Sociolinguistics Few Students Even Know Term Paper

Thus sociolinguistics is far more than an arcane academic field of study; rather, sociolinguistics offers a unique opportunity to make a real difference in society.

Now, for a concrete example that you as students should be able to understand and appreciate. Sociolinguistics has profound implications for teaching and has played a huge role in understanding the poor educational performance of lower-class inner-city children (Labov, 1972). Sociolinguists have found that language is one of the variables that make these children significantly different from the standard culture of the classroom. Sociolinguists believe that the solution is to adapt the school system to the language and learning styles of the majority of students in the inner-city schools.

Of course, teaching is just one area that sociolinguistics touches. For instance, sociolinguists might investigate attitudes towards the proposed English-only Amendment to help policy makers formulate strategies for obtaining support or rejection.or, sociolinguistics might study gender differences in conversations to help understand how differential power relations manifest themselves in language forms (Wolfram). This type of knowledge could have profound implications for helping women even in the playing field in the business community.

As you can see, sociolinguistics is indeed very exciting and very meaningful work. When deciding on a field of study, I encourage you to consider this field as an option that will challenge you and provide you the opportunity to make a real difference in the world.

Bibliography

Labov, W. (1972, June) Academic ignorance and black intelligence. The Atlantic Monthly. N Retrieved at http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/95sep/ets/labo.htm

Shuy, R.W. (1969, March). The relevance of sociolinguistics for language teaching. TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 3, No. 1 pp. 13-22

Wolfram, W. Sociolinguistics. Linguistic Society of America. Retrieved at http://www.lsadc.org/info/ling-fields-socio.cfm.....