27.3402, Review: Discipline of Ling; Socioling: Tagliamonte (2015)

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Subject: 27.3402, Review: Discipline of Ling; Socioling: Tagliamonte (2015)

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Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2016 12:39:12
From: William Cotter [williamcotter at email.arizona.edu]
Subject: Making Waves

 
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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/26/26-5363.html

AUTHOR: Sali A Tagliamonte
TITLE: Making Waves
SUBTITLE: The Story of Variationist Sociolinguistics
PUBLISHER: Wiley-Blackwell
YEAR: 2015

REVIEWER: William M Cotter, University of Arizona

Reviews Editor: Helen Aristar-Dry

SUMMARY

In “Making Waves: The story of variationist sociolinguistics”, Tagliamonte
sets out to tell the story of sociolinguistics from its inception roughly
fifty years ago.  To get the story of the discipline from the major scholars
of the field, Tagliamonte employs the very methodology that practitioners of
sociolinguistics have used for five decades. The book is the outcome of over
150 hours of audio recordings conducted between 2012-2014 by the author with
43 key figures in the discipline. Beyond tracing the trajectory and
development of the field, Tagliamonte notes that what comes out of these
interviews are the researchers’ personal philosophies and outlooks. 

Chapter One represents the beginning of the story, with William Labov, the
founder of the discipline. The chapter traces Labov’s transition from the
world of industrial chemistry to his graduate program at Columbia University,
the result of his fascination with the way that people spoke when he would
meet with clients. The chapter then goes on to discuss Labov’s pioneering work
in Martha’s Vineyard (1963) and New York City (1966). Although Labov’s story
opens the chapter, it quickly transitions to discuss Bob Le Page’s influence
in developing sociolinguistics in the United Kingdom, crucial meetings of the
Linguistic Society of America in the 1960s, the Center for Applied Linguistics
in Washington D.C., and soon-to-be leading figures in the field such as
Gillian Sankoff, Roger Shuy, Peter Trudgill, Ralph Fasold, Henrietta
Cedergren, and Lesley & James Milroy. The chapter concludes with mention of
the very first NWAV meeting, and the development of the Montreal French
Project in the 1970s. 

After the stage is set for the initial development of the discipline, Chapter
Two sketches how scholars who were not part of the initial core group of
researchers found their way to sociolinguistics. The list of voices that
emerge in this chapter is long, but Tagliamonte intricately weaves their
experiences into an evolving story of how sociolinguistics began to expand and
grow. The chapter begins by providing a window into how a number of soon-to-be
sociolinguistics found their way to Labov and his early research. Later in the
chapter, the reader is provided with a view of how a number of these scholars
came to be Labov’s students and the environment in Labov’s linguistics
laboratory in the 1970s. Throughout these sections, Tagliamonte includes
regular excerpts from her interviews that underscore the personal nature of
each individual’s experience with the development of the field. The chapter
closes with a lengthy section on how sociolinguistics developed in other areas
of the United States and, crucially, its expansion outside of America to areas
further afield in Europe and Australia. 

Chapter Three focuses on some of the major early areas of research interest
within sociolinguistics. Namely, the chapter discusses early studies on
African American Vernacular English (AAVE) conducted by Labov, as well as
other scholars such as John Baugh. In addition, the chapter discusses the
intersections between AAVE and Southern varieties of American English by
weaving in narratives from Crawford Feagin. At the same time, the chapter taps
into some of the early theoretical debates of the field, including whether or
not sociolinguistics can profitably study syntactic change. The chapter ends
by providing an overview of some of the other major conferences that feature
sociolinguistic research, including UKLVC and the Sociolinguistics Symposium,
along with the development and proliferation of one of the field’s major
publishing venues: the Journal of Sociolinguistics. 

Chapter Four lays out major viewpoints from variationist sociolinguistics, and
it does so through the lens of Weinreich, Labov, & Herzog’s (1968) influential
paper. Tagliamonte touches on two key tenets of the field in this chapter:
orderly heterogeneity and inherent variability, discussing the ways in which
these principles differ from other prevailing schools of linguistic thought at
the time of Weinreich et al’s paper. The chapter then turns to discussing the
intellectual roots that underpin sociolinguistics; dialectology, sociology,
anthropology, and other disciplines. Each of these disciplines are covered in
turn, highlighting their role in the development of sociolinguistics. Chapter
Four ends with a discussion on how to teach the discipline, along with
scholars reminiscing about William Labov’s influence on the field. 

Chapter Five treats on one of the most important aspects of sociolinguistic
research: fieldwork. Tagliamonte provides an illuminating account of what
fieldwork entails, how it is experienced, and why it is such an integral part
of the sociolinguistic enterprise. The chapter paints this picture through
narrative excerpts from scholars such as Penelope Eckert and Walt Wolfram, who
provide insight into some of their most memorable fieldwork experiences.
Tagliamonte highlights not only what fieldwork provides to the researcher, but
additionally what we learn about humanity in the process. The chapter then
covers the differences between the sociolinguistic interview and other
research methodologies, while discussing the challenge that fieldworkers face
in walking what Tagliamonte refers to as a fine line “between quantity and
quality in sociolinguistic research” (p. 95). 

What Tagliamonte points to is a common dilemma in sociolinguistics, the
reality that analysts need a great deal of casual speech data to tap into and
analyze variation. However, at the same time, what we are able to collect is
what we have. This reality is especially poignant as sociolinguistics has
spread into communities that lie outside of the largely Western and English or
French speaking contexts common in much of the early sociolinguistic research.
Chapter Five also provides insight into how major researchers in the field
came to study the communities that they study, and how they select their field
sites and gain access to the community. 

The sixth chapter focuses on one of the major methodological and theoretical
anchor points of variationist sociolinguistic research, quantitative
methodologies and the importance of statistics for studying language variation
and change. The bulk of Chapter Six discusses the variable rule program, with
excerpts from David Sankoff, Henrietta Cedergren, Gregory Guy, and others who
were influential in developing Varbrul and putting it to work. This chapter
also details how the concept of the variable rule has been refined, along with
newer developments in quantitative sociolinguistic methods, including the
development and growth of Rbrul (Johnson 2009). By discussing quantitative
methods, Tagliamonte shows how the field has debated, refined, and advanced
its own quantitative outlook over the past five decades. However, Tagliamonte
is right to point out that quantitative methods alone will not bring
sociolinguists to their answers. At the end of the day, Tagliamonte notes,
sociolinguists are obligated to “trust your data, know your data, and tell a
linguistically informed story.” (p. 118). 

Chapter Seven focuses on the ways in which sociolinguistics has an effect on
the world outside of the fairly narrow scope of our linguistic analyses.
Inequality, stigma, and prejudice are major points of focus in this chapter.
Through discussions around these topics, the chapter covers what leading
sociolinguists feel the impact of sociolinguistic research can be outside of
the discipline. One of the major foci of the chapter is Labov’s The Reading
Road program, which was developed and implemented in Philadelphia along with
Labov’s influential testimony on behalf of the Oakland School Board. The
chapter then goes on to discuss Roger Shuy’s influential work in the court
system, and ends by focusing on Walt Wolfram’s outreach and preservation work
with Ocracroke, along with a ‘call to arms’ of sorts from the author that
encourages sociolinguists to step outside of their comfort zone to engage more
directly with these areas. 

In the eighth chapter of the book, Tagliamonte traces the trajectory of
variationist sociolinguistics from the 1970s up to the present day. One of the
major thrusts of this chapter is the way in which it highlights how social
categories like class, gender, and social network structure were refined and
reexamined through more recent research. In particular, this chapter
highlights work conducted by Lesley Milroy (1980) in Belfast during this
period, which influenced our understanding of language variation in relation
to social class and social network structure. The chapter also draws on a
lengthy interview excerpt with Penelope Eckert that highlights the need to
re-examine our understanding of gender in relation to language variation, as
she discusses her major work on the topic (Eckert 1989). 

A great deal of Chapter Eight also covers the lengthy debate over the origins
of African American Vernacular English (AAVE). Tagliamonte weaves the
narratives of some of the major scholars who have investigated the issue into
the chapter, covering the major theories surrounding the origins and
development of AAVE. This portion of the chapter touches not only on a
critical debate, but provides an example of how sociolinguistics has
approached the question from a variety of different perspectives. The chapter
also provides an important discussion of social meaning, grounded in Penelope
Eckert’s narrative on what sound changes actually mean. The importance of
social meaning has been one of the main axes of the Third Wave of
sociolinguistic research, and the chapter goes on to cover the trajectory of
the three waves of research within sociolinguistics. Chapter Eight concludes
by covering additional topics, including Perceptual Dialectology and the
contributions of scholars like Dennis Preston, as well grammaticalization and
the work of Shana Poplack. 
 
Chapter Nine of Making Waves consists of a brief “where are they now” account
of a number of key scholars from the field. The chapter details the
circumstances under which Tagliamonte was able to track down and interview
each of these scholars. This chapter also focuses on one of the key questions
in Tagliamonte’s interviews, the question of why these leading
sociolinguistics chose to study variation. 

The tenth and final chapter of the book focuses on where variationist
sociolinguistics seems to be heading from the perspective of those scholars
that are featured in the book. One key point in the chapter is how far the
technology employed in the study of language variation and change has come in
recent years, as well as the new ways in which statistical analyses can be
carried out. This final chapter also discusses the evolution and development
of NWAV as a professional conference and community. One interesting point from
this closing chapter is the sense that the reader gets from the scholars that
the field has become polarized, particularly in the split between more
“socially” minded researchers, and those more directly focused on the
linguistic side of sociolinguistics. The chapter concludes with a final look
towards the horizons of the discipline and the potential for researchers to
make a broad impact on both scholarly work and the world that we live in. 

EVALUATION

Overall, Tagliamonte’s account of the history and development of
sociolinguistics provides a succinct and easily accessible avenue through
which to learn about the intellectual history of the discipline. The author
certainly achieves her stated goal of telling the story of the discipline, and
the inclusion of narrative excerpts from figures in the field provides a
unique way to learn about how sociolinguistics has grown since its inception.
However, the book’s structure and the fact that it is written in an almost
novelistic style represents one of the major obstacles in working through the
text. While the book reads very easily, the novelistic style can also prove to
be somewhat cumbersome and at times the text feels disjointed. In the end
though, this does not ultimately detract from the value of the book. One other
unique feature of Making Waves is the audio clips of narrative excerpts from
the book that are available online through the book’s Wiley companion site
(http://www.wiley.com//legacy/wileychi/tagliamonte/). 

Making Waves serves as a useful introduction to some of the major theoretical
tenets of the field. This text would prove to be useful for undergraduates
just beginning to wade into sociolinguistics who are looking for an accessible
path towards some of the discipline’s theoretical underpinnings. At the same
time, graduate students interested in sociolinguistics will find the book
useful because it allows them to hear from the founders of the discipline,
providing insights about conducting research and the scientific enterprise
more generally. In addition, more senior scholars of sociolinguistics,
linguistic anthropology, or related disciplines will find the book insightful
as a fairly broad overview of how the field developed. Making Waves provides
an important and useful form of documentation for how sociolinguistics has
grown so rapidly over the past five decades and where variationist
sociolinguistics in particular seems to be heading in the years to come. 

REFERENCES

Eckert, Penelope. 1989. The whole woman: Sex and gender differences in
variation. Language Variation and Change 1(3). 245–267. 

Johnson, Daniel E. 2009. Getting off the GoldVarb standard: Introducing Rbrul
for mixed effects variable rule analysis. Language and Linguistics Compass
3(1). 359–383. 

Milroy, Lesley. 1980. Language and social networks. Baltimore, MD: University
Park Press. 

Labov, William. 1963. The social motivation of a sound change. Word 19.
273–309. 

Labov, William. 1966. The social stratification of English in New York City.
Washington, 
DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.
 
Weinreich, Uriel, Labov, William, & Herzog, Marvin. 1968. Empirical
foundations for a theory of language change. In Lehmann, W. P. & Malkiel, Y.
(Eds.) Directions for historical linguistics. 95–188. Austin: University of
Texas Press.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

William Cotter is a joint PhD student in Anthropology and Linguistics at the
University of Arizona. His research focuses on contact between dialects of
Palestinian Arabic in the Gaza Strip and in particular the sociophonetic
outcomes of these forms of contact. More broadly, his work asks how protracted
political conflict and forced migration influence language change in this
community.





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