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The individual in the semiotic landscape
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In: Glossa: a journal of general linguistics; Vol 4, No 1 (2019); 14 ; 2397-1835 (2019)
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Abstract:
I present the extreme proposal that change spreads by virtue of its role in a system of social meaning. And since individuals cannot construct meaning on their own, they can play no elemental role in sound change. Based on ethnographic-variationist studies of sound change among preadolescents and adolescents, I challenge two common assumptions in the study of variation and change: (1) that sound change is autonomous, and (2) that change spreads from individual to individual, by imitation and in isolation. Whatever its origins, whether from linguistic pressures (“change from below”) or social pressures (“change from above”), sound change spreads by virtue of its incorporation into a semiotic landscape, as non-referential material is recruited into signs articulating social distinctions. Participation in this landscape connects the individual to the immediate community and to the larger social order and it is through participation in this landscape that speakers produce and perceive – and accelerate – changes in progress.
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Keyword:
adolescents; Historical Linguistics; indexicality; Linguistics; preadolescents; sociolinguistic variation; Sociolinguistics; sound change; style
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URL: https://doi.org/10.5334/gjgl.640 https://www.glossa-journal.org/jms/article/view/640
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