Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community

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dc.contributor.advisorMesthrie, Rajenden_ZA
dc.contributor.authorToefy, Tracey Lynnen_ZA
dc.date.accessioned2014-11-11T06:53:29Z
dc.date.available2014-11-11T06:53:29Z
dc.date.issued2014en_ZA
dc.descriptionIncludes bibliographical references.en_ZA
dc.description.abstractThis thesis provides a detailed acoustic description of the phonetic variation and changes evident in the monophthongal vowel system of Coloured South African English in Cape Town. The changes are largely a result of South Africa's post-apartheid socio-educational reform. A detailed acoustic description highlights the most salient changes (compared with earlier reports of the variety), indicating the extent of the change amongst working-class and middle-class speakers. The fieldwork conducted for this study consists of sociolinguistic interviews, conducted with a total of 40 Coloured speakers (half male, half female) from both working-class and middle-class backgrounds. All speakers were young adults, born between 1983 and 1993, thus raised and schooled in a period of transition from apartheid to democracy. Each of the middle-class speakers had some experience of attending formerly exclusively White schools, giving them significant contact with White peers and teachers, while the educational careers of the working-class speakers exposed them almost solely to Coloured peers and educators. The acoustic data were processed using methods of Forced Alignment and automatic formant extraction – methods applied for the first time to any variety of South African English. The results of the analysis were found generally to support the findings of scholars who have documented this variety previously, with some notable exceptions amongst middle-class speakers. The changes are attributable to socio-educational change in the post-apartheid setting and the directionality of the changes approximate trends amongst White South African English speakers. The TRAP, GOOSE and FOOT lexical sets show most change: TRAP is lowering, while GOOSE and FOOT are fronting. Although the changes approximate the vowel quality used by White speakers, middle-class Coloured speakers use an intermediate value between White speakers and working-class Coloured speakers i.e. they have not fully adopted White norms for any of the vowel classes. Working-class speakers were found to have maintained the monophthongal vowel system traditionally used by Coloured speakers.en_ZA
dc.identifier.apacitationToefy, T. L. (2014). <i>Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community</i>. (Thesis). University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Linguistics. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9525en_ZA
dc.identifier.chicagocitationToefy, Tracey Lynn. <i>"Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community."</i> Thesis., University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Linguistics, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9525en_ZA
dc.identifier.citationToefy, T. 2014. Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community. University of Cape Town.en_ZA
dc.identifier.ris TY - Thesis / Dissertation AU - Toefy, Tracey Lynn AB - This thesis provides a detailed acoustic description of the phonetic variation and changes evident in the monophthongal vowel system of Coloured South African English in Cape Town. The changes are largely a result of South Africa's post-apartheid socio-educational reform. A detailed acoustic description highlights the most salient changes (compared with earlier reports of the variety), indicating the extent of the change amongst working-class and middle-class speakers. The fieldwork conducted for this study consists of sociolinguistic interviews, conducted with a total of 40 Coloured speakers (half male, half female) from both working-class and middle-class backgrounds. All speakers were young adults, born between 1983 and 1993, thus raised and schooled in a period of transition from apartheid to democracy. Each of the middle-class speakers had some experience of attending formerly exclusively White schools, giving them significant contact with White peers and teachers, while the educational careers of the working-class speakers exposed them almost solely to Coloured peers and educators. The acoustic data were processed using methods of Forced Alignment and automatic formant extraction – methods applied for the first time to any variety of South African English. The results of the analysis were found generally to support the findings of scholars who have documented this variety previously, with some notable exceptions amongst middle-class speakers. The changes are attributable to socio-educational change in the post-apartheid setting and the directionality of the changes approximate trends amongst White South African English speakers. The TRAP, GOOSE and FOOT lexical sets show most change: TRAP is lowering, while GOOSE and FOOT are fronting. Although the changes approximate the vowel quality used by White speakers, middle-class Coloured speakers use an intermediate value between White speakers and working-class Coloured speakers i.e. they have not fully adopted White norms for any of the vowel classes. Working-class speakers were found to have maintained the monophthongal vowel system traditionally used by Coloured speakers. DA - 2014 DB - OpenUCT DP - University of Cape Town LK - https://open.uct.ac.za PB - University of Cape Town PY - 2014 T1 - Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community TI - Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community UR - http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9525 ER - en_ZA
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11427/9525
dc.identifier.vancouvercitationToefy TL. Sociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured community. [Thesis]. University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Linguistics, 2014 [cited yyyy month dd]. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9525en_ZA
dc.language.isoengen_ZA
dc.publisher.departmentLinguisticsen_ZA
dc.publisher.facultyFaculty of Humanitiesen_ZA
dc.publisher.institutionUniversity of Cape Town
dc.titleSociophonetics and class differentiation: A study of working- and middle- class English in Cape Town's coloured communityen_ZA
dc.typeDoctoral Thesis
dc.type.qualificationlevelDoctoral
dc.type.qualificationnamePhDen_ZA
uct.type.filetypeText
uct.type.filetypeImage
uct.type.publicationResearchen_ZA
uct.type.resourceThesisen_ZA
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