16th edition

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LinguaLinks Library

Sociolinguistics Bookshelf

Designed to help you do language assessment and strategic program planning

This bookshelf presents an extensive array of reference materials relating to sociolinguistics in cross-cultural contexts. Sociolinguistics is a many-faceted discipline that studies the relationships between language and society. Some scholars distinguish between the broad patterns of language behavior (such as language contact, multilingualism, and language policy and planning) “macrosociolinguistics” or the “sociology of language” and the finer patterns of language in use (such as conversational styles or social dialects) “microsociolinguististics.” These bookshelf materials focus primarily on the macrosociolinguistic end of the continuum and assume a broad familiarity with macrosociolinguistics as foundational to linguistic and sociolinguistic survey and application of that data to assess the viability and types of possible language development programs.

The tasks of identifying and cataloging basic information about each of the thousands of distinct languages spoken in the world today is daunting. Our Ethnologue database presently contains information about more than 6,800, which are for the most part either minority or endangered languages. Each language group has its own unique social structures, while simultaneously existing within larger regional, national, and international societies. As in a biological ecosystem, any change in interconnected social systems—no matter how seemingly small—can have potentially large consequences.

The LinguaLinks Sociolinguistics bookshelf is designed to help local, national, or others from outside a speech community understand more about the social, linguistic, economic, and political frameworks influencing the speech community. SIL continues research through on-the-field surveys, library research, and collaboration with other agencies and scholars. These materials are for the benefit of helping any person or agency offering to assist these language communities as they make decisions for change needs, whether

• private,
• government,
• humanitarian, and/or
• educational agencies

By using the Sociolinguistics bookshelf, you will be able to:

• find out what minority and endangered languages exist in your geographic area
• evaluate whether each one is experiencing decline, stability, or expansion of its vernacular language use
• suggest what, if anything, external agencies might do to help the language community reach its goals
• project some of the predictable consequences of changes.

The LinguaLinks Sociolinguistic bookshelf is broken into three main tasks:

• Language survey
• Language assessment
• Integrated program planning

The language survey section will show you how to identify and inventory the languages in a geographic region, based on things like: linguistic distinctives, social groupings, geographic distribution, and political "boundaries" which a group of people may use to identify themselves as being distinct from others.

You will also learn how to observe and record information about

• different dialects of the same language,
• numbers of speakers of the language,
• bilingualism in regional and national languages,
• differing language use in different social contexts,
• differing language use by adults or children, or by men and women,
• and many other factors.

In the language assessment section you will find tools for interpreting the data collected in the surveys, and for reporting any significant patterns or trends found in the data regarding such things as:

• increase or decrease in the use of the vernacular language over time,
• changes in the internal cohesiveness and stability of the group, and
• social, linguistic, economic, and political pressures upon the speakers.

By using the integrated program planning section you will be able to work through a process of identifying ways in which resources from outside the community could possibly be made available to the language community to facilitate the goals the community establishes for itself. The LinguaLinks Sociolinguistics bookshelf brings together information, procedures, and guidance that give you a clear road map through these processes.

To see a list of other resources available in this bookshelf go to the Contents of the Sociolinguistics bookshelf.