The Handbook of Language Variation and Change

2003 ◽  
pp. 707-728 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Language Variation ◽  
Language Variation And Change

Hands off the metadata!: Comparing the use of explicit and background metadata in crowdsourced dialectology

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (s1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamsin Blaxter ◽  
David Britain
Keyword(s):  
Language Variation ◽  
Social Background ◽  
Smartphone Application ◽  
Background Information ◽  
British Isles ◽  
Language Variation And Change ◽  
Digital Era ◽  
The Social ◽  
Dialect Variation ◽  
Regional Dialect

Abstract In this article we assess the extent to which we can collect plausible data about regional dialect variation using crowdsourcing techniques – the BBC Future Survey – without explicitly gathering any user metadata, but relying instead on background information collected by Google Analytics. In order to do this, we compare this approach with another crowdsourced survey, operated from a smartphone application, which examines the same site – the British Isles – but which explicitly asks users to submit detailed social background information – the English Dialects App (EDA) (Leemann et al. 2018). The EDA has the disadvantage that there is a considerable user drop-off between completing the dialect survey and completing the social metadata questionnaire. The BBC Future Survey, however, only collects information on where users are physically located when they complete the survey – not where they are from or even where they live. Results show that the BBC Future Survey produces a plausible snapshot of regional dialect variability that can complement other more sophisticated (expensive, time-consuming) approaches to investigating language variation and change. We suggest the approach constitutes a digital-era rapid anonymous survey along the lines of Labov (1972), serving similar aims, with similar success, but on a much much larger scale.

scholarly journals Implicitness and experimental methods in language variation research

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (s1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Rosseel ◽  
Stefan Grondelaers
Keyword(s):  
Language Attitudes ◽  
Language Variation ◽  
Underlying Structure ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Language Variation And Change ◽  
New Methods ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Status ◽  
Terminological Confusion

AbstractThis special issue brings together research that reflects on the status and role of different types of language attitudes, and the methods required to study them. Many linguists distinguish between explicit and implicit attitudes towards language, but more often than not it remains unclear how these constructs are defined, and what their potential significance is for the study of language variation and change. The contributions to this issue address this question by critically reflecting on theory and methodology, by highlighting (and clarifying) the terminological confusion, and by showcasing new methods and tools. It is hoped that this special issue can inspire theoretical and methodological convergence in a notoriously fragmented field, so that attitude researchers can identify the underlying structure of language attitudes, and the theoretical significance of language evaluation to processes of language variation and change.

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