Modeling Socioeconomic Class in Variationist Sociolinguistics

Abstract

AbstractModeling socioeconomic class has been a persistent challenge in the analysis of sociolinguistic variation. While early stratificational models formulated on the basis of socioeconomic indicators such as income, occupation, and area of residence revealed compelling patterns of linguistic variation, they were critiqued for their lack of explanatory power at the interactional level and for their marginalization of those without paid employment. Subsequent models have employed cross‐disciplinary concepts such as the linguistic market, social networks, and communities of practice, prioritizing local social distinctions that are understood to reflect or even constitute abstract structural categories such as ‘working class’ or ‘middle class’. It is argued that a full socioeconomic class paradigm for sociolinguistics would also theorize class at the aggregate level, and to this end, sociological class models may prove useful. Contemporary sociological class analysis at the level of social practice offers additional avenues for interfacing with sociology.