Linking community coherence, individual coherence, and bricolage: The co-occurrence of (r), raised bought and raised bad in New York City English

Abstract

Although most sociolinguists assume that regional varieties are coherent – that features co-occur in the speech of individuals and in the broader sociolinguistic patterns of the speech community – little empirical work has verified this co-occurrence. This paper considers three approaches to the study of co-occurrence – community coherence, individual coherence, and bricolage – for three variables of NYCE. There is community coherence for (r), raised bought and raised bad in NYCE, three features which are all in withdrawal in the regional variety. In addition, some speakers, mainly older and younger white New Yorkers, also show individual coherence for these variables, but over 70% of speakers are “incoherent” in their use of the three variables. A bricolage analysis of one speaker's use of the three variables in micro-interaction reveals a range of co-occurrence strategies, including both alignment and dis-alignment with the traditional social meanings associated with these variables as well as a lack of co-occurrence. These practices highlight the importance of a bricolage perspective in linking individual speaker practice to community-level patterns, and suggest that both views are necessary in understanding how multiple variables co-occur in speech communities.