The University of the West Indies, Mona

The course is fundamentally an exploration of the ways language can be studied as a social phenomenon, and focuses on developing an objective understanding of the links which speakers make between language and social groupings. The course will examine the connection between specific language features in speech communities such as the pronunciation of ‘r’ and the social background of the speaker who uses the feature. Other topics include sociological and social psychological explanations for language use, language change, language and gender, and language ideology. This course has a strong Caribbean focus.