Abstract
Hip-Hop and Country musicians concurrently create culture while being affected by the specific subculture of their sociolects and communities. Within these specific speech communities, language is a vital part of constructing reality; of showing class values; and of defining who is ‘in’ and who is not - often in terms of being in opposition to and standing apart from mainstream society. Inclusion in the Hip-Hop and Country subcultures indicates a delineating boundary of authenticity, which clearly suggests that there are others who are therefore not ‘authentic’ and must be excluded. Members view their group as separate and work to maintain the boundary from the other, from the majority. In the sociolinguistic exploration of Hip-Hop and Country communities, there are five major themes that will be considered: Legitimacy, Commodification & Globalization, Boundary Margins, Sexuality, and Rebellion – giving prominence to the social context of language use rather than to purely lexical considerations within the two communities.
Highlights
While recognising the distinctive approaches to organising language, cultural beliefs, and experiences in both the Hip-Hop and Country music communities, it is clear that there are multiple pragmatic universal commonalities.Debate concerning linguistic relativity has been persistent since the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis was first proposed. Wierzbicka (1997, p. 5) argues for a strong version in stating, “it may seem obvious that words with special, culture-specific meanings reflect and pass on ways of living characteristic of a given society, and ways of thinking,” while Pinker, as a cognitive scientist, argues against any version of linguistic relativity, claiming “there is no scientific evidence that languages dramatically shape their speakers’ ways of thinking” (1994, p. 48)
Hip-Hop and Country musicians concurrently create culture while being affected by the specific subculture of their sociolects and communities. Within these specific speech communities, language is a vital part of constructing reality; of showing class values; and of defining who is ‘in’ and who is not - often in terms of being in opposition to and standing apart from mainstream society
If many researchers acknowledge at least moderate Whorfianism as true for languages of different cultural groups or nation-states, we may argue that the same holds true for sub-cultural groups and sociolects within wider society
Summary
While recognising the distinctive approaches to organising language, cultural beliefs, and experiences in both the Hip-Hop and Country music communities, it is clear that there are multiple pragmatic universal commonalities. If many researchers acknowledge at least moderate Whorfianism as true for languages of different cultural groups or nation-states, we may argue that the same holds true for sub-cultural groups and sociolects within wider society. Within these specific speech communities, language is a vital part of constructing reality; of showing class values; and of defining who is ‘in’ and who is not - often in terms of being in opposition to and standing apart from mainstream society
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