Three different requests for information:

1. From a friend

Where were you last night? I rang to see if you wanted to come to the movies.

2. In court from a lawyer

Could you tell the court where you were on the night of Friday the seventeenth of March?

3. From a teacher to his pupils in school on the day after Hallowe'en.

I know some of you went 'trick-or-treating' last night and so I thought we might talk a bit today about
how you got on. Did you go out last night Jimmy?

In each of these three utterances the speaker is trying to elicit the 'same' information from the
addressee, but the context dramatically influences the form of the query. Each request I for information
is expressed quite differently.

Language varies according to its uses as well as its users, according to where it is used and to whom, as
well as according to who is using it. The addressees and the context affect our choice of code or varlety,
whether language, dialect or style. The difference between the three utterances in example 1 are
stylistic differences, and it is style which is the focus of this chapter.

In the second section of this book, we looked at ways in which people's speech indexes their group
membership. These features are also sometimes described as stylistic features. Feople talk of an ethnic
style or a female register, for instance, referring to the way people speak by virtue of their ethnicity or
gender, regardless of context. In this chapter, however, the focus is on the ways in which speech is both
influenced by and constructs the contexts in which language is used, rather than characteristics of the
speakers. We first consider the influence of the addressee on the speaker's language, exemplifying from
less formal contexts where the degree of solidarity between participants is an important factor
contributing to choice of speech style. Then we examine features of speech style in a range of contexts
which vary in formality, looking at the interaction between the formality and status dimensions. Finally,
we investigate the way that distinctive styles or registers may be shaped by the func tional demands of
particular situations or occupations.

4. Style in non-Western societies

Example 19:

When he first visited Tokyo, Neil found his Japanese was fine for reading and for talking to other young
men of his own age, but in any other interactions he found himself floundering. He knew that he needed
to express the appropriate degree of respect to his hosts, and to the various business contacts he was
introduced to. Yet his control of the complex system of Japanese styles and honorifics was not yet good
enough. He struggled along in a 'basic' or 'plain' style, occasionally inserting features of 'polite style, and
frustrated that the subtleties of Japanese interpersonal interaction seemed beyond him.

(Inoue, 1979)
Japanese is one of a number of languages with a special set of grammatical contrasts for expressing
politeness and respect for others. Before deciding which style of Japanese to use, Japanese speakers
assess their status in relation to their addressees on the basis of such factors as family background,
gender and age (and even one day's age difference can be important), as well as the formality of the
context. They then select from plain, polite and deferential styles. The choice of appropriate style
involves consideration of a range of word forms and syntax. The appropriate form of the verb, for
instance, varies in different styles.

Example 20:
(a) Sakai-ga watashi ni chizu-o kai- te- kure- ta
Sakal-Subject me for map- Object draw gerund-plain past
marker marker form tense
'Sakai drew a map for me.'
(b) Sakal-senpai- ga watashi ni chizu-o
Sakai-respect Sub me for map-Obj
form marker marker

kai-te kure-mashi-ta.
draw-gerund polite-past tense
form
Mr Sakai drew a map for me.'
The basic straightforward non-deferential utterance represented by (a) contrasts with the politer style
used in (b) where the polite verb ending-mashi is added to the verb. Utterances can also be modified in
a variety of ways according to the attitude and relationship of the speaker to the subject matter of the
utterance. In (b) the speaker uses the respect form (or honorific) -senpai (appropriate to older
colleagues) to express respect for the person mentioned. In addition to these morphological means,
there are also other strategies for increasing the politeness of one's style, such as using negative
construction (analogous to English wouldn't you like to...), using longer sentences, avoiding dialect
words and using Chinese loan words.

Knowledge of the complexities of stylistic variation in countries like Japan and Korea Is a sign of a
person's educational level and social status. Better-educated people have greater control of the various
styles. So the social status of a speaker can be deduced from the skill with which they select and use the
various styles of Japanese or Korean.

Although the Islamic revolution has increased the use of reciprocal forms of address, ritual courtesy is
still very important in Iranian society too. Relative status must be carefully assessed on every occasion in
order to select the correct combination of grammatical forms, vocabulary items and pronunciation in
other words, the appropriate style for the context and the addressee. Expressing deference in Tehran
Persian involves choosing from clusters of particular verb forms, as well as carefully selecting the
appropriate high, neutral or low alternative from twenty-four personal pronoun forms.

Here, too, context is a relevant factor and Iranian reading styles, in particular, contrast dramatically with
other styles of speech. In all social groups, there is a dramatic increase in the percentage of standard
variants in people's reading and word-list styles, compared to their careful and casual styles. For at least
some linguistic features, then, this society marks speech style differently from social group membership.
The choice between the vernacular and standard variants of some sounds is influenced by the social
context in which a person is speaking, independently of their social group membership. In these cases,
the standard variants mark reading style rather than social group membership. In other communities,
too, reading style contrasts markedly with other styles. Where reading aloud is not a common activity, it
may be best measured along a different dimension than that of formality.

Javanese is another example which illustrates the complexity of stylistic variation which can be found in
languages. As mentioned in chapter 6, the choices facing a speaker of Javanese involve two ranked
social dialects, within each of which there are three stylistic levels. In other words, both social group
membership and social context influence a speaker's linguistic choices. In addition, there is also the
possibility of raising any utterance an additional 'half-level' by various linguistic means. Each level
involves different pronunciations, differ- ent grammatical forms and different items of vocabulary. There
are three words for 'house', for example, omah, grija and dalem, and five forms for 'you'. Once you have
selected the appropriate stylistic level, you must follow the rules for which forms may occur with which.
You cannot jump around between levels.

Example 21:
Menapa nandalem mundhut sekul semanten? 3 HIG
a H

Menapa panjenenga mendhet sekul semanten? 3

n

Napa sampéyan mendhet sekul semonten? 2

Napa sampéyan njupuk sega semonten? 1

a

Apa sliramu mundhut sega semono? 1

b

Apa kowé njupuk sega semono? 1 LOW

QUESTIO YOU TAKE RIC THAT

N E MUCH

MARKER

Did you take that much rice?

The sentences in this example are ordered from the most formal 'high' style (level 3a, known as krama
inggil) to the least formal 'low' style (level 1, known as ngoko). Though there is a great deal of overlap -
especially between half-levels - every sentence is different from each of the others, and not a single
word-form is common to all of them.

Selecting the appropriate 'level' of Javanese for a particular interaction involves, as else. where, taking
account of your relationship to the addressee in context. As elsewhere, too, solidarity (or degree of
friendship) and relative status (assessed by such factors as age, wealth, descent, education and
occupation) are important in assessing the relationship. The result may be that each of the participants
selects a different level of Javanese. If I am an ordinary educated citizen speaking to a high government
official, I will use the highest level 3a to express respect, but the official will use only level 1, ngoko, to
me. Two very high status Javanese, on the other hand, will both use level 3 to each other. Faced with
this array of levels and the social consequences of a wrong choice - insult or embarrassment, for
instance - one can readily understand the popularity of Indonesian, the national language. In a society
where social divisions are not so clear as they once were, Indonesian offers much simpler stylistic
alternatives.

Javanese provides a graphic example of a language where the stylistic choices are much more clear-cut
than in English, l.e. the co-occurrence rules can be explicitly specified. The discussion of diglossia and
situational code-switching in chapter 2 provided further examples of linguistic variation motivated by
contextual features. In its narrow definition, diglossia involves two distinct styles or varieties of a
language - a High variety and a Low variety - distinguished by features of pronunciation, grammar and
vocabulary, and appropriately used in different contexts. The broader definition of diglossia adopted by
some sociolinguists includes situational switching between dialects of a language, such as a regional
dialect and a standard language, or even between distinct languages. So the shift by Norwegian students
from Ranamål in their village homes to standard Norwegian with less regionally marked pro- nunciation
when at university is a style shift motivated by features of the context - addressee, topic and setting.
Similarly, the switch from Greek at home to English at university by Maria, a linguistics student at La
Trobe university in Melbourne, can equally be regarded as an example of a style switch. Situational
code-switching and diglossia are therefore further examples of the effect of contextual factors on
linguistic behaviour.

We have illustrated that linguistic features which signal social group membership are often, but not
always, signals of contextual variation too. A high level of education and familiarity with using language
in more formal contexts frequently go hand-in-hand, and so it is scarcely surprising that the features
which characterise each tend to overlap. However, particular pronunciations, syntactic constructions or
vocabulary items may simply indicate a person's social group without also patterning for style.
Conversely, linguistic features may serve primarily as markers of particular social contexts rather than
particular groups. This pattern is illustrated in the final section on register differences.