Social Group Lexes in the Illawarra: The Register of the Secondary School

Abstract

Four adolescent social group lexes from the Illawarra region of New South Wales are characterised in this paper using two instruments: the one a measure of meanings available to individuals in passive vocabulary, and the other a measure of meanings available in active vocabulary. The four social group lexes are contrasted with a fifth social group lexis from Sydney. The nature of social group lexis and its measurement are discussed. The lexico-semantic weaknesses (relevant to the register of the secondary school) of the Wollongong poorer working-class social group lexis are linked with the educational failure of its users; the relative strengths of immigrant- descent Wollongong social group lexes are linked with the relative educational success of their users. The influence of the phenomenon of 'extralinguistic context' on lexical selection is discussed.