LESSON 3: RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN LANGUAGE AND SOCIETY 

Before you proceed: 

Fill in the following KWL chart. What do you know about language and society? What do
you  still want to know about it? What have you learned about it or what do you expect to
learn? 
WHAT I KNOW  WHAT I WANT TO KNOW WHAT I
LEARN

Language is a process of  I want to know what are the  I learn that
communication while society  history of languages while language and 
is a group of people who lives  in  society what are the society is
together. major  effect of society in connected on one 
our   another.
language

TRUE OR FALSE 
1. True 
2. True 
3. False 

4. False 
5. True 
6. False 
7. False 
8. False 
9. False 
10. True 

ACTIVITY 

Reflect on this: What do you think is the most widely used language in Southeast Asia? How
do  ASEAN countries regard English? At what stage/ age do you start learning English in
school and  at home? Share your thoughts below 

Based on my research the most widely used language in Southeast Asia is English however
the  calculation of Mandarin speakers is much higher than English speakers but they
consider the  numbers of people who speak English in different places not like in mandarin
the numbers of  people who speak mandarin in just one place, it means that English had
wide spread all around  southeast Asia. At a stage of childhood I used to speak English for
fun since I love to watch  cartoon movies it has a great impact on my childhood days. 

ANALYSIS  
Based on the illustration below, make a short essay on how language affects society and
vice  versa? 

The illustration demonstrates the connection between language and society there are lots of
study  that provide enough proofs and analysis that language can affect society same as the
society can  affect the process of language. The best way to summarize the illustration is that
language and  society is a both process of communication between individual and social group
of people that  can be distinguished by the actors Affecting Language Use, Relationship
Between Language  and Society and lastly the Various Definitions of Sociolinguistics
ABSTRACTION 
Answer the following questions: 

1. How does the speaker's social role affect language use? 

The social role of a one person can affect the whole language use, in a process on how the 
speaker act in a particular group of people by its culture, belief, adaptation and a pattern of 
behavior. There are different ways of language in different social roles for example how
the  teacher communicate between the students is different between how the student
communicate  with his/her the teacher. 

2. How does culture influence linguistic behavior? 

We have different culture around the world and it shows how our linguistic behavior can
be  affected, for example here in the Philippines we have a group of LGBTQ members
and this  group of people who share same interest and culture that creates development,
that can also  affect there linguistic behavior creating new ways on how to communicate
on one another. 

3. What is the relation between language and society? 

Language is a form of social interaction inside a society, even though group of people with 
different interest have their own way of communication. Now this two can’t be separated 
language can help us to communicate and share our knowledge inside the society same as
society  provides way and process of communication. 

4. What is the relationship between language and people? 

Language is very important in our daily lives it plays a major role in our whole journey. 
Language is our process of development sharing values, culture and belief as they say that
the  world is nothing without language if there is no language verbally still there is
language in  different ways and that’s why language and people is inseparable. 

5. Make a list of how many groups you are a member of, i.e., do you move
out and in groups in a day, a week, or even a month? (i.e., class, women' 
s/men's group, church, social club (name it) sports club (name the sport), 
music, etc. 
I do have a lot of groups. I have a group of female friends, I also have my group of
Genovate  families and I’m also a member of a female athlete team. I do have my study
buddies the  Bachelor of Secondary Education English major 3a and in addition I am a
member of Minuyan  Proper scholarship. 

APPLICATION  
Explain your answers on the blanks below. 
1. What are some of the grammatical variances between the language of men and women
that  have been revealed in linguistic research?  

Based on my studies that languages of men and women have a different variance even though 
they share the same system of language but it depends on behavior, tone, action and more as
men  speak more powerful and directly women speak intellectually and careful they have their
own 
way of communicating as gender can be a way on how a person express his/her opinion
and  more on psychological behaviors. 

2. In your own words, briefly describe two of the possible explanations for
these  grammatical differences. 

I do believe that the best example is a human emotion. Women and Men shows their
emotion  differently they come with different ways on expressing feelings and this process
also inter  related in our language on how they communicate by others based on their
emotional state and  behavior. 

3. In your opinion, is one of the more plausible than the other? Why? 

Yes because we have different ways of analyzing and processing something. And it depends
on  our understanding men speak directly while women speak specifically. 

Post-test 
Multiple Choice. Circle the letter of your choice. 

1. Sociolinguistics is most appropriately defined as: 

a. The study of human behavior 

b. The scientific study of vocal sounds 
c. The study of animal vocalizations 
d. The scientific study of language usage 

2. Which is NOT a part of sociolinguistics? 

a. The study of people's attitudes toward specific speech characteristics 

b. The study of the sounds in an articulated language 
c. The general perception of a dialect within a society 
d. It is the study of socioeconomic and political power factors and their influence on
language  change. 

3. All of the following statements about language are true, EXCEPT: 

a. It is a system of communication. 
b. It often involves mutual intelligibility. 
c. It can include many dialects. 
d. All the word meanings are the same. 

4. The study of how socio-cultural norms and contexts shape language use in society is called. 

a. Sociolinguistics c. Phonetics 
b. Speech pathology d. Linguistics 

5. The following are factors affecting language use EXCEPT: 

a. Age and gender c. Education 
b. Social status d. linguistic determinism
Essay: 
1. Explain the sociolinguistics situation of multilingual societies. Ex. New
Zealand,  Philippines, etc. 

Based on my research Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an 
individual speaker or by a group of speakers and one of the best examples is the Philippines. 
The Philippines is a multilingual nation with more than 170 languages when we talk about 
majority most of the Filipino’s are bilingual since Tagalog and English is part of our daily
lives  and according to my perception Philippines can be a top group of multilingual country
since we  are engage with globalization, school education system or curriculum offers a
variety of foreign  languages. Some may think it is a chaotic way of communication however
as long as we can  understand one another anything is possible for improvement. 

2. Why is gender considered as variable sociolinguistics?  

Why is gender considered as a variable of sociolinguistics? Simple as There are lots of ways
on  how language develops and how people tend to express themselves based on their
gender. One factor is that we tend to express our emotions based on our identity with the
impact of our  environment. And there are lots of factors related to gender such as tone,
behavior beliefs,  psychological aspect and more based on our gender identity. 

3. Suppose language is an essential human attribute, and humans are necessarily social 
beings. What problems and paradoxes do you see for theoretical work in
sociolinguistics if  the last grapple with the relationships between linguistic and social
factors? 

Since we have different societies with different culture and language there are
misunderstanding.  Number one barrier is the difficulty for people in communicating because
they can’t speak and  understand other languages. There are conflicts that can cause chaotic
situations, second one is  the cultural barriers since we have different culture there are beliefs
that is not acceptable to  other’s beliefs and more difficulties. However for me in our
generation the challenges is lessen  by the help of technology and innovation now if we can’t
understand one another just in one  click there are lots of translation and apps that helps us to
understand one other and this  generation stage is also accepting the beliefs of other since
everyone can express there selves  easily by the used of social Media
LESSON 4 SOCIOLINGUISTIC CONCEPTS 

Before You Proceed…  

Watch the following videos online. Observe the use of language in the following
situations.  How are they similar? How are they different? 

The videos are both scenario of answer and question portion of a beauty pageant when both 
candidate didn’t understand the questions properly because of language barrier. They struggle
to  answer the questions since they can’t understand the language of the speaker and they
can’t  speak the language properly. 

ACTIVITY  

Daniels (1985) wrote an article about his 'nine ideas about language.' How much do
you  agree with his ideas? Tick the box that best corresponds to your answer. 
Statement  Strongly  Agree  Neutral  Strongly  Disagre
Agree Disagree e

1. Children learn
their native
language 
quickly,
efficiently, and
mainly without 
instruction.

2. Language operates
by rules.

3. All languages have

three major  
components: a
sound system,
vocabulary,  and a
system of grammar.

4. Everyone speaks a
dialect. 

5. Speakers of all
languages employ a 
range of styles and a
set of sub-dialects
or  jargon

6. Language change is
expected.

7. Languages are
intimately
related to 
societies and
individuals who
use them.

8. Value
judgments about
different 
languages or
dialects are
matters of taste.

9. Writing is a
derivative of speech.

ABSTRACTION 
Answer the following questions:  

1. Code-switching is a result of language contact. With CS, two or more languages can
be  mixed and used at the same time. How do languages preserve their own identity?  

I personally believe that Code-Switching is a good way to preserve a one language. We

learn  new languages yet we still used and know the system of the first language that we
usually used,  in other words a person can balanced his or her way of communication which
is a good thing  because we can switch or mixed both easily to the language that we are
comfortable.
2. Like plants and animal species, when a language becomes nonexistent, it is gone
forever.  Over half of the world's 6800 languages are endangered. How do you think we
can preserve  and conserve our dying languages? Suggest some ways.  

The best way to preserve these languages is that we have to keep using those languages
every  day, as much as possible we have to keep in touch in these languages we have to
consider and  keep the whole language system in our education we should keep studying
and practicing by  using those languages. 

APPLICATION  
These some words from Tok Pisin. From what English words are they derived? The
answer  is shown for the first entry. 
Tok Pisin  Gloss  Answer

Taim biloong kol  Winter  Time belong cold

Pinga bilong fut  Toe  Finger belong on foot

Hamas krismas you  gat? How old are   How many Christmas you  get?
you?

Kukim long paia  Barbecue  Cooking big pig

Sapos  If  Suppose

Haus moni  bank  House of money

Kamup  arrive  Come up

Tasol  only  That’s all

Olgeta  all  All together

Solwara  sea  Solo water

House sik  hospital  House of sick

Handet yia  century  Hundred year

Post-test Based  
on the discussion, determine whether the following statements are TRUE or FALSE.
On  the space provided, write the letter T if you think that the idea is right to the
sociolinguistic  concepts discussed above and F if it is not. 

1. TRUE 
2. TRUE 
3. FALSE 
4. FALSE 
5. TRUE