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The potential for synthesis between variationist sociolinguistics and theoretical linguistics has been recognised by researchers in both sub-disciplines (e.g. Henry 1995; Adger and Smith 2005) but it has been difficult to move beyond a description of this unified approach towards an account of variation that can explain both ‘social’ and ‘linguistic’ phenomena in the same theoretical framework. Chambers (2005: 217) suggests that such a synthesis is currently “well beyond our reach and hardly even foreseeable”. I argue that this is partly because most of the theories on which attempts to address this issue are modelled are fundamentally asocial in their design and in order to improve the synthesis between sociolinguistics and theoretical linguistics, it is necessary to first begin with a theory in which social and linguistic knowledge are inherently and inextricably linked in cognition. The aim of this thesis is therefore to consider to what extent it is possible to synthesise variationist sociolinguistic methods of data collection and analysis with usage-based models of interpretation. Using the ethnographic technique of participant observation, the data for this thesis were collected over a 2 year period from a group of 54 speakers who play together in West Fife High Pipe Band (WFHPB). These data form a corpus of 38 hours of conversation (roughly 360,000 words). Two different phonological variables are discussed in this thesis: th-fronting, which is a consonantal change in progress in this community, and variation in the BIT vowel, which is reported to be a stable variable in this variety. Using quantitative methods that are typically considered appropriate in variationist sociolinguistics (i.e. varbrul and multiple regression), this thesis correlates variation in both of these variables with a number of different ‘social’, ‘linguistic’ and ‘cognitive’ factors and shows that this is one way to explore the potential for synthesis. However, it is vital not only to incorporate these factors into a quantitative analysis of variation; it is also necessary to be able to explain the outcome of the quantitative analysis by invoking principles of the theoretical framework. By adding the theoretical assumptions of the usage-based approach to an analysis of variation that is already grounded in current sociolinguistic practices of data collection and interpretation, I suggest that it is possible to reach a more unified and insightful explanation of linguistic variation and change in this community and a more unified and insightful approach to linguistic theory; one in which “everything fits, and everything fits together” (Langacker 1987: 32).

In this thesis, I intend to further our knowledge of the sociolinguistics of Early Modern minority languages. Social and political developments in North-Western Europe in the 16th to 18th centuries caused an emancipation of vernacular languages, which took over from Latin as the main language in official domains. The sociolinguistics of this change are well known (e.g. Burke 2004); the fate of languages that did not make it to this new status, emerging ‘minority languages’, remains under-researched. Chapter 2 introduces some of the terminology used in this study. I discuss four categories of research methods into minority language shift and how they are applicable to research on historical situations, which often suffers from ‘bad data’. I then present a model of ethnolinguistic vitality that I use to survey the socio-historical backgrounds of several minority language groups in Chapter 3. Chapter 3 begins with a brief presentation of minority language groups from the Early Modern period. I choose three language groups to focus on in more depth: speakers of Norn in Shetland, of Flemish in Northern France, and of Sorbian in Germany. A survey of these three cases, with the initial wider presentation, identifies three recurring issues that are the focus of the subsequent chapters. The first of these is the influence of demographic change (Chapter 4). In the formation of nation-states in this period, many speakers of the majority language migrate to peripheral minority-language areas. I present two historical-demographic studies showing the integration of immigrants into the local community through intermarriage, based on 17th-century population registers from Shetland and Dunkirk (France). Both show a large amount of intermarriage, despite a bias towards in-group marriage. Intermarriage brings the majority language into the minority-language home; the strength of the bias against intermarriage is likely to be a factor in the rate of shift, one of the main differences between Shetland and Dunkirk. Language policies are the topic of Chapter 5. They are an important part of minority language studies in the present day, particularly with regard to language maintenance. I survey the language legislation that existed in Shetland, French Flanders, and Lusatia, its purpose and implementation, and its effects on language shift. Purpose and implementation of language policies were limited, and its effect on minority language communities therefore only secondary. Chapter 6 is about target varieties in language shift. The question of whether language shift happened through education in a standard variety or through contacts with majoritylanguage speakers from nearby areas can be answered by looking at the new majoritylanguage dialect in the minority area. I undertake two different studies in this context. The first is an analysis of Shetland Scots using theories of dialect contact. The dialect has a number of ‘standardised’ features, but I argue these are mainly due to koinéisation of various dialects of Scots immigrants to Shetland and a second-language variety of Scots spoken by the local population. The second is a study of the French dialect of French Flanders using computational methods of data comparison on data taken from dialect atlases. This dialect shares features with neighbouring Picard dialects, but we can also identify Standard French features. This pattern correlates with what we know of migration to the area (Chapter 4). Both new dialects suggest the shifting population acquired the majority language mainly through contacts with majority-language speakers in their direct environment. In conclusion, I show that language shift in the Early Modern period was an organic process, where the inception, the rate, and the result of shift were steered by the minority population’s social networks. The influence of institutions often blamed for language shift in modern situations – educational and language policies – was very restricted. In addition, I show that methods used in modern sociolinguistics can be successfully applied to historical situations, despite the bad data problem. This opens the door for more extensive research into the area.

This research represents a unique exploration of the life narratives of Russian-German (Spät)Aussiedler within the city of Berlin, stretching from affluent areas in the west of the city, to areas of high unemployment in the east. A unique feature of this study is that the informant cohort consists solely of the "grandparent" generation.

This thesis is a sociolinguistic investigation into the variable encoding by form of the discourse variables 'I don't know', 'I don't think' and negative polarity tag questions within a variety of English spoken in the north-east of England. Combining qualitative methods from conversation analysis and quantitative methods from variationist socioloinguistics, it examines the pragmatic functions the variables perform and explores whether their surface realisations correlate with their functions and with the broad social dimensions of age and gender. Qualitative analysis shows that the selected discourse variables perform multiple functions in the interpersonal and textual domains of discourse. The quantitative analysis demonstrates that pragmatic and social factors are strongly implicated in the variation in the form of these variables, although the extent of their impact differs according to the geographical distribution of the variants involved. The occurrence of non-localisable and supra-local discourse variants, which have relatively wide geographical spreads, is strongly conditioned by discourse function.  The impact on their distribution of social factors is generally less important than that of function. Conversely, localised variants, whose usage is less widespread, do not display function-specific patterning. Their occurrence is highly constrained by social factors.  The variables’ multifunctionality and, to an extent, their variants’ functional distributions are attributed to processes involved in grammaticalisation, including semantic bleaching, pragmatic strengthening, phonetic attrition and decategorialisation. The study demonstrates that discourse variants, like variants in other components of language, are not randomly distributed in speech but display systematic patterning along multiple contextual factors.

<p> Marital naming choices are inevitably made from within the framework of the historical sociopolitical contexts and carry the potential to index particular social, cultural, and political meanings or to be made on the basis of personal, individual, or relationship-bound rationales. While same-sex couples may draw upon the choices and discursive frames put forth in the rationales provided by opposite-sex couples, there is no precedent of tradition for same-sex marital naming, allowing for flexibility and variety in the choices made and rationales invoked by married same-sex couples. This paper demonstrates that the reflexivity necessitated by being a member of a marginalized group newly entering into a normative practice influences naming decisions. Same-sex couples present highly nuanced rationales for naming choices and draw from but rework the traditional, heteronormative frame of marital naming by incorporating novel naming choices. Same-sex couples often make appeals to what &ldquo;makes sense&rdquo; for a particular couple in their own relationship in the context of traditional practice, whether regarding children and being seen as a family, biological factors in parenting, or resistance to heteronormative practice. </p>

<p> Treating aging as a disease has led to what Carrol Estes termed &ldquo;the aging enterprise:&rdquo; the development of services to house and care for elders. Much is known about the power structures in such facilities, but the issue of socio-economic decline and its relation to elder health has not received a great deal of attention. This thesis analyzes interview and participant-observation data from a sample of residents in an assisted living facility (ALF) to ethnographically explore the way physical and socio-economic experiences of decline emerge in participant narratives. Findings indicate elders construct identities of illness that draw from institutional discourses that diminish their personhood. The narrative structure of declining health is also found to be compatible with other socio-economic descriptions of decline. The multiple discursive patterns of decline culminate in a model of ALF resident dependency. Based on this model, recommendations are made to affirm elder personhood and enact agency in ALF.</p>

<p> This dissertation draws from research in memory studies, discourse analysis, ethnographic methods, and human rights rhetoric to argue that analysis of on-the-ground discourses in the form of lived narratives advances how we think about human rights. Eleven Bosnian Americans who came to Salt Lake City, Utah as a result of the Bosnian war in the mid-1990s were interviewed. I examine how participants share stories about prewar, wartime, and postwar life, and how trauma emerges from those narratives in the form of &ldquo;traumatic breach&rdquo; and &ldquo;(dis)placement trauma&rdquo;. My findings suggest that a practice of human rights is more effectively understood as <i>lived,</i> accounting for the enduring embodiment of trauma manifest throughout these collected, lived narratives, rather than as physical, static manifestations of violence. As opposed to universalist conceptions of justice put forth by The Hague, this research pays attention to local particularities as significant groundwork for theorizing human rights violations and war trauma.</p>

University of Macau / Faculty of Arts and Humanities. / Department of Portuguese