Labovs Stratification of New York City - Essay Example

Research methods and findings of Labov's Stratification of New York There are three main research methods, namely Causal Research, Relational Research and Descriptive Research. "Causal Research determines if one variable causes another variable to occur or change, while Relational Research can be seen as a study that investigates the connection between two or more variables is considered relational research." (http://www.petech.ac.za/robert/research.htm). The type of research employed in this report is descriptive research. Descriptive studies do not seek to measure the effect of a variable, instead they seek only to describe. The term descriptive is self-explanatory and terminology synonymous to this type of research is: describe, write on, depict. The aim of descriptive research is to verify formulated hypotheses that refer to the present situation in order to elucidate it. Descriptive research is thus a type of research that is primarily concerned with describing the nature or conditions and degree in detail of the present situation (Landman 1988. p. 59). Descriptive Research also aims to show what already exists in a population or group of people. For example, an opinion poll that is conducted to determine the most popular Presidential candidate in an upcoming election, or the type of research used in this paper. Results Here are the results of an interview carried out in a New York City school. During the interview, a black boy enters a room where there is a big, friendly white interviewer. The interviewer puts a fire engine or a block on the table between them, and asks the boy to describe what he can about the object. In the conversation below, the remarks in parentheses are the interviewer's (What would you say this looks like) A spaceship. (Hmmmmm.) Like a je-et. Like a plane. (What color is it) Orange. An' whi-ite. An' green. (An' what could you use it for) A je-et. (If you had two of them, what would you do with them) Give one to some-body. (Hmmm. Who do you think would like to have it) Cla-rence. (Mm. Where do you think we could get another one of these) At the store. (Oh-ka-ay!) (Labov, W 1972 p. 8) Here we can see the same kind of monosyllabic and defensive behavior and way of speech which produces a situation in which the child is in an asymmetrical situation where anything he says can, literally, be held against him, as Bereiter reported in his work. The child has seems to have acquired a number of devices to avoid saying much in a situation like this, and he strives quite hard to achieve this end. If one takes this interview as a measure of the verbal capacity of the child, it must be as his capacity to defend himself in a hostile and threatening situation. But unfortunately, thousands of such interviews are used as evidence of the child's total verbal capacity, or more simply his verbality: it is argued that this lack of "verbality" explains his poor performance in school. (Labov, W 1972 p. 8) The verbal behavior that is shown by the child in the interview above is not as a result of ineptness on the part of the interviewer. Rather, this is the result of regular sociolinguistic factors that are in operation both on the child and the adult in this asymmetrical situation. In urban ghetto areas, it is usual to encounter such behavior. Clarence Robins has worked with a group of boys ten to twelve years old, known as the Thunderbirds, and who dominated the preadolescent group in a low-income project in Harlem. In an interview involving a few younger brothers of the Thunderbirds aged between eight and nine years old, the question and answer approach was utilized, but this old approach did not work. Below is an extract from the interview between Clarence and Leon, an eight year old boy. CLARENCE: What if you saw somebody kickin' somebody else on the ground, or was using a stick, what would you do if you saw that LEON: Mmmm. CLARENCE: If it was supposed to be a fair fight-- LEON: I don' know. CLARENCE: You don' know Would you do anything...huh I can't hear you. LEON: No. CLARENCE: Did you ever see somebody get beat up real bad LEON: ...Nope CLARENCE: Well--uh did you ever get into a fight with a guy LEON: Nope. CLARENCE: That was bigger than you LEON: Nope. CLARENCE: You never been in a fight LEON: Nope. CLARENCE: Nobody ever pick on you LEON: Nope. CLARENCE: Nobody ever hit you LEON: Nope. CLARENCE: How come LEON: Ah 'on' know. CLARENCE: Didn't you ever hit somebody LEON: Nope. CLARENCE: [incredulous] You never hit nobody LEON: Mhm. CLARENCE: Aww, ba-a-a-be, you ain't gonna tell me that. This nonverbal behavior occurs in a relatively favorable context for adult-child interaction, since the adult is a black man raised in Harlem, who knows this particular neighborhood and these boys very well. He is a skilled interviewer who has obtained a very high level of verbal response with techniques developed for a different age level, and has an extraordinary advantage over most teachers or experimenters in these respects. But even his skills and personality are ineffective in breaking down the social constraints that prevail here. (Labov, W 1972 p. 10) This recorded interview with Leon can be used as a test of knowledge of the sociolinguistic factors that control speech. In the next interview, below, the social situation is different. The differences being that the interviewer Brought along Leon's best friend, eight-year-old Gregory, introduced taboo words and taboo topics, and proved to Leon's surprise that one can say anything into our microphone without any fear of retaliation. It did not hit or bite back. The height imbalance was also reduced because Clarence got down on the floor of Leon's room, thereby dropping from 6 feet, 2 inches to 3 feet, 6 inches, and brought along a supply of potato chips, changing the "interview" into something more in the nature of a party. The resulting changes in the style and volume of the conversation make a striking difference. CLARENCE: Is there anybody who says. "Your momma drink pee" LEON: [rapidly and breathlessly] Yee-ah! GREG: Yup. LEON: And your father eat doo-doo for breakfas'! CLARENCE: Ohhh! [laughs] LEON: And they say your father--your father eat doo-doo for dinner! GREG: When they sound on me, I say "C.B.M." CLARENCE: What that mean LEON: Congo booger-snatch! [laughs] GREG: Congo booger-snatcher! [laughs] GREG: And sometimes I'll curse with "B.B." CLARENCE: What that GREG: Oh, that's a "M.B.B." Black boy. [Leon crunching on potato chips] GREG: 'Merican Black Boy. CLARENCE: Oh. GREG: Anyway, 'Mericans is same like white people, right LEON: And they talk about Allah. CLARENCE: Oh, yeah GREG: Yeah. CLARENCE: What they say about Allah LEON: Allah--Allah is God. GREG: Allah-- CLARENCE: And what else LEON: I don' know the res'. GREG Allah i--Allah is God, Allah is the only God, Allah-- LEON: Allah is the son of God. GREG But can he make magic LEON: Nope. GREG: I know who can make magic CLARENCE: Who can LEON: The God, the real one. CLARENCE: Who can make magic GREG The son of po'--(CLARENCE: Hm) I'm sayin' the po'k chop God! He only a po'k chop God! [Leon chuckles] The "nonverbal" Leon is now competing actively for the floor; Gregory and Leon talk to each other as much as they do to the interviewer. The monosyllabic speaker who had nothing to say about anything and could not remember what he did yesterday has disappeared. Instead, we have two boys who have so much to say that they keep interrupting each other, who seem to have no difficulty in using the English language to express themselves. (Labov, W 1972 p. 12) Interpretation of results Middle class children in college and high school tend to complicate their syntax spontaneously, up to the point that their teachers and instructors despair to ensure that they can communicate in a clearer and simpler way. One can now transfer this demonstration of the sociolinguistic control of speech to other test situations, including IQ and reading tests in school. It should be immediately apparent that none of the standard tests will come anywhere near measuring Leon's verbal capacity. On these tests he will show up as very much the monosyllabic, inept, ignorant, bumbling child of our first interview. The teacher has far less ability than Clarence Robins to elicit speech from this child; Clarence knows the community, the things that Leon has been doing, and the things that Leon would like to talk about. But the power relationships in a one-to-one confrontation between adult and child are too asymmetrical. (Labov, W 1972 p. 13) This does not necessarily mean that it is not possible for an adult to get close to any child, or that some black children will not talk much when they are alone with an adult. It just means that social situation is the most important determinant of verbal behavior and that for an adult find out what a child can do, the adult has to enter into the right social setting or relationship with the child. Unfortunately, it is a reality that a great number of teachers have a lot of difficulty doing this. "We see, however, no connection between verbal skill at the speech events characteristic of the street culture and success in the schoolroom; which says something about classrooms rather than about a child's language." (Labov, W 1972 p. 13) Suggested improvements There are a lot of verbal skills which children from ghetto areas in New York and other parts of the world must have to learn, so as to succeed in their schooling activities, and some of these are indeed characteristic of the verbal behavior consistent with the middle class. Spelling precision, practice in handling abstract symbols, the ability to state explicitly the meaning of words, and having a richer knowledge of the Latinate vocabulary may all be useful acquisitions. Before imposing middle class verbal style upon children from other cultural groups, it is essential to ascertain how much of it is will be used for analysis. References Fasold, R. The Sociolinguistics of Language. Oxford, Blackwells, 1990 Labov, W. Academic Ignorance and Black Intelligence Landman. (1988). Navorsingsmetodologiese Grondbegrippe. Pretoria: Serva. http://www.petech.ac.za/robert/research.htm Read More

 

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