LING20010 Chap.9 Grammatical Variation and the Variable Context
Grammatical Variation and the Variable Context
Variationist analysis depends on knowing exactly where speakers have a choice. This chapter shows how to define the variable context: count every place a variant could occur, then exclude categorical contexts, where one form always appears, and neutralised ones, where you cannot hear which form was used.
The lecturer's own study of Ned Kelly's Jerilderie Letter is the worked case, narrowing 843 finite verbs to 45 genuine choices. The chapter then asks when two grammatical forms count as the same variable. Weiner and Labov accept rough referential equivalence, Sankoff relies on neutralisation in discourse, and Lavandera and Dines propose functional comparability, which lets intensifiers or be- and get-passives form a variable.
Where no closed set exists, as with wh-clefts and De Smet's hypervariation, rates per thousand or million words take over. It closes with the lecture's own position: the old slogan that variants are different ways of saying the same thing downplays social meaning, so variants are better seen as alternative ways of carrying out one shared job.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Defining the envelope of variation
- 02
Categorical and neutralised contexts
- 03
S-form verbs in the Jerilderie Letter
- 04
Referential equivalence and neutralisation
- 05
Functional equivalence
- 06
Hypervariation and rates per million words
Worked example · free
Calculate the rate inside the variable context
- 1Share in the variable context: 45 divided by 843 is about 0.053, or 5.3% of all finite verbs.
- 1Rate of -s inside the context: 24 divided by 45 is about 0.53, or 53%.
- 1Explain that only the second figure measures Kelly's choice, because the excluded verbs offered none.
Key terms
- Categorical context
- A categorical context is one in which only one variant ever occurs, so it is excluded from the variable context.
- Neutralisation
- Neutralisation is a context where the analyst cannot tell which variant was produced, or where meaning differences between variants do not matter.
- Northern Subject Rule
- The Northern Subject Rule is an agreement pattern, documented in Irish English, that allows -s on present-tense verbs with certain plural subjects.
- Functional equivalence
- Functional equivalence is the criterion that variants count as one variable when they do the same job in discourse.
- Hypervariation
- Hypervariation is variation in which the set of competing forms changes from context to context.
Grammatical Variation and the Variable Context FAQ
Why can't you just count every verb with -s?
Many verbs offer no choice: modals and most past tense forms never take -s, third person singular subjects always do, and others never do. Including them would mix choice with obligation and hide the real rate in the contexts where Kelly decided.
Do the variants of a grammatical variable have to mean the same thing?
Not under the functional view the lecture prefers. Variants can differ in nuance as long as they do the same job, and semantic factors such as subject adversity for the get-passive then become part of the analysis.
When should you report rates per thousand words instead?
When there is no closed set of competing forms, as with wh-clefts used for emphasis, there is nothing to divide by. Rates per thousand or million words compare frequency fairly, though speakers may still differ in their opportunities.
Why do grammatical variables need more data than phonological ones?
Grammatical constructions occur far less often than sounds, so a short recording may contain only a handful of tokens. The fieldwork lecture notes this contrast, and it is one reason to plan data collection that gives speakers many chances to use the construction.
Assessment move
Practise the exclusion procedure until you can do it on any variable: list the forms, mark categorical contexts, mark neutralised ones, and count what remains. Use the Kelly figures as your anchor example and the existential there exercise in the paid chapter as a second. Then learn the equivalence debate as four positions in a table, each with its author and consequence.
For the project, write the variable-context paragraph of your methods before you finish coding, and keep a tally of excluded tokens with reasons, because readers need both numbers to trust your rate.
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