Language with an Attitude – Preston (Winnie Yan) 

1. Across a few studies mentioned in the paper, and in other widely accepted social stereotypes, it appears that in many areas, southern dialects seem more “laid-back”, “warm”, and “improper”, whereas northern dialects are seen as more “proper” and “educated”. Is this phenomenon purely by coincidence or is there an underlying geopolitical reason for how these attitude ideas came to be across many different locations?  
2. “On the one hand, speakers of “correct” dialects do not believe they speak dialects at all, and educational and even legal repercussions arise from personal and institutional devaluing of “incorrect” varieties (Lippi-Green 1997). On the other hand, speakers of devalued varieties (like prejudiced-against groups in general) derive solidarity from their distinctive behaviors, in this case, linguistic ones” (p. 177).  During a computational linguistics talk last week, the guest speakers (Jones & Kalbfeld) presented their research entitled “Testifying While Black: African American English in the Judicial Linguistic Marketplace”, discussing how speakers of AAE frequently get mistranscribed by court reporters during legal court proceedings and discussing the implications of such mistranscriptions. While there is currently not enough data to make definitive statements on the how severely these mistranscriptions can affect the population, researchers are working on studies to document and quantify these effects. How could data from the attitude studies that Preston looked at be used in studying mistranscription effect to help develop studies quantifying impact/effect?  
3. As mentioned in the example provided on p. 178, television (and media) are providing a sort of nationwide understanding of what a “standard”/”correct” English is, and establishing ideas of where this “standard” is prominently spoken. Considering the expansion of media since the study in 1999, how much of the United States has transitioned away from stereotyped regional accents towards this “standard” variety? Already, I’ve noticed most native New Yorkers I know do not have the stereotypical “New York accents” observed in the Labov’s studies (p. 160-163) ranging from the 1960s-1980s. Is this attributable to New York’s prevalent immigrant population (and subsequent incorporation of accents/dialects) or is this something occurring nationwide?