A. introduction
Some investigators have found it appropriate to try to introduce a distinction
between sociolinguistics or micro-sociolinguistics and the sociology of language or macro sociolinguistics. In this distinction,
sociolinguistics is concerned with investigating the relationships between language and society with the goal being a better understanding of the structure of language and of how languages function in communication; the
equivalent goal in the sociology of language is trying to discover how social structure can be better understood through the study of language, e.g., how certain linguistic features serve to characterize particular social arrangements. Hudson (1996, p. 4) has described the difference as follows: sociolinguistics is ‘the study of language in relation to society,’ whereas the sociology of language is ‘the study of society in relation
to language.’ In
other words, in sociolinguistics we study language and society in order to
find out as much as we can
about what kind of thing language is, and in the sociology
of language we reverse the direction of our interest. Using the alternative terms given above, Coulmas (1997, p. 2) says that ‘micro-sociolingustics investigates how social structure influences the way people talk and how language varieties and
patterns of use correlate with social attributes such as class, sex, and age. Macro-sociolinguistics, on the other hand, studies what societies
do with their languages, that is, attitudes and attachments that account for
the functional distribution
of speech forms in society, language shift, maintenance, and replacement, the delimitation and interaction of speech communities.’ The view I will take here is that both sociolinguistics and the sociology of language require a systematic study
of language and society if they are to be successful. Moreover, a sociolinguistics that
deliberately refrains from drawing conclusions about society seems to be unnecessarily
restrictive, just as restrictive
indeed as a sociology of language that deliberately ignores discoveries about language made in the course of sociological research. So while it is possible to do either kind
of work to the exclusion of the other, I will be concerned with looking at both kinds. My own views are essentially in agreement with those of of Coulmas (1997, p. 3), expressed
as follows: There is no sharp
dividing line between the two,
but a large area of
common concern. Although
sociolinguistic research centers about a number of different key issues, any rigid micro–macro compartmentalization seems quite contrived and.....
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