Chapter 2
Enregisterment and historical sociolinguistics
This chapter introduces the concepts of indexicality and enregisterment and examines how they can be applied
to the study of historical sociolinguistics, as part of a recent turn towards “third wave” (Eckert 2012) sociolinguistic approaches in this discipline. The chapter explores the
potential usefulness of indexicality and enregisterment as tools for historical sociolinguistics, drawing on
historical evidence of metalinguistic commentary. It also discusses the role of normative texts, dialect literature
and popular culture in establishing what Agha terms “a linguistic repertoire differentiable within a language as a
socially recognised register” indexing “speaker status linked to a specific scheme of cultural values” (Agha 2003: 231).
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Indexicality and enregisterment
- 3.Historical discourse about language
- 4.Conclusion
-
Note
-
References
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