19.53, Diss: Phonology/Socioling: Valentin-Marquez: 'Doing Being Boricua: ...'

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Subject: 19.53, Diss: Phonology/Socioling: Valentin-Marquez: 'Doing Being Boricua: ...'

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1)
Date: 21-Dec-2007
From: Wilfredo Valentin-Marquez < wvalenti at umich.edu >
Subject: Doing Being Boricua: perceptions of national identity and the sociolinguistic distribution of liquid variables in Puerto Rican Spanish

 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 13:32:16
From: Wilfredo Valentin-Marquez [wvalenti at umich.edu]
Subject: Doing Being Boricua: perceptions of national identity and the sociolinguistic distribution of liquid variables in Puerto Rican Spanish
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Institution: University of Michigan 
Program: Linguistics & Romance Languages and Literatures 
Dissertation Status: Completed 
Degree Date: 2007 

Author: Wilfredo Valentin-Marquez

Dissertation Title: Doing Being Boricua: perceptions of national identity and
the sociolinguistic distribution of liquid variables in
Puerto Rican Spanish 

Linguistic Field(s): Phonology
                     Sociolinguistics

Subject Language(s): Spanish (spa)


Dissertation Director(s):
Lesley Milroy
Teresa Satterfield

Dissertation Abstract:

This dissertation examines patterns of phonological variation in two Puerto 
Rican (PR) communities with different kinds of language contact situations.  
It compares a community where Puerto Rican Spanish (PRS) is the only 
language spoken by most of the population (Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico) with a 
community where PRS is a minority language (Grand Rapids, Michigan).  I 
describe the sociolinguistic distribution of (rr), (r), and (l)?, focusing on 
their stigmatized realizations: velarization ([x]), lateralization ([l]), and 
rhotacization ([?]), respectively.

Besides the contributions of linguistic context, life stage and gender, I 
explore whether the degree of integration into the PR community of the 22 
informants on the Island and the 20 participants on the mainland offers 
explanatory insight to differences between the communities in terms of the 
variables' distribution.  I consider the speakers' perceptions of national 
identity?based on the meanings and uses of the word boricua, typically 
associated with core Puerto Ricanness?and I explore whether those 
judgements relate to the use of [x], [l] and [?] in the two communities.

The general distribution of (rr) was very similar in the two populations, and 
that was also the case for (l), but the samples contrasted in the distribution 
of (r).  Although the main realizations of (rr) and (r) were strongly 
conditioned by linguistic environments in the two communities, differences 
were found in their social conditioning.  Variable (l) did not show 
meaningful sociolinguistic variability in either location.

As regards (rr) and (r), the following patterns emerged in both 
communities: women favored the prescribed variants ([r] and [?]); middle-
age speakers favored the stigmatized realizations; men favored [?], the 
innovative variant of (rr); and women and adolescents favored [??], the non-
prescribed, non-stigmatized variant of (r).

Differences in the level of integration into the PR community did not 
influence the sociolinguistic distribution of (rr), but had an effect on the 
distribution of (r).  Also, speakers related [x] and [l] to the linguistic 
projection of core Puerto Ricanness, and I associate the preference of a 
different variant to describe typical boricua speech in each location with 
differences in the demographic composition of the communities. 





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