Australian Journal of Linguistics

Vol. 20, no. 2 (2000)

Articles

An acoustic study of the vowels of New Zealand English	Anita Easton & Laurie Bauer	93-117
The use of the present perfect in Australian English	Dulcie M. Engel & Marie-Eve A. Ritz	119-140
Grammatical change in progress: The Anejom conditionals	John Lynch	141-155
The semantics of verbal classification in Bardi (Western Australia)	Edith Nicolas	157-177
The mutual process of semioticization: Linguistic acquisition and performance of social subjectivities	Jennifer J. Peck	179-209
Gender, sex and stereotyping in the Collins COBUILD English language dictionary	Encarnación Hidalgo Tenorio	211-230

Abstracts

An acoustic study of the vowels of New Zealand English

Anita Easton & Laurie Bauer

Abstract: This paper presents the result of an acoustic analysis of the more monophthongal of the New Zealand English vowels read in word lists for the Wellington Social Dialect Survey (carried out in 1989). Speakers are cross-classified by sex, social class, ethnicity and age, and a total of 75 speakers were recorded. In addition, comparisons are made with other (earlier and later) acoustic analyses of New Zealand English vowels, with a view to discovering diachronic trends or regional differences. Comparative figures for RP and Australian English are also given from a number of sources.

The use of the present perfect in Australian English

Dulcie M. Engel & Marie-Eve A. Ritz

Abstract: This paper describes and discusses the use of the present perfect in Australian English which, when compared to uses in other varieties of English, is found in a broader range of contexts. Examination of data collected mainly from radio news programs and chat shows reveals that the present perfect in Australian English is used: (1) in combination with past temporal adverbials; (2) in sequences indicating narrative progression; (3) in alternation with the simple past and the present tense to express stylistic contrast. All these uses are common in our sample, which seems to indicate that the category is undergoing an extension of its meaning.

Grammatical change in progress: The Anejom conditionals

John Lynch

Abstract: Anejom is the sole indigenous language of Aneityum, the southernmost inhabited island in Vanuatu. Possibly due at least in part to drastic depopulation in the nineteenth century, as a result of introduced diseases and natural calamities, various aspects of Anejom lexicon and grammar have undergone fairly rapid change, often involving simplification. Interestingly, however, these changes seem to have been 'selective', as other areas of grammar remain unchanged and as complex as they ever were. One such area in which change still seems to be in progress is the marking of conditional clauses. An original conditional conjunction seems to have been lost, first undergoing reanalysis and paradigm reduction; and original conditional constructions were first replaced by temporal constructions and more recently by constructions based on a temporal clause, the quotative verb and a complement clause. This paper documents those changes and tries to explain why they have occurred.

The semantics of verbal classification in Bardi (Western Australia)

Edith Nicolas

Abstract: This paper investigates the phenomenon of verbal classification in Bardi, an Aboriginal language of north-western Australia. Verbal classification involves the categorization of processes and works primarily at the lexical level. The analysis shows that lexical valency and aspect as well as the type of trajectory contained in the process are essential to account for verbal classification. The seven most productive classifiers of Bardi are described and their semantic classifying features are outlined. The study concludes with cases of multiclassification which show a variety of output ranging from lexical contrast to syntactic oppositions.

The mutual process of semioticization: Linguistic acquisition and performance of social subjectivities

Jennifer J. Peck

Abstract: Sociology and critical linguistics discuss the influence of parents, teachers and peers in the socialization of children, and the importance of language in early and continuing socialization processes (Parsons 1951; Schutz 1962, 1973; Cicourel 1971; Hodge and Kress 1988). This paper extends these discussions to illustrate that this process is continuously interactive. Using data from everyday situations (Goffman 1966, 1977; Garfinkel 1963, 1967) the paper argues that young children are not only acquiring gender-differential social subjectivities but that they are involved in reinforcing and reproducing the social positions of adults in ways that support dominant traditional social structures. Similarly, it is demonstrated that women facilitate children's gendered performances that encode positions of power and subordination, and are implicated in the abdication of their own institutionalized power.

Gender, sex and stereotyping in the Collins COBUILD English language dictionary

Encarnación Hidalgo Tenorio

Abstract: The analysis of any topic related to language and gender or sex tends to give rise to a range of somewhat diverse material. The core of the problem is not so much the bias of an approach to such a matter (which is obvious and can be easily identified), as how bias itself may organize human beings' experience by means of language in use. There exist well-known cultural stereotypes associated with the male and female conditions, and it is necessary to acknowledge the limitations to the application of many an impressionistic linguistic study on such issues. Taking this into account, the aim of this paper is to look at the way certain aspects of present-day English (a natural-gendered language) are recorded by the Collins COBUILD English language dictionary (1987) in order to assess: 1) the representation of the two sexes; 2) the extent to which some of the dictionary definitions are inaccurate, biased, and/or the result of having ignored changes in society; and, subsequently, 3) possible stereotyping. By describing a corpus extracted from the Collins COBUILD, I also address its representation of Western societies; its editorial board's policy to prevent discrimination in language usage; and its efforts, if any, to avoid conveying the same stereotyped picture of women and men.

Last update: 4 December 2000
Comments to Tim Curnow