Re: THEORY: Sound changes in literate societies

Quoting "Karapcik, Mike" <KarapcM@...>:

>         According to the book "Applied Linguistics", which I read a year
> ago, the changes are motivated by the middle class.
I have to wonder: since the Middle Class in most western countries
makes up the vast majority of the population (in the US, more than
80%), how can we distinguish something caused by the "middle class"
and something that just happens randomly throughout the population,
and by virtue of their numerical preponderance is most likely to
occur among Middle Class speakers? That is, how do we know that it
is an effect of being a member of the Middle Class at all? I'm not
up on all the recent sociolinguistic literature, but I know Labov's
central observation has been that linguistic changes tend to radiate
out from important members of the *local* community, and these
important members of the community may or may not have any class
distinctions associated with them.

=====================================================================
Thomas Wier          "...koruphàs hetéras hetére:isi prosápto:n /
Dept. of Linguistics  mú:tho:n mè: teléein atrapòn mían..."
University of Chicago "To join together diverse peaks of thought /
1010 E. 59th Street   and not complete one road that has no turn"
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