Books like Sociolinguistics by Peter Stockwell

In this new edition of a classic textbook, Martin Montgomery explores some of the close connections between language and social life. He explores the ways in which children learn language in interaction with those around them, learning at the same time through language how to make sense of their world. He considers the social implications of accent and dialect as well as the broader interconnections of language with social class, ethnic group and subculture. He explores the role of language in shaping social relationships as part of everyday encounters and looks at the ways in which our habitual ways of interpreting the world may be shaped by the categories, systems and patterns of our language.

Sociolinguistic Theory presents a critical synthesis of sociolinguistics, centering on the study of language variation and change. Since the inception of sociolinguistics more than three decades ago, the correlation of dependent linguistic variables with independent social variables has provided the theoretical core of the discipline. Chambers reviews the essential findings of Henrietta Cedegren, William Labov, Lesley Milroy and James Milroy, David Sankoff, Gillian Sankoff, Peter Trudgill, Walt Wolfram, and many others, and puts them into context both with the work of the numerous linguists who have followed their lead and with their intellectual forbears from Wilhelm von Humboldt and Louis Gauchat to Edward Sapir. The book opens with a discussion of the linguistic variable and its historical methodological and theoretical significance. Three central chapters are organized around the crucial social variables of social stratification, sex, and age. The final chapter considers the social and cultural purposes of linguistic variation.

Gerard Van Herk’s textbook introduces students to sociolinguistics with engaging prose, covering region, status, gender, time, attitudes, interaction, style, multilingualism, culture, ethnicity, language contact, and education.