Constant sociolinguistic change in children’s communication

Constant sociolinguistic change in children’s communication

 In my end-term essay I would like to elaborate on the different aspects and influencing factors of the constant sociolinguistic change that might be observed in the communication of children according to several aspects within different environments. By considering the studies I have found most useful and representative when focusing on sociolinguistic features observed among children, I would like to offer a detailed insight through different aspects to their constantly changing use of language systems within various social frames.

One important aspect that should be accounted is the difference and change influenced by different locations, and therefore, different social environment. In a study observing groups of children from inner-cities and from the suburbs, Entwisle (1968) points out that regarding language and cognitive development, cultural differences are essential topics to consider. Entwisle (1968) also introduces her observations, such as when starting elementary school children from the city centre have more developed language skills at the measured fields than children from suburban areas. As Hymes states, only restricted amount of data is available about the personal and community beliefs and values influencing language use, especially in the case of language acquisition by children. According to basic language skills, this study is aimed to measure the differentiation in terms of “sentence length, use of various grammatical constructions, vocabulary size” etc. the results show that – among other detailed outcomes of the survey – as the participants grow older – especially in the first couple of years in school – several capacities, regarding stimulus and response seem to increase. Meanwhile, it is also important to mention that depending on the consistence of I.Q., linguistic differences associated with social class often fade away. However, when focusing on language behaviour and general cognitive style, there might be a couple of distinguishable observations that are hardly explainable with the association between their socioeconomic status and their intellectual level.

Furthermore, I found it also important to consider that this considerable change was triggered by the event of school-start. In other words, children stepped out of their environment, and in order to be able to enhance the success of communication, they needed to acquire further language skills.

Secondly, I have found essential to explore how children communicate in peer groups, what kind of a hierarchical order they develop and how they learn to handle conflicts. Corsaro’s (1979) study has shown that in the fields of peer activities in sociological terms, regarding children’s knowledge about status and roles, their abilities are less developed and sophisticated from what is expected. Thus their communication often leads to conflicts and breakdowns. According to studies he had relied on, children are seemingly aware of the key concepts of status and role expectations. This can be explained with the frequency of interactions with adults. Children may even adapt the status of the adults and transmit it into their role plays. However, the situation seems to be more complex than that, when taking the linguistic regard into consideration; seemingly, children’s developing ideas of the conceptions of status and role, furthermore, their developing linguistic skills may heavily influence the social positions they take in an interaction.

In general, children proved to produce a relatively wide scale of linguistic features; however, when it comes to role plays, they tend to rely on simple linguistic structures.

From this study we can clearly see that children develop a certain kind of order of roles when it comes to communication in peer groups. Moreover, we can also observe that the development and the direction of change in their communication heavily depend on the patterns they acquire from adults.

In a third study we can take a method, called ‘controlled improvisation’ into account. This study turned out to be limitedly successful which lead us to the observation that children are either insecure or unwilling to cooperate in an artificial situation. Andersen (1993) analyzed the use of speech forms (e.g.  statements,  questions,  and imperatives)  in their  function as speech  acts (representatives,  directives,  expressives) but she considers the results to be too complex to be summarized  briefly. This study shows clearly the developing ability of children to play different roles; this method is called “controlled improvisation.” However, only an inconsiderable amount of reliable data can be observed by a method that persuades children into inconvenient situations. In such situations children tend to either refuse to cooperate or they act resistantly. Although, in order to conclude this study, it still counts as a great step in the development of observing the sociolinguistic skills of children.

As another aspect that should be taken into account when looking at the development of children’s communication from a sociolinguistic point of view, Kyratzis (2004) writes about the way how children are constantly shaping cultural and social categories and introduces a view over language as a “social action that helps shape reality.” She mentions the main approaches how these cultural categories are established, such as creation of various games and codes, the way they elaborate to handle conflicts, the establishment of group-identities, and the way they overrule already existing cultural conventions through peer talk.

She defines peer cultures as “stable set of activities or routines, artifacts, values, and concerns” and establishes them as an outgrowth of the interactions among peer groups. These peer cultures seemingly include various concerns regarding gender identity, romantic relationships and relations to one another within the society and adult culture.

She also considers rituals and games developed by peer groups essential when understanding their social systems. She also thinks that the role of language use also has an important role when children organize their games and rituals, such as creating bonds by involving each other in a hierarchical order or using different narrative voices.

When solving a conflict, they use many advantageous ways, although resolution is not their primary objective. She also focuses on the communicative competence in conflict talk; through the multiplicity of voices they can animate several figures. According to a study concerning aspects of Italian discussione, children at times also use features, such as “interruption devices, predisagreements, emphasis markers, and format tying (Kyratzis, 2004).”  Children also have several ways to evoke sympathy and therefore support from others; furthermore, grammatical features and the way they cope with adult culture also mirror their communicative competence.

From this study we can clearly observe peer groups’ communication in various aspects. We can see that peer communication is constantly changing and developing, while the use of grammatical features is increasing and becoming even more varied.

As Llamas and Stockwell (2010) say that when different age-groups are taken into consideration, the language use of each group tends to vary. In case of the comparison of the given aspect that are being considered, as time passes, changes in the use of language can be discovered. This observation can also point towards the change of language use in history. They call this the ‘apparent time hypothesis’; a revelation that makes it possible to observe change in progress.

Llamas and Stockwell (2010) also point out that the ways how individuals of a community relate to each other should be essentially observed in order to understand to what extent they are influenced from a sociolinguistic point of view (regarding the strength of their bonds within the social group) and “how linguistic features are maintained, reinforced and spread.”

As a conclusion, we could clearly see in the above mentioned examples and studies that the developmental changes in children’s sociolinguistic levels are quite varied and depend on many layers of different information. We could see that location can be an influencing factor, and it is especially observable when children are placed into a different social environment. Nonetheless, they seem to integrate quickly in a sociolinguistic level. We could also have a look at their development of social groups within their peer groups and at their conceptions of status and role. The influential effect of adult patterns can also be discovered.  Yet in another study we could see that children are hardly cooperative when being pushed into inconvenient situations. Then we could observe how children shape their own environments with the help of developing linguistic skills. Lastly we could have a look at the revelation how the progress of language change can be observed in a given timeframe. There are further influencing factors, such as the time that actually passes and strength of social bonds meanwhile. Although these several levels of these studies cannot be compared to each other, it is clearly observable that children constantly acquire several sociolinguistic attributes that they are capable of using in practice as well observed from the discussed aspects and with the effect of the influencing factors.

References

Andersen E. S. (1993). Speaking with Style: The Sociolinguistic Skills of Children. Language in Society.

Corsaro, W. A. (1979). Young Children's Conception of Status and Role. Sociology of Education.

Entwisle, D. R. (1968). Developmental Sociolinguistics: Inner-City Children. American Journal of Sociology.

Kyratzis, A. (2004). Talk and Interaction among Children and the Co-Construction of Peer Groups and Peer Culture. Annual Review of Anthropology.

Llamas, C., & Stockwell, P. (2010). Sociolinguistics. In N. Schmitt (Ed.), An introduction to applied linguistics. London, United Kingdom: Hodder Education.