I’ve just wrapped up an insightful and engaging week at the Australian Linguistic Society annual conference, held this year at Macquarie University.
I presented as part of the fourth Language Variation and Change workshop, in collaboration with my colleagues Professor Catherine Travis and James Grama at the ANU. Our paper looked at methodological approaches for constructing social classes in sociolinguistic analysis, focusing on speakers of Sydney English. Our paper was well received, and our audience (comprising some of the foremost variationist researchers and sociophoneticians in Australia and internationally!) gave helpful feedback and suggestions for moving forward–I always appreciate the constructive academic environment that is fostered by fellow members of the linguistics field.
Listening to other presenters, I was fascinated to hear more about the patterns of variation and gain new insights into the ways humans use language. Particularly interesting were findings about dialect variation, e.g. one study that found Australian speakers accommodated more to American speakers in terms of /r/ sounds than vice versa, and another paper noted that ‘foreign-accentedness’ for English speakers learning Japanese is more related to features of intonation and rhythm, rather than necessarily the pronunciation of individual sounds.
Research such as this can greatly inform dialect and voice coaching, and I’m an advocate of using an evidence-based approach in my work.
If you’re interested in how I could help you with your own dialect and voice needs, or for linguistic research consulting, please get in touch at benjamin@benjaminpurser.com.au or fill out an inquiry form here.