Dynamic dialectology and social networks

Mieko Ogura | Tsurumi University, Yokohama; Project on Linguistic Analysis, University of California at Berkeley

William S-Y. Wang | Chinese University of Hong Kong; Project on Linguistic Analysis, University of California at Berkeley

This paper examines how different structures of social networks affect linguistic selection type of change or functionally biased change, and game type of change or socially biased change, based on simulation and historical data from English. We show that the weaker the functional or social bias, the greater the effects of different network structures on diffusion processes of change. We also show that the weaker the functional or social bias, the more probabilistic the learner becomes, and the stronger the functional or social bias, the more categorical the learner becomes. Furthermore, we discuss that there is little increase in diffusion time with the increase in population size in a small-world and scale-free networks.

Published online: 09 July 2008
https://doi.org/10.1075/cilt.297.08ogu

Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Grzega, Joachim

2012. In The Handbook of Historical Sociolinguistics, ► pp. 271 ff.

Ogura, Mieko

2012. In The Handbook of Historical Sociolinguistics, ► pp. 427 ff.

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