Introduction

This paper deals with the notion of attitude towards the language and speech community, and
linguistics performance of power. I begin with a brief sketch of the history of the word
stereotype, its integration into the humanities. Stereotype in linguistics and the main stages of
its study. And then, I will depict the appropriateness of language in ethnography and
communication and the linguistics performance power in a community.

1. Stereotype
1.1 Definition of Stereotype
Originally, the word stereotype derives from two Ancient Greek roots: στερεός ‘solid’ and
τύπος ‘impression’. It was first used by the French printer Firmin Didot (1764–1836) in 1796
as a term for duplicate impression of an original typographical element. Later, it became a
part of everyday language (in the beginning, it was used mostly in the form of an adjective
stéréotypé ‘stereotyped’) to describe repetitive situations that lacked originality or
spontaneity, cf. a quote from Le Père Goriot by Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850): « ces sottises
stéréotypées àl’usage des debutants » ‘such stereotyped phrases as these, in the mouths of
beginners’ (Balzac 1834).

In 1922, it was introduced into the social, cultural and psychological studies by the American
writer Walter Lippmann (1889–1974), who saw stereotypes as pictures in our heads which
simplify reality:“Stereotypes may not be a complete picture of the world, but they are a
picture of a possible world to which we are adapted” (Lippman 1922).

Nowadays, the notion of stereotype is widely used in different fields, and even in linguistics,
there are two major traditions of understanding it.

The first approach defines stereotype as a fixed form, fixed expression, or even fixed text. It
implies that stereotypes include proverbs, clichés, famous quotations, etc. and are studied by
phraseology.

According to the second approach, stereotype is seen as a fixed content, a fixed mental image
of a person, an object or an event, and the language gives different means of its
representation. This account puts stereotype into the frame of semantics, pragmatics and
lexicography.

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On account of this, stereotype is a held belief about a group of people that has no scientific
basis but that affects how a person perceives and analyses communication. Stereotyping leads
to bias and a lack of empathy when communicating with other people.

According to Lippman (1992), stereotypes are presented in people’s culture and they absorb
them through the process called socialization as they are conducting behaviour patterns. He
further adds that there are four classifications of stereotypes. First, stereotype is more simply
than a reality. Secondly, people tend to acquire stereotype from cultural mediators rather than
experiencing by themselves with the grounds of being stereotyped. Thirdly, erroneous claims
that all stereotypes false. Some may less false than others, and some may less harmful than
others. Lastly, stereotype is resistant to change, though after several decades ago, old
stereotypes are still embedded in people’s perception (Lippman in Ajtony, 2011: 138).
Therefore, it can be concluded that stereotype occurs in socialization process whether it is
consciously learned or not.

Stereotypes are oversimplified generalizations about groups of people; stereotypes can be

based on race, ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation almost any characteristics. They may
be a positive (usually when referencing one’s own group such as when women suggest they
have better soft skills), but are often negative ( Usually towards other groups, such as when
number of a dominant racial group suggest that a minority racial group is dangerous or
stupid). Therefore, Stereotypes are preconceived ideas or judgments about people based on
their characteristics.

Making judgments about people according to linguistic features is a common form of

stereotyping; it is possible because of the highly “visible” nature of the markers in language
which are correlated with extra linguistic categories in a society, such as sex, age, social
class, religion, and ethnicity. The social categories in turn carry with them traditional
attitudes and expectations which strongly influence all communication, and which govern
what Goffman (1967) calls “interaction ritual.”

Social “typing” or categorization is probably a necessary part of our procedures for coping
with the outside world. It allows us to quickly define our orientation to other individuals, and
is a basis for our cultural sense of “manners” and other conventions of interpersonal relations.
It is a means for establishing preliminary relationships (Abrahams 1972). If we did not
“know” how to relate appropriately to different groups of people before we were acquainted
with them personally, we would be socially ineffective to say the least, and perhaps even

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unable to function normally in a society. “Social structure is the sum total of these
typifications and of the recurrent patterns of interaction established by means of them”
(Berger and Luckmann 1967: 33).

Social typing should thereby be seen as a potentially positive and in any case inevitable
process. The typing may assume negative aspects, however, Attitudes toward Communicative
Performance and then it ceases to be just a mode of socialization. It may become a means of
disaffiliation or rejection, or of rationalizing prejudice, and it is this negative connotation that
is usually associated with the term “stereotyping.” Further, the stereotyping involves “an
exaggerated belief associated with a category. Its function is to justify (rationalize) our
conduct in relation to that category” (Allport 1954: 187).

Because of their negative connotations and consequences, we might like to claim that
stereotypes have no basis at all in observable reality, but they often do. Tannen’s (1979a)
contrast of New York Jewish and Los Angeles non-Jewish conversational style, for instance,
documents that New York Jewish speakers talk more, interrupt (overlap) other speakers, and
use “machine-gun” questions, all of which supports common stereotypes about the way
“they” talk. Stereotyping departs from observable reality, however, when such attributes as
“pushy” or “rude” are inferred from these conversational strategies: i.e. judgments not about
how people talk, but about what kind of people they are. From the perspective of the Jewish
speakers in the study, these conversational strategies are intended as positive moves to
develop rapport.

Another claim we might like to make about stereotyping is that it operates between members
of different groups only at initial or superficial contact, and does not survive repeated
interaction. Unfortunately, this does not necessarily lead to “better understanding.”

On the contrary, it tends to reinforce mistaken judgments of the other’s intentions

and tends to increase expectations that the other will behave in a certain way. . .
Misjudgement is calcified by the conviction of repeated experience. (Tannen 1979a:
161)

Stereotypic expectations may well become self-fulfilling prophesies. Our preconceptions of

how a doctor “should talk,” for instance, are usually met; if not, patients may be suspicious of
the doctor’s credentials or professional competence. As cited from the introduction of
Ethnography of communication that stated I know from years of residence in the state of

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Texas that most Texans do not actually say Howdy in greeting, but the stereotype was
reinforced each time I stepped up to the counter of a Texas-based airline in other parts of the
country and heard Howdy, Ma’am (which was probably used intentionally to reinforce the
corporate Texas image). The stereotype of southerners speaking more slowly than
northerners, on the other hand, is generally not supported by objective observational data; it is
evidently a misinterpretation of their typical “breaking” of vowels as a slower rate of speech.
When we come to Ethiopian context some tonal language speakers speak loudly than other
speakers.

Another type of stereotyping is not based on observable traits at all, but is a negation of the
values held by the group which is typing. In this case, the traits which are attributed are not
specific to the language of the target group, but tend to be the same for all “others”
(Abrahams 1972). These are universally dehumanizing, imputing childish or animalistic
behaviour, immorality, and absence of manners, rules, or laws: i.e. absence of culture. The
group doing this kind of stereotyping defines culture in terms of its own beliefs and practices,
and then interprets all differences as deficiencies. Information about these judgments
provides no insights about those being typed, but may be interesting and useful with respect
to understanding the values of the source group.

When groups remain at a distance from one another, stereotypes may have little effect,
though this is decreasingly true in our shrinking world. Similarly, the stereotypes which a
subordinate group holds toward the dominant group in a society may have little or no direct
effect on that group (which is often unaware of them), although it clearly affects intergroup
communication. In both cases, the stereotyping serves to strengthen group boundaries and
emphasize group unity. Stereotypes which the dominant group in a society holds toward
subordinate groups, on the other hand, are often adopted by those groups as part of their own
self-image.

Recognition of the stereotypes which are held by and about a speech community as such are
relevant for ethnographic description in at least three important respects:

 As a dimension of the attitudes related to language which are part of the content of the
description;
 As part of the framework of socio-cultural expectations within which communicative
behaviour must be interpreted by participants or observers; and

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  As a check on the reliability of reported data when doing research in a community
other than one’s own. When ethnographers are working in their own speech
community, stereotypes must be recognized so that they will not bias perceptions, and
so they can be brought under conscious control.

Therefore, Stereotype is a belief about someone or a group looks like. According to Smith
(1980), the most common stereotype occurred in inter-group conflict is the negative
stereotype although stereotype may be positive or negative. It emerges since the members of
a dominant group define negative attributes or characters to member of other groups
(minority). The existence of stereotype leads to the acts suppressing the minority as for
instance group differentiation. One of the group differentiations is racial discrimination
between black and white. Racial discrimination has been a history since centuries ago. This
racial discrimination aimed to slavery in some countries back then, for example in the United
States and Ukraine in last week while war in Russia. Disparities have been setting up among
black and white. Those disparities can be found in public facilities, education, transportation,
administration, and any others in every single aspect of daily life. Those phenomena can
occur since there is dissimilarity among the group where a group of race is claimed as a
higher one than the others.

1.2 Most common stereotypes

A stereotype is a widely held belief about a certain social group or a type of individual based
on prior assumptions. Stereotypes can also be based on popular cultural depictions of groups
of people or deeply held beliefs passed down through generations. Often, stereotypes can be
negative or even harmful. The most common stereotypes that tend to be negative include:

Cultural stereotype- each culture has key characteristics that make them vibrant and unique.
Unfortunately, each culture also has its share of stereotypes either negative or positive about
themselves or other cultures. They are often broad and overly generalized, and this can lead
to some harmful beliefs and misconceptions about individual and entire cultures. For
instance, people from X country are better than people from Y country. People from X
countries are less educated than people from Y or Z countries.

Social stereotype- Whether it’s the jocks, nerds, cheerleaders, or Goths in your school or the
lone wolf at work, people sometimes make assumptions about different social groups based
on their characteristics, economic class, age, skills, etc. While these can be positive, there are
many negative stereotypes about various social groups. For instance, X type of person is
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better at something than Y type of person simply because they belong to that group. X people
are not attractive because they are part of a certain group.

Racial stereotype - One of the most egregious kinds of stereotypes is racial stereotypes.
These stereotypes are extremely harmful to others and can result in discrimination and even
violence. While stereotypes especially racial and cultural stereotypes are often harmful, there
are some that can seemingly reflect positively on groups. Nevertheless, stereotypes contribute
to misconceptions about and inequality among groups because they reduce individual or
collective experiences to a few characteristics that do not apply to everyone. For instance, X
race is superior to Y race. People from X race are not as good at something as people from Y
race.

Gender stereotype- People of different genders have always been compared and contrasted
with each other, which can result in stereotypes. Negative stereotypes can arise when people
of a certain gender make generalizations about another gender or even their own. For
instance, X gender is better at something than Y gender. X gender is more aggressive than Y
gender. Females are weak.

Religious stereotype- Religion is a deeply significant aspect of life for billions of people
around the world and impacts most people in some way. Because religion is so prevalent,
both positive and negative stereotypes have been formed over the years. For instance, People
who practice X religion are extremists and hypocrites. People who follow X belief system are
all foolish or selfish.

Therefore, stereotypes are rarely correct and certainly not always accurate, they are not
always negative. In fact, some cast a positive light on a certain group or type of people.
However, they are still over-generalizations and ultimately not helpful because individuals
and groups cannot be limited to a few stereotypical traits. Stereotyping leads to categorizing
people into groups based on certain characteristics or ideas about that group. This can be
limiting at best and lead to unintentional or intentional discrimination and even violence at
worst. Even in instances of apparently positive or neutral stereotypes, stereotyping can still be
harmful because it creates preconceived ideas or expectations for people that they may not
meet, or it can make a person feel reduced to those stereotypical traits. For instance, if
someone does not live up to the “positive” stereotypes of their group, they may think they fit
the negative stereotypes by default. Furthermore, the negative stereotypes can lead to feelings
of inferiority or that the person will be stereotyped no matter what they do.

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 1.3 Communication of stereotypes in society

A stereotype is a held belief about a group of people that has no scientific basis but that
affects how a person perceives and analyses communication. Stereotyping leads to bias and a
lack of empathy when communicating with other people. One of the ways stereotyping has an
effect on the way people communicate is through stereotype threat. Studies show that this
happens often in classrooms and work places.

Stereotype threat is when a person does not perform or communicate to the best of his ability
because he is feeling self-conscious of his perceived minority status. A woman may not speak
up when she is a part of a group comprised mostly of men due to stereotype threat. Often but
not always, persons of any racial or ethnic background may feel a need to stifle their
communication when surrounded by people outside of their own group.

When stereotype threat affects communication in the work place or classroom, there are
simple practices that can be used to remedy the situation. These practices focus on
minimizing negative subtext and allowing an open flow of information between participants.
When these practices are implemented successfully, people focus on ideas rather than group
identities and stereotypes.

Communication is essential to the social life of human beings. We, as in a group-living

habitat, rely on it for exchanging information, building relationships and creating a more
civilised world. While communication adds value to social harmony, on the other hand,
messages with negative connotations or rumours sustain or even power up through ongoing
propagation. Arising from prevalence of online social platforms such as Facebook and
discussion forums, cyber-bullying is typical yet devastative result of disseminating offensive
messages across netizens (a member of the community of internet users).

1.4 Communication and maintenance of stereotypes in society

“Communication, the verbal and nonverbal interaction between two or more interdependent
individuals, would contribute to the maintenance of stereotypes if conducted at a large
collective level.” Prof Yeung further explained that stereotypes are socially shared beliefs and
expectations we hold about certain social groups. Stereotypes can actually be positive,
neutral, and negative. Unfortunately, most stereotypes circulating in our society carry
negative connotations. To explain the stereotypes’ self-perpetuating cycle of maintenance,

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she quoted the Mainland China-Hong Kong conflict as an example, “there are increasing anti-
Mainland sentiments among Hong Kong people. Hong Kong people in general hold negative
stereotypes of Mainland Chinese tourists and immigrants. During daily life communication,
people tend to communicate information that is consistent rather than inconsistent with the
existing stereotypes. Such communication activities gradually reinforce and maintain the
negative stereotypes of Mainlanders. This can also be reflected by the use of various
derogatory terms to describe the Mainlanders.”

While stereotype plays its role in cultural conflicts, it emerges even if you grasp nothing
about a person’s background but only his or her physical appearance. We can easily form
immediate impression of others based on their body shapes and types. To understand how
weight stereotype affects our first impression, Prof Yeung has conducted an interesting field
experiment on how people develop, inherit and propagate impressions on an unfamiliar
overweight individual. Resembling a traditional party game “The Broken Telephone”, it
showed random people on the street with a fictitious story about an overweight man and had
they verbally reproduced the story to another person. The story consisted of comprehensive
attributes which were consistent, neutral or inconsistent to typical stereotypes on obesity.
Based on the reproduced message, the listener carried on to tell the story to the next person
until the tale reached the last person. So, what could they recall and what had they omitted?
It came to Prof Yeung’s attention that not only did most participants emphasise the negative
traits but they even exaggerated or made up the unfavourable connotations. “The results
showed us how communication maintains and reinforces the negative stereotypes of obese
people, as communicators tend to transmit the obesity-related stereotypical information and
drop out the counter-stereotypical information,” said Prof Yeung, explaining how the
experiment simulated the process of information transmission in our social networks.

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 1.5 Reducing stereotyping and prejudice

“Education can enhance our understanding of individual differences, reduce stereotyping and
prejudice. The service-learning element in Lingnan’s curriculum exposes students to
multicultural interactions with people from diverse backgrounds, and helps students realise
that individuals are unique idiosyncratic entities that are not necessarily defined by group
stereotypes,” she pointed out the importance of social contact and communication as the best
way to improve human relations and reduce prejudice. “We offer a general education course
entitled ‘Human Relationship and Interpersonal Skills in Organisations’ for undergraduates,
aiming at brushing up our students’ interpersonal and communication skills which are
conducive to social harmony.” Prof Yeung hopes to instill in her students a sense of
appreciation towards diversity in society.

Devoted to exploring topics on stereotypes, Prof Yeung is planning to conduct some new
research projects like cross-cultural differences in the expression and experience of
stereotypes. “Bias, prejudice and even discrimination could happen primarily based on a
single cue such as physical appearance, gender, or occupation”.

Biased language frequently occurs with gender, but can also offend groups of people based
on sexual orientation, ethnicity, political interest, or race.
Stereotyped language is any that assumes a stereotype about a group of people. For example,
don't assume a common stereotype about blonde women:
Incorrect: Although she was blonde, Mary was still intelligent.

Revised: Mary was intelligent.

Writing without gender bias is sound and effective. You should always consult your
professional or disciplinary community standards or imagine what is appropriate to your
rhetorical audience or genre. Writing without gender-biased language is necessary for most
audiences. How you approach your audience, what assumptions you make or expectations
you assume about it are choices you make as a writer.

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 2. Appropriateness
The term appropriateness is defined as “the extent to which a use of language matches the
linguistic and sociolinguistic expectations and practices of native speakers of the language”
(Richards & Schmidt 2010: 30).This definition means that the knowledge of pure linguistic
rules apart from their socio-cultural expectations is not quite enough to achieve successful
communication. To speak appropriately, “a speaker needs to know what is grammatical and
what is suitable (appropriate) for the particular situation” (ibid: 30). Therefore, there are some
social factors that play a significant role in being appropriate or the vice versa and “in any
situation, linguistic choices will generally reflect the influence of one or more of the
following components: the participants, the setting, the topic and the function speaking”
(Holmes 2001: 8).According to (Fraser & Nolan 1981: 96) the realization of politeness varies
from context to context, and they point out that politeness is actually a contextual judgment:
"No sentence is inherently polite or impolite". So, polite behaviour is assessed according to
the different paralinguistic factors such as distance, solidarity, gender, etc.

Holmes (2001: 271) argued that “You can cause offence by treating someone too familiarly,
as in (a) or by treating them distantly as in (b) below:

(a) Post Office delivery man to elderly upperclass woman. Can I have your signature, my
love?

(b) Director to colleague at a meeting where first names are generally used. - I think it's time
you let someone else contribute, Mr. Morgan. (ibid: 271).

Many studies of attitudes toward language use (including, but not limited to stereotypes) have
not dealt with language in general, but what language or variety of language is considered
more appropriate in a specific context. This is basic to all sociolinguistic survey procedures,
and has included studies of Spanish and English (e.g. Fishman, Cooper, and Ma 1971),
varieties of Arabic and English (El-Dash and Tucker 1975), varieties of Norwegian (Blom
and Gumperz 1972), and African American English (Hoover 1975). Findings generally show
that attitudes toward the appropriate use of codes in a speech community have a very high
correlation with their functional distribution, and the relative social status of their speakers.

Many of the attitudes reported relate to which language or variety is considered appropriate
for formal education; as opposed to informal interaction. These attitudes are particularly
strong in areas where creoles are for the first time being considered viable media for

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instruction, at least in primary grades. The following quotation is from a letter to the editor of
the Trinidad Guardian in response to a report on a Language Arts syllabus which includes
recognition that English is not the native language of most Trinidadians:

If the language of the barrack yard and the market is to be the accepted mode of
expression in the school-room . . . there would be no need for teachers . . . We could save
the high wages of those experts and set them free to go and plant peas . . . where they can
give full vent to this dialect stuff. . . . What if not broken English is this dialect? . . . I feel
that such discussions should be banned from our news media as a most damaging . . .
exercise. (Reported by Sealey)

Conversely, Trinidadian Creole is considered the most appropriate code in events associated
with local culture, conversation between intimates, joking, and “liming.” According to
Sealey, a person telling a joke in Standard English in her speech community will be a
laughing stock, and calypsos sung in a variety of English nearer to the standard end of the
Creole continuum are marked as being “for export”: i.e. not for the people. At the same time,
many parents can be heard telling their Creole-speaking children to “speak properly”; the
notion that somehow the Creole code is improper is instilled from early childhood in the
home, and is reinforced in the schools.

Although Cape Verdean Creole has been introduced in bilingual programs in New England,
there is a residual attitude among native speakers that it, too, is not appropriate for written
communication. In its African context (the Republic of Cape Verde), Crioulo was the Low
variety in a diglossic situation, and Portuguese the High. Even if proficiency in Standard
Portuguese was not achieved, all written communication, regardless of its nature, was
produced in some attempt at Standard Portuguese. This attitude is clearly reflected in Silva’s
recollection of an experience in Massachusetts:

My cousin’s younger sister, having come to the US before starting school and having to
leave her sister a note, since the older sister did not know any English, resorted to writing
the note in Crioulo. The mere fact that Crioulo was used to communicate the written
message produced laughter among Crioulo speakers.

The addition of English for the immigrant speech community has resulted in a trilingual
situation. The high and low functions of Standard Portuguese and Crioulo remain essentially
the same as they were in Cape Verde, with English used without a strict allocation to domain.

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According to Silva, rejection of Crioulo in favour of Portuguese is interpreted as more of a
rejection of the cultural values and identity of the community than is symbolized by the use
of English. The more recent influx of Cape Verdeans from Portugal and other former
Portuguese colonies accentuated this situation.

Another reference to the High variety of a language being associated with writing is reported
by an Indonesian, where bahasa resmi is the official/ standard language associated with
education, and bahasa sehari-hari the daily/colloquial language associated with conversations
with intimates, instructions to servants, etc. Although the High variety is more prestigious, a
speaker who uses it exclusively is considered pedantic, or worse, “putting on airs.” Gunarwan
reports:

I remember one occasion when, during a casual conversation, a friend made a mistake of
using the literary word semalam ‘last night’ instead of the everyday word tadi malam.
Another friend responded mockingly, saying Si Didi belajar membaca ‘Didi learns to
read’, referring to a reading series formerly used in the elementary school.

There has been only minimal acceptance of native language literacy within the Navajo speech
community, where Navajo generally functions for oral communication and English for
written. Even in a single communicative situation, such as a meeting of tribal representatives,
business is conducted in Navajo and minutes recorded in English. Unlike the cases of Cape
Verde and Indonesia, relative prestige is not a factor in considering Navajo inappropriate for
literacy: Navajo is currently accorded at least as much prestige as English, although that was
not always so. Spolsky and Irvine suggest the reason is that “when the introduction of literacy
is associated with a second language, an alien culture, and modern, technological functions,
literacy in these new domains is preferred in the alien, second, or standard language” (1982:
76). Resisting native language literacy in this instance might thus be seen as a means of
protecting traditional culture from the modernizing (and more public) influence of writing, or
it could reflect an attitude that the native language is unworthy of being written, or that
writing it would strip it of its intimacy.

The appropriateness of one language or variety in a multilingual, international context is even

more complex, but rules for selection are quite distinct, and strong negative attitudes often
accompany inappropriate language selection.

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Speakers generally have some positive feelings about their native language, at least for
expressive purposes in intimate or informal contexts with members of the same group.
Attitudes toward acceptability and appropriateness for other functions can be understood only
in relation to a complex of social and historical factors. Since these include the language in
which questions about them are being asked, and the ethnic and linguistic identity of
interviewers or observers, responses on this aspect of language attitudes are particularly
susceptible to biases in elicitation and interpretation.

3. Linguistic Performances of Power

Language is not even used to portray power; it is also used to acquire it. Social control,
influencing feelings and moulding mind, determining access to knowledge, and otherwise
institutionalizing prejudice are some of the roles of language that may be included in this
category. Particular of these roles are executed at a macro societal level via overt or covert
policies that encourage some languages or variants of language over others, and thereby
privilege their speakers. The way we use language, both subconsciously and consciously,
determines our linguistic performance of power. That is to say, within the constraints given
by the specific community one is a part of, such as one's family, one can adjust one's own
language use to manipulate the unconscious language use and perception of others. Language
is an essential factor in communication, promotional strategies, corporate reputation, and
positioning because of its power in regards with identity. Once it comes to reaching out to an
audience as a writer either through broadcasted media, linguistic performance is critical to the
outcome in terms of identity, image, and public sentiment. The language used by prose
authors, for instance, contributes to the writer's public image and, as a result, his or her
personal brand. Linguistic aesthetic is critical to the process: the writer's or speaker's
language is a reflection of his or her personality, and linguistic aspects have an impact on the
public impression. As a result, language portrayal and performance of media personalities,
such as comparing male and female performance of representations in the same profession
and public arena but with distinct cultural origins and linguistic styles, would be beneficial.

3.1 Social control

The realization of social control may be seen in ritual communication. In religious and
magical usage, some words and speech acts are believed to have supernatural power and thus
embody strong control functions in their own right, often including those which constitute
blessings, curses, and charms. Such belief explains in part why sacred or archaic languages

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rather than vernaculars are employed in many religious rituals, and why some religious and
magical texts must be recreated in exactly the same form for each performance. When any
speech event is formalized, there are fewer options open to its participants and others claim
that in societies where there is more emphasis on ritual events, more direct social control is
exerted than in societies where there is less emphasis on ritual. This point is relevant to the
study of speech communities in their administrative domains, as well as in religious and other
ceremonial areas. The functions of ritual rhetorical genres on Sumba Island, Indonesia, for
instance, include creating and displaying authority as well as ratifying the power of others
(Keane 1997; Kuipers 1998), and rhetorical strategies in Quechua sermons create influence
for the priest and maintain social control of the congregation (Howard-Malverde 1998). The
heavy patterning of ritual discourse also extends into other domains where speaker goals
include construction and maintenance of system and order, such as teachers’ vested authority
in school classrooms to suppress student speech and control speaking rights. Prescribed rules
of address and privileged efficacy ascribed to speech acts according to hierarchical rank are
essential to the rigid system of control required for the operation of military organizations
(where even relaxation of rules may require a speech act (e.g. “at ease”) to license).

Suppression of speech as a means of social control in a larger context is illustrated by Berman

(1998), where she claims it has greatly contributed to the successive ascendance of absolute
rulers in Java. She further relates patterns of speech and rules for interaction which are used
(and accepted) by Javanese women as contributing to their low position in the social
hierarchy. These include many of the potential linguistic displays of power (or
powerlessness) discussed above, such as lexical elements (adverbial time markers), nonverbal
features (pauses, vocal noises, intonational contours), and discourse organization (code-
switching and style-shifting, reported speech, text boundary indexical).

Berman illustrates a critical approach to language research and application in both her preface
and her conclusion:

My intention is that the people of Indonesia recognize how they have contributed to
these abuses and power, and that their everyday language practices are essential sites for
political and social reform. (P. v)

Language in Javanese contexts is anything but neutral, and participation and the varying
degrees to which it is accomplished are socially charged, highly meaningful actions.
Linguistic analyses must combine discourse processes with social processes to remove “the

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mask” that conceals the complex and politically charged dimensions underlying theories of
person, meaning, and social action. (p. 220)

Some of the most socially important research has been conducted on events in legal and
medical settings, such as that by Walker (1985) which was mentioned above. It has generally
focused on the power relationships that exist in them, and on issues of justice or equity in the
delivery of social services. O’Barr (1982), for instance, reports how different verbal strategies
may influence jury decisions about credibility; Wodak-Engel (1984) describes how social
class differences in rules for speaking lead to discrimination against working-class
defendants; and Conley and O’Barr (1990) and Gibbons (1994) include documentation of
how differences in narrative organization and other usage patterns create problems in
courtroom communication which disadvantage particular social groups. Grimhaw
summarizes the implications of similar discourse phenomena in the “powerfulness-
powerlessness” domain of control:

Courtroom studies show that witnesses who produce powerful speech, epitomized by
assured affirmative or negative responses to questions (“yes” or “no”), are seen as more
credible than those who employ hedges, hesitation forms, polite forms, question
intonation, tag questions (“You know about tag questions, don’t you?”), and intensifiers.
Not surprisingly, control attempts by actors who speak with assertive assurance are most
likely to be successful. (2000: 51)

Looking at other ways in which control is exerted in legal proceedings, research also shows
how the way in which lawyers phrase questions to eyewitnesses leads them to different
recollections and testimony. For instance, Shuy (1995) reports that when eyewitnesses are
asked how fast a car was going when it “smashed” into another car, they estimate a speed of
ten miles an hour faster than when they are asked how fast the car was going when it “ran”
into the other car (Loftus 1979), and when eyewitnesses are asked if they saw “the broken
glass” at the accident (with the definite article the), many agree that they did even though
there was no broken glass present. This contrasts with their recollection when they are asked
if they saw “any glass” at the accident (with the indefinite determiner any). Judicial control
factors include determining turn-taking and speaking rights in the courtroom, giving
directives about what speech and other evidence is to be included or excluded from the trial
record and wording and sequencing instructions to a jury.

BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 15

Jacquemet (1996) provides analysis of judges’ linguistic power in Italian courts, focusing on
a set of trials which prominently featured pentiti, informants who typically receive immunity
from prosecution in exchange for their testimony. The courtroom data include code-switching
among Standard Italian, Neapolitan, and the rural Campanian variety; the judges exert control
by adjusting the content of witnesses’ remarks as they recast Neapolitan and Campanian
utterances into Standard Italian “for the record.” In these cases, multilingualism in the events
gives judges more discretionary power and allows them to provide greater protection for the
informants. In other multilingual contexts, the judge’s power to make linguistic judgments
may result in blatant discrimination. For instance, in US v. Mendoza-Cepeda (No. 00-3116,
8th Circuit, May 18, 2001), the judge decreed that “Since the officers did not intimidate or
make any promises to the defendant, the officers’ determination that the defendant
voluntarily consented to the search was reasonable even though defendant spoke no English”
(example from C. Thomas Mason).

There is some danger of being overly simplistic in data collection and interpretation, of
course. The power dimension is in large part a factor of the social role-relationship that
participants bring with them to an encounter, but as is demonstrated in the case of medical
encounters (e.g. Treichler et al. 1984; Ainsworth-Vaughn 1994, 1998), it is also a dynamic
co-constructed product of interaction. In contrast to some analyses which focus only on
powerful doctor questions and powerless patient answers, for instance, Ainsworth-Vaughn
describes complex events which include many other conversational features in which

Patient and physician perform an intricate dance of discourse moves with multiple
possible meanings, rather than filling simple questioner-questionee roles. Both participants
propose to exercise power (control over information, the emerging discourse, and future
actions), and both defer to one another by mitigating their attempts. (1994: 195)

Even with consideration of such complexities, however, Ainsworth-Vaughn does not deny
the power asymmetries in such encounters, nor claim equality in discourse control.

Also in the domain of medicine, early sociolinguistic research on doctor– patient

communication by Skopek (1975) documents miscommunication that could result in
misdiagnosis or mistreatment because of differences in power, gender, ethnicity, and social
class. Continued work in this area (e.g. Wodak 1996) highlights additional problems in
medical communication and suggests changes in training procedures and other remediation to
effect changes in discourse practices. A review of Wodak’s book by Norman Fairclough from

BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 16

the perspective of critical social research attests to the potential political impact of
sociolinguistic intervention, while adding a cautionary note:

Disorders of discourse” practices that constitute “barriers to communication” can be

subjected to critique, and critique can lead to the suggestion of different practices. Such
changes in discourse may contribute to changes in the “structures of organization”.
However, in the absence of such structural changes, changes in the discourse may actually
result in more subtle, and thus more effective, forms of domination. (1999: 605)

Literacy, or lack thereof, may also be used as a powerful device for social control. Literacy
tests for access to voting rights were used in the American South until the 1950s to
disenfranchise the majority African American population, who had less access to good
schools because of legal racial segregation.

3.2 Influencing thought

Media coverage, advertising, politics, and religion are all examples of how language
promotes ideological purposes. Trew's (1982) investigation of linguistic form and political
ideology in news reporting, for example, demonstrates how emotive language selection,
grammar and syntax, content inclusion or exclusion, and metaphorical usage in news articles
and editorials may all influence public perception and sentiment. Trew presents news
accounts from two newspapers that reflect opposing ideologies: the Sun, which has no formal
allegiance with a political entity, and the Morning Star, which is a magazine of the
Communist Party of Great Britain. A confrontation between revellers and policemen was the
subject of both claims.

The ideological contrast is most obviously apparent in terms selected for reference to the
revelers, with the Sun using such phrases as “the mob,” “a gang of youths,” “thugs,” and “a
rioting mob of Black youths” and the Morning Star referring to “groups of youngsters” and
the “great gay surging carnival.” Words like “mob,” “gang,” and “thugs” clearly connote
organized lawless activity, while “youngsters” and “gay surging carnival” connote
spontaneous and innocent high spirits. It is also noteworthy that the Sun mentioned the race
of the revelers multiple times, but the Morning Star omitted this information entirely. Trew
also analyzes who did what to whom, or the contrastive participant and thematic structures of
the reports. Transitive clauses with agents are much more common in the Sun, with processes
more frequently reported in the Morning Star without participants. The police are more
prominent in the Morning Star as initiators of action, however. Verbal strategies in the two
BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 17
accounts project values of preserving versus contesting the status quo, and of legitimizing the
actions of the establishment versus a subordinated group.

Another domain illustrating ideological force is advertising, where a major function of

language use is to create needs, as well as to shape public opinion and perceptions. Which
communicative symbols and strategies will be considered effective are of course (and
significantly) culture specific, but they often follow conventions that are adapted from
traditional visual and verbal arts.

Many parallels with advertising may be found in the political domain, including primary
reliance on nonverbal symbols in some contexts, carefully crafted verbal appeals as primary
in others, and differing bases of appeals to “proof” and prestige. Slogans in politics are akin
to jingles, and may also cement simplistic associations. Similar strategies are used to
influence thought in the domain of religion, including power-laden nonverbal symbols, artful
oratory, and differential appeals to authority, “logical” proof, and emotions such as fear of
damnation and hope for salvation. Advertising jingles and political slogans share a number of
cohesive and functional features with religious chants.

In addition to comparing means of influencing thought cross-culturally, ethnographers might

well give more attention to intracultural analysis of how ideology is shaped verbally across
institutional structures within the same societies.

3.3 Access to knowledge

As there is a disparity of competence among parts of society, language is a fundamental role
in inequalities of access to knowledge and ultimately power. Unique varieties inherent in
intricate communities' communicative repertoires are often distributed unequally throughout
groups of people, and language proficiency in a given domain often impedes or preclude
input and participation. Differentiated competence and access are seen as correlations to
existing societal divisions and socialization practices from a purely descriptive perspective;
from a critical perspective, enabling differential access to knowledge is seen as one strategy
by which some individuals, groups, and institutions establish and maintain control over
others: in other words perform power.

Gatekeeping is however one approach, which Erickson and Schultz define as "short meetings
in which two persons meet, typically as outsiders, with one of them having power to make
decisions that determine other's future" mostly In Counsellor as Gatekeeper (1982: xi). The

BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 18

concept can be applied to a wide variety of institutionalised tasks that share some common
purpose, as well as preceding cultural encounters as prerequisites that are only attainable on a
preferential basis. The social implications are especially important in education because
student-teacher interactions (or institutionalized extensions) often determine access to career
paths and thereby upcoming social inclusion; they can separate students for socialization and
limit knowledge transmission in some areas to a chosen few.

Considering parameters for educational segregation or "surveillance" frequently incorporate

either overtly or covertly student manifestation of proficiency in "standard" grammatical
structure and "correct" application, I characterize them as linguistic performances of power.
Linguistic proficiency can only be recognized in diverse communities if it has been proved in
the majority group's official or prestigious language.

The phenomenon and level of competence that students bring to such encounters can be
associated with changes in linguistic experiences that are inherent in the nature of social
divisions (a correlation view); it can also be attributed to societies' general tendencies to
maintain power; and, in some cases, it can be attributed to contemplate design and
discrimination. As Saville stated in book of “The Ethnography of communication” (2003)
Romaine illustrates the historical occurrence of this last possibility in her account of

How speakers of Hawai’i Creole English have been discriminated against through
education in a school system which originally was set up to keep out those who could not
pass an English test. In this way it was hoped to restrict the admission of non-White
children into the English Standard schools set up in 1924, which were attended mainly by
Caucasian children. . . . By institutionalizing what was essentially racial discrimination
along linguistic lines, the schools managed to keep Creole speakers in their “place” and
maintain distance between them and English speakers until after World War II. (1999:
289)

Interpersonal communication in formal educational contexts is typically essential for

acquiring the transmission language and thereby understanding the content of areas like as
law, medicine, and linguistics, although there are several alternative venues for socialization
in other fields. Some of them are even more exclusive than the others.

Religion becomes a subject that deserves special attention for its use of limiting access to
knowledge to maintain power and authority. When religious scriptures are written, they are

BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 19

usually encoded in language forms that seem to be foreign or incomprehensible to the
average individual, prompting the interpretation of priests or others with specialized
knowledge.

Literacy is a source of power within itself, and though universal literacy has definitely
increased the potential for increased access to knowledge, it has also introduced another
dimension of inequitable distribution. Access to literacy was severely restricted in the United
States during the era of slavery to prevent insurrection through education; contemporary
societies that refuse literacy to women or other groups are wielding a similar discriminatory
power. Finally, the literate's choice of orthography has power.

Apart from access issues, the script used may also be a manifestation of power. For example,
the Cherokee syllabary (developed in the 19th century by an American Indian named
Sequoia) was purposefully created to be unlike the Roman alphabet as an assertion of Indian
identity and power apart from the European colonists. In the same way, Korea's adoption of
the unique Hangul alphabet was a sign of cultural independence. In Japan, hiragana was seen
as the "women's hand" and was regarded as powerless.

3.4 Other institutional discrimination

Linguistic discrimination in service encounters is most visible when the official designation
of language "service" is not one in which some of those being "served" are fluent. In the
United States and other countries where such designations have been established or where
there is no option for communication in minority languages, a lack of competency in the
prevailing language brings tremendous to prejudice against immigrants. As a result of
differences in linguistic competence within immigrant families, the traditional family
structure can disintegrate, as children learning the dominant language at school act as
translators and brokers for their parents in service encounters, inverting the power structure
and undermining parental authority.

Language policies, which even by their own nature entail power and politics, typically
prioritize some languages or varieties of language over others, and thereby benefit their
speakers, and indeed institutionalize potential language-related discrimination. Language
policies usually handle two basic issues: language choice (designating official languages for
government, legal procedures, education, administration, and the news media) and language
engineering (principles for standardizing and modernizing the language chosen). Fostering
national unity and identity, creating educational and economic resources, and expanding
BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 20
communications systems are all societal aspirations for these initiatives, especially at the
early stage of nation-building.

Some of the discrimination that emerged as a result of language policy seems to be more
casual, but it is still ingrained. For example, a social phenomenon I mentioned earlier that has
prioritized learning of the dominant second language at the expense of minority languages in
the United States and England, as well as replacing nonstandard varieties with the standard in
the case of bilingual or monolingual speakers, is the widespread belief that not speaking
"good" English is the primary causal factor in large segments of minority group communities'
low socio - economic status, and that learning "good" English is the primary cause of their
own low economic status.

According to critical social theory, communication is an element of economics, and language

is a resource that produces linguistic capital, which is why language has such a powerful
potential for social elevation or discrimination. The power conferred on a specific linguistic
form, style, or dialect affiliated with the legitimacy and prestige of a particular social position
is known as "linguistic capital." Inequalities in capital between jobs convey power
differences. (Chouliaraki and Fairclough, 1999, p. 101.)

The power of a foreign language may also be shown through media coverage of political
protests around the world; banners are typically printed in English so that messages can be
seen with the widest possible audience.

BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 21

 Summary
The above-mentioned points are extremely intertwined because each one exists because of
the dedication of others. In sociolingistical dimensions of the language, they are common.

They can be favorable (especially when referring to one's own group, such as when women
claim to have better soft skills), although they are frequently negative (Usually towards other
groups, such as when number of a dominant racial group suggest that a minority racial group
is dangerous or stupid).

Tannen’s (1979a) contrast of New York Jewish and Los Angeles non-Jewish conversational
style, for instance, documents that New York Jewish speakers talk more, interrupt (overlap)
other speakers, and use “machine-gun” questions, all of which supports common stereotypes
about the way “they” talk.

Making judgments about people based on linguistic attributes is a common form of

stereotyping; it is possible due to the extremely "visible" nature of linguistic markers that are
connected with non-linguistic categories such as sex, age, social status, religion, and ethnicity
in a culture. Similarly, preconceptions held by a subordinate group regarding the dominant
group in a society may have little or no direct impact on that group which is often oblivious
of them, but they do have a significant impact on intergroup communication.

The nature of the connectedness between a co participant's strategic communication, its

linguistic realization, and its embeddedness in linguistic and cultural settings has been
defined as being calculated with respect to the appropriateness of a donation and its linguistic
realization as one or more articulations.

The way we use words, both instinctively and consciously, creates an antithesis to the
concept of power. That is to say, within the confines provided by the specific community one
is a part of, such as one's family or occupational group, one can adjust one's own language
use to control the unconscious language use and perception of others.

BY: G/Iyesus M. To: Emebet B. (PhD) Page 22

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