Language as a Symbol of Group Membership

Abstract

Whenever we speak in a particular language variety rather than another, we display an affinity with one social group distancing ourselves from other social groups. The identity-marking function of speech is as important as the communicative one. The type of language variety, people use, makes a considerable contribution to shape their social identities. This means that the people with high social or political status should often carefully control their language styles in order to exert profound influence on people's attitudes to meet desired expectations. In fact, social class-based language differences may have more important social implications than regional variations. In many class-conscious societies, particular varieties associated with lower social classes, may be greatly stigmatized by the members of the society. Hence, the speakers of less prestigious varieties may often lose many educational and occupational opportunities unfairly. However, a language variety in linguistic term is more expressive, logical, regular, and correct than social varieties. Therefore, making any valid judgment on the superiority or inferiority of a particular language variety is concerned with social and political affairs and does not have any linguistic merits. The article also discusses the relation between language variety and cognitive ability of language users based on Bernstein's theory and the critics.

Multi-aspect multilingual and cross-lingual parliamentary speech analysis

“…The description of differences between young and older generations focuses on (in)formality [34,56]. In the research of group membership through speech Ghafournia [23], sociolinguists describe two types of prestige, overt and covert prestige. Overt prestige is related to standard and more formal linguistic features, which are normally associated with those who hold more power and status.…”

Multi-aspect Multilingual and Cross-lingual Parliamentary Speech Analysis

“…The description of differences between young and older generations focuses on (in)formality (Labov 1972;Stenström and Jørgensen 2009). In the research of group membership through speech (Ghafournia 2015), sociolinguists describe two types of prestige, overt and covert prestige. Overt prestige is related to standard and more formal linguistic features, which are normally associated with those who hold more power and status.…”

Left Out—Feelings of Social Exclusion Incite Individuals with High Conspiracy Mentality to Reject Complex Scientific Messages

“…The argument that conspiracy mentality influences whether text complexity leads to feelings of social exclusion can also be supported from the perspective of group membership. Readers can use different modes of language, for instance complex language instead of simple language, as a cue of group membership (Ghafournia, 2015). Scientific jargon might generally exclude readers without an academic background (Sharon & Baram-Tsabari, 2013), but its impact on feelings of social exclusion might be particularly strong for individuals who are wired to divide their surroundings into in-group and out-group members and are thus especially sensitive to cues of group membership (see Cichocka et al, 2016; van Prooijen & van Lange, 2014 for in-group positivity among conspiracy theorists).…”