland both of my aunts had been born. My grandmother (Meman) still lives in that house, which, despite going through many changes, still seems, in many ways, untouched by time.

**My brothers, grandparents, and I. Summer 2010**

Do Canadians Close Their Mouths More While Speaking Because It’s Cold?

Brian

You have no idea how many hours I have spent in the classroom teaching, listening to, and analyzing American English pronunciation. Actually, I have no idea either. We would go over all of the sounds, especially vowels, figuring out the differences between bat, bet, and bit, and between bot and but.

As I corrected my students’ pronunciation, and attempted to model it myself, I started to realize something: while my students were repeating the sounds accurately, it didn’t sound natural. But it was me that didn’t sound like the recording. In order to teach the lessons, I had to speak differently, which meant moving my jaw and opening my mouth more than I was used to.

Paris is Burning, Polari, Drag Race, and the Decades-Long Journey for Queer Slang to Go Mainstream

Brian–Blog post #2

I first saw Paris is Burning a few weeks after 9/11, and the film had a tragic air to it. Though it had been released just eleven years earlier, in 1990, it seemed like a relic from a different era, right from the opening shot of the Twin Towers. The majority of the people who had participated in the documentary, primarily black and Latinx, were already dead then: the first before the film was even completed, murdered and abandoned beneath a dingy hotel bed, and the rest from AIDS-related illnesses. But it also seemed culturally irrelevant as flag-waving, the Patriot Act, and the War on Terror swept the US. It was exactly at this time, in fact, that the most famous drag queen, RuPaul, who I had seen in a recurring role on The Tonight Show, began a two-year sabbatical, knowing that there was little opportunity during such a conservative period.