What is sociolinguistic competence?

What is sociolinguistic competence?

Definition

Sociolinguistic competence is the ability to interpret the social meaning of the choice of linguistic varieties and to use language with the appropriate social meaning for the communication situation.

Note:

Sociolinguistics is a very broad discipline and the term sociolinguistic competence could be used much more broadly than it is here, where we have restricted its use to refer to the recognition and use of appropriate varieties of language.

Examples
	When greeting someone in a very formal situation an American might say, Hello, how are you? or Nice to see you again, but if he were meeting a friend in an informal situation it would be much more appropriate to say Hi, or Hey, whatcha been doing?

Context for this page:

Concept module: sociolinguistic competence
In overview module: Pragmatic aspects of communicative competence
In overview module: Aspects of communicative competence
In overview module: Introduction to guidelines for a language and cult...
In modular book: Guidelines for a Language and Culture Learning Program, by Carol J. Orwig
In document collection: Other Resources
In bookshelf: Language Learning

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 3.5, published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 1999. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 23 October 1998