5. “
Ethnicity is considered to be shared
characteristics such as culture, language,
religion, and traditions, which contribute
to a person or group’s identity.
6. Ethnic Group
An ‘ethnic group’ has been
defined as a group that
regards itself or is regarded
by others as a distinct
community by virtue of
certain characteristics that
will help to distinguish the
group from the surrounding
community.
7. Ethnicity
▹ Many ethnic groups use a distinctive
language to identify their ethnicity
▹ If the dominants/main language is
use, speakers may incorporate
linguistic signals that identify their
ethnic background
8. Examples
▹ New Zealanders use Maori
linguistic signals like kia
ora, eki, ne to express
their ethnic identity
▹ Chinese Singaporeans in
Singapore use the tag la to
express solidarity
▹ Italians in Boston and
Sydney use particular high
percentage of vernacular
pronunciations of certain
vowels
▹ Scottish people in New
Zealand retain the [r]
sound
▹ Jewish people in Boston
and New York use
marked linguistic tags
such as oy vay, and
Yiddish vocabulary items
such as bagel
9. Example in
Indonesia Chinese Indonesian in Surabaya dominantly use
Indonesian and Javanese, however there are particular
linguistic features, such as:
▹ Words related to the kinship system: tacik, koko, cece
in ‘Ikut sama koko sana!’
▹ Use of pigi for ‘pergi’ (go)
▹ Use of Javanese affixations such as –e in Indonesian
words: ‘namae’, ‘orange’
▹ /r/ sound becomes /l/ sound: /murah/ /murah/
▹ /t/ sound becomes /k/ sound: /lihat/ /lihak/
11. AAVE
▹ It has some features which do not occur
in standard American English, and
some which less frequently occur
▹ Linguistic differences act as symbols of
ethnicity
▹ It exists particularly in the northern
cities of the United States
12. Linguistic
features
represent
cultural
distinctiveness
▹ Absence of copula be (e.g. ‘she very nice’,
‘he a teacher’
▹ Use of copula be to signal recurring actions
(e.g. ‘she be at school on weekdays’)
▹ Multiple negation (e.g. ‘I don’t have no
money’)
▹ Consonant cluster simplification (aks in
place of ‘asks’, las in place of ‘last’)
14. British
Black
English
▹ Members of British Black community
(born in England) speak a variety of
Jamaican Creole, also known as Patois
▹ Patois used as symbol of ethnic identity.
Those who are not fluent in Patois use
English with Patois features. This way,
their English is marked as “Black” which
signals the identity of the speaker
17. Linguistic
Features
Pronunciation
Use of [d]
sound: then
pronounce as
‘den’, the
pronounce as
‘de’
Vocabulary
Kia ora for
greetings
Tangi meaning
‘funeral’
Kuia meaning
‘old woman’
Grammar
Vernacular present
tense forms: with /s/
‘I says you wanna
bet’
Vernacular past tense
‘She seen it
happen…’
19. Features of
Social
Networks
Density
It refers to whether
members of a person’s
network are in touch with
each other
Plexity
It refers to the type of
transactions people are
involved in
• Uniplex relationship:
when the link to someone
else is only in one area
• Multiplex relationship:
interactions with others in
several dimensions
20. Communities of practice develop
around the activities which group
members engage in together, and their
shared objectives and attitudes.
Communities of practice
and the construction of
social identity
21. ▹ Linguistic patterns described by
sociolinguists correlate to macro-level
categories such as gender, age, ethnicity
and class
▹ The concept of community of practice is
aimed at understanding the complexities
of belonging to a certain group
