Peter Trudgill and Robin Lakoff sociolinguistics research

Peter Trudgill

Peter Trudgill researched speech in Norwich in the 1970s in an attempt to find out why people speak differently. One of the variables that he studied was the end of words such as ‘walking’ and ‘talking’ which people often shorten down to ‘walkin’ and ‘talkin’. He related this to class, gender and other factors and then attempted to work out if there were any correlations between these factors.  He wrote; "Nearly everywhere in the Eng-speaking world we find this alternation between higher-class/formal ng and lower class/informal n. It goes back to the fact that in Old English (and later) there were two forms, a gerund ending in -ing (walking is good for you) and a present participle ending in -end (he was walking). The -end form was the ancestor of -n' and -ing (obviously) of -ing. "

These were his findings;

1. “In all social classes, the more careful the speech, the more likely people were to say walking rather than walkin'.”
2. “The proportion of walkin' type forms was higher in lower social classes.”
3.  “The nonstandard -in' forms occurred much more often in men's speech than in women's, and this was true for all social classes.”
4.  “When women were questioned about what they thought they were saying, they tended to say they used the standard -ing forms more often than they really did.”
5. “When men were questioned about what they thought they were saying, they tended to say they used the nonstandard -in' forms more often than they really did.”

Robin Lakoff

Robin Lakoff is a professor of linguistics who is credited with the introduction of language and gender to sociolinguistics due to her 1975 book, ‘Language and Woman’s place’ which has inspired many different strategies for studying language and gender. She claimed that men and womens’ language could be distinguished in numerous ways, such as;

1.       “Hedges: Phrases like "sort of", "kind of", "it seems like"”
2.        “Empty adjectives: "divine", "adorable", "gorgeous"”
3.        “Super-polite forms: "Would you mind..." "...if it’s not too much to ask" "Is it o.k if...?"”
4.        “Apologize more: "I'm sorry, but I think that..."”
5.        “Speak less frequently”
6.        “Avoid coarse language or expletives”
7.        “Tag questions: "You don't mind eating this, do you?".”
8.        “Hyper-correct grammar and pronunciation: Use of prestige grammar and clear articulation”
9.        “Indirect requests: "Wow, I'm so thirsty." – really asking for a drink”  
10.     “Speak in italics: Use tone to emphasis certain words, e.g., "so", "very", "quite"”

She suggested that women changed their language and linguistics to suit different situations.

Additionally, she has developed theories such as the ‘Politeness principal which went by a set of three maxims, which were;

1. "Don't impose."
2. "Give the reciever options."
3. "Make the reciever feel good."