labov(64) the effect of social mobility on linguistic behavior

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The Effect of Social Mobilityon Linguistic Behavior

WILLIAM ABOVColumbia University

Previous investigations of sociolinguistic structure in New York Cityincluded quantitative study of five variables of the sound system.1These variables displayed a regular structure of social and stylisticstratification, in which linguistic behavior was closely correlated withproductive indicators of socioeconomic status. Patterns of sociolin-guistic stratification will be analyzed further in the present paper byconsidering the added dimension of social mobility. Each sociolin-guistic stratum will be differentiated into subgroups according to thespeakers histories of social mobility. I t will then be possible to deter-mine which of the subgroups represents the modal tendency of socio-linguistic behavior within each class and to ask whether a second formof stratification exists within each class which is based on socialmobility. Finally, sociolinguistic stratification will be reexamined interms of the added information on social mobility, so that furtherlight may be shed on the question of how such stratification is main-tained.

SOCIAL MOBILITY IN THE MECHANISM OF ARURAL SOUND CHANGE

Before considering the New York City situation, i t is worth notingthat social mobility was found to play an important part in the mecha-nism of linguistic change in an earlier study of the island of MarthasVineyard.2 The linguistic variable studied was the centralization ofthe diphthongs /ay/ and /aw/ in words such as right, r ide my, abou tand d o w n . This sound change was unusual because of its complexdistribution over several ethnic groups, occupational groups, and age

1 William Labov, Phonological Correlates of Social Stratification, in John J. Cumpen andDell Hymes, editors, The Ethnografihy of Communication, American Anthropologist, Specialpublication, volume 66, number 6, part Z , pp. 164-176. A complete report is given in TheSocial Stratification of English in N e w Y o r k City, Columbia University, 1964: dissertation to bepublished by the Center for Applied Linguistics, Washington, D. C. Cf. also Reflections of SocialProcesses in Linguistic Structures, to appear in Joshua A. Fishman, editor, A Reader in theSociology oj Language, The Hague: Mouton, and Hypercorrection by the Lower Middle Classas a Factor in Linguistic Change, to appear in William Bright, editor, Sociolinguistics, TheHague: Mouton, 1966.

2 William Labov, The Social Motivation of a Sound Change, Word 19 (December, 1963).pp. 273-306.

186



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 187categories of the island population, and also because increased cen-tralization departed from the recessive character of this feature to befound in many American dialects. The overall social significance ofthis sound change was its association with a positive orientationtowards Marthas Vineyard. Those who laid claim to native status asVineyarders showed the greatest centralization, while those who wereexcluded from this status, or who abandoned their claims to pursue acareer on the mainland, would show no centralization of these vowels.

Thus the complexity of the distribution of this sound change canbe attributed to the phenomenon of social mobility. Th e older genera-tion of Yankee fishermen who initiated the change had behind them ahistory of downward social movement. Under economic and socialpressures, they had retreated from their grandfathers positions as shipcaptains and landed proprietors to become small-boat lobstermen andsmall-scale contractors. The younger Yankee Vineyarders split intotwo groups: one moved u p and out, to college on the mainland andto urban occupations; the other remained on the island at a lowereconomic level. Th e latter showed strong centralization, the formernone at all. The strongest centralization was shown by the few whoabandoned their mainland careers and reasserted their claims to islandstatus.3A simpler pattern of upward social mobility was shown by the largePortuguese ethnic group. T he older Portuguese were hardly consideredVineyarders at all by the Yankees; they occupied the lowest socio-economic level on the island and showed almost no centralization. Theyounger generations of Portuguese moved up to positions vacated byYankees and began to appear as merchants, aldermen, and contractors;centralization became increasingly strong in this group.

The small group of Gay Head Indians had been suffering fromsteady attrition of economic and social position ever since they weredeprived of reservation status in 1870.4 In the last several decades theyhave reasserted their Indian identity and claimed the elementary socialservices and rights to which they are entitled as citizens. As with thePortuguese, we find the younger G3y Head Indians increasing cen-tralization, in most cases su-ng the Yankee islanders.

It is thus dear that the complexity of Iinguistic change reflected acomplex set of underlying social movements, and linguistic change

3 This is the patceern termed hypercormct ion, which appears below in the discussion of NewYork City speech as an important element in the mechanism of linguistic change.4 The Governor of Massachusetts terminated the reservation status of Gay Head in 1870, onthe ground that the inhabitants were no longer Indians as the result of intermarriage withNegroes. They were thus given the normal privileges o citizens, including the payment of taxes,and lost most of the iand which had traditionally belonged to the community. Details are givenin William Labov, The Social History of a Sound Change, Columbia University M.A. essay,1963.



188 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYcould not be understood without analyzing patterns of social mobilityon the island. On the other hand, linguistic data added further con-firmation to our social analysis, and illuminated features that mightotherwise have escaped notice. Furthermore, linguistic data wereshown to facilitate the recognition of similar phenomena in diversesettings.

T H E LOWER EAST SIDE SURVEYThe 1963-1964 investigation of the sociolinguistic structure of New

York City was designed to study a similar problem of complex dis-tribution.6 Previous descriptions of New York City English had re-ported a very wide range of variation in the sound system-a variationso extensive that the concept of language as a structured, integratedsystem began to seem meaningless.

Exploratory interviews suggested that one reason for this fluctuationis that the linguistic behavior of New Yorkers varies with their socio-economic position. This independent variable was controlled andstudied through the selection of a stratified random sample of adult,native English speakers from the Lower East Side. The sample wasone that had been constructed for Mobilization of Youth in 1961 in asurvey of social attitudes and aspirations.

Socioeconomic information on these subjects was, therefore, alreadyavailable; and the population had been classified on the basis of thisdata into ten socioeconomic strata by MFY analysts. The 988 adultsinterviewed by MFY represented a population of 100,000. From thissample, 312 native speakers of English were randomly selected.6 Overthe intervening two years, 117 had moved or died, leaving a targetsample of 195. Linguistic information was obtained from 158 subjects;the most detailed interviews were completed with 122 subjects.

The interview was designed to analyze another major dimension ofvariation, that of contextual style as it is governed by the immediatecontext of discourse, the topic, and the attitudes of speaker and listener.This dimension was systematically studied through interview tech-niques which elicited a wide range of styles in a partly predictablemanner.? At one extreme of the stylistic range is casual or spontaneousspeech, which approximates the language used in everyday familysituations. T he main bulk of the interview, however, is in careful

SThis survey was carried out by the author and Mr. Michael Rac of Haverford College.Reports are given in the references of footnote 1.JAbout one third of the population were recent amvals from Puerto Rico, and included nonative apeaken of English. Of the total native speakem of English, 100 per cent of the socio-economic groups 0-2 and 6-9 were aelected, and 67 per cent of groups 3-5.he primary problem is one of eliciting casual or spontaneous speech in an interview situa-tion for which careful speech is socially defined as appropriate. Techniques for overcoming thisdilemma are discussed in Labov, Phonological Correlates of Social Stratification; Op. nt



MOBILITY AND LINGUIST IC BEHAVIOR 189speech which is appropriate to an interview situation.* At the moreformal end are reading style the pronunciation of individual words,and the contrasting minimal pairs where the speaker's attention isfocused directly on the phonological variable.

Five phonological variables were selected for quantitative study.Each occurrence of each attribute in the tape-recorded interview wasrated on a codified scale which represented the possible range of articu-latory variation. The mean value of these ratings for a given stylisticcontext in any one interview is the basic datum for further analysis-the value of the variable for that person and that style.

Th e simplest case is that of the variable (r),9 representing the occur-rence of a consonantal (r) in final and pre-consonantal position: inbeard beer guard car board, and bore but not in red berry orfour o clock. The index here is the percentage of occurrences of con-stricted [r] among all occurrences of (r).

Table 1 displays the typical complex of regularities which charac-T A B L E 1

MEAN (r) VALUESBY CONTEXTUALTYLEAND SOCIOECONOMICLASSFOR SUBJECTSRAISEDN NEWYORKCITYWHO YIELDEDFULLNTERVIEWS

Casual Speech 02.5 04.0 04.0 19.0Careful Speech 10.5 12.5 20.5 32.0Reading Style 14.5 21.0 27.0 37.0Word Lists 23.5 35.0 61.0 47.0Minimal Pairs 49.5 55.0 77.5 60.0terize the social and stylistic stratification of the variables-in this case,the variable (r). The socioeconomic classes represent subdivisions ofthe aforementioned ten-point index developed by Mobilization forYouth, which was based upon three equally weighted indicators ofproductive status: occupation of the breadwinner, education of thesubject, and family income (adjusted for family size)*O The pattern ofsocial stratification is generally preserved for each style,ll and similarpatterns of stylistic stratification are preserved for each group. Thus

No attempt is made to isolate speech styles by impressionistic means. T he style used inanswering interview questions is used as a reference point, and other styles are defined by con-trastive cues: specifically. the Occurrence of one or more contrastive channel cues in a set ofpredetermined interview situations.In the notation used here, (r) represents a linguistic variable, defined by the existence ofordered covariation with other linguistic or extralinguistic variables; (r-I) represents a particularvalue of a variable in one instance; r)-22 represents a mean index value for a set of instances.Square brackets, as in [rl, enclose phonetic notation an d italic r indicates the unit oE spelling.10For further detailc and the rationale behind this approach as developed by John Michaelof MFY, see The Social Stratification of English in N e w Y ork City, 09 cit. Education of thesubject. as an indicator, gave results equivalent to education of the male head of the household.

11 In cawal speech, all New Yorkers except upper middle class speakers are essentially r-less:the small figures here show no significant differences.



190 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYalthough New Yorkers are quite finely differentiated by their use of(r),l2 they also appear to be quite similar in the direction of theirstylistic shifts with respect to (r).

One major deviation from this pattern appears in the behavior ofthe lower middle class,l3 which surpasses the upper middle class inthe use of (r) in the more formal contexts. This crossover pattern is notidiosyncratic here: i t reappears in similar structures for other variableswhich, like r), represent a linguistic change in pr0gre~s .l~his hyper-correct behavior seems to characterize the second highest status group,given its extreme range over the contextual scale. The native speechpattern used by almost all children growing up in the city is rejectedwhenever attention is paid to the speech process, and the patternused by an exterior reference group is substituted.

There is considerable agreement among native New Yorkers in theirunconscious evaluation of the phonological variables. A subjectiveresponse test described in earlier reports15 was designed to isolatesuch unconscious reactions to particular variables. There was oftenremarkable uniformity of response to this test. All forty-two NewYork subjects in the 18-39 age group responded to this test in a man-ner which clearly indicated recognition of the prestige status of (r),although no such agreement was found in the responses of older peopleor out-of-towners. Such unanimity i n the evaluation of (r) is parallel tothe uniform direction of stylistic shift in the use of (r): both patternsindicate that normative behavior may be more consistent than actualperformance. Indeed, i t seems preferable to define the New York Cityspeech community as a group with similar evaluative norms in regardto language, rather than similar patterns of speech performance.

The evidence of (r) is reinforced by the data for the other four mainvariables. In all five cases, a regular structure of social and stylisticvariation was found; the degree of regularity was such that groups assmall as four or five subjects fitted into the matrix in a predictable man-ner. Table 2 shows the pattern of social and stylistic variation for (dh),the initial consonant of this, then, the, etc. The (dh) index is built ona scale which rates the prestige form, the fricative [a] ] as (dh-1); the

22 This is an example of fine stratification in which it appears that almost any fine subdivisionof the socioeconomic scale will be reflected in a corresponding stratification of r). The case of(dh), discussed below, is the opposing type of sharp stratification.1 3 Such class terms are employed informally to represent the objective divisions of theMFY scale as indicated in the tables. See Hypercorrection by the Lower Middle Class .cited above for a detailed discussion of this crossover pattern.1 4 These variables are: (eh). the height of the vowel in bad ark dance etc., and (oh). the

height of the vowel in law coflee talk bore , etc.16 Cf. The Social Stratification of English i n New York C i t y , o p . cit. Chapter 11. The subjectslistened to 22 sentences on a test tape, and rated the speakers on a scale of occupational suitabil-ity ranging from television announcer to factory worker. A particular variable was concentratedin a given sentence, and the listeners unconscious reaction to that variable was determined bycomparing his rating of that sentence to his rating of the same speaker in a zero sentencewhich contained none of the variables in question.



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 191T A B L E 2MEAN dh) VALUESB Y CONTEXTUALTYLEA N D SOCIOECONOMICLASSFOR SUBJECTSRAISEDN NEWYORK CITY WHO YIELDED FULLNTERVIEWS

~ ~Casual Speech 79 64Reading Stvle 49 34Careful Speech 52 45

30 2219 712 5affricate [db] as (dh-2); and the most stigmatized form, the stop [d] as(dh-3). The numerical average of all ratings multiplied by 100 givesthe numerical scale used in Table 2.l6 The higher the (dh) index,the greater the percentage of nonstandard, nonprestige forms. This is acase of relatively sharp stratification of the population into two majorgroups, with lower class and working class at the top, and middleclass groups near the bottom of the scale. No crossover pattern is foundfor this relatively stable linguistic variable. Again we find that greatdifferentials in the speech performance of New Yorkers are accom-panied by high agreement in their directions of stylistic shift and intheir subjective reactions. .Two other variables which representedchanges in progress yielded the same results and, in addition, thehypercorrect pattern of the lower middle class.

The results which have been shown are based on data for 81 sub-jects raised in New York City. The 37 informants who were raisedoutside New York City showed similar patterns for variables which aregeneral throughout the country, but no pattern at all for variablesspecific to New York City. The 35 informants who were briefly inter-viewed by anonymous methods, a sample of the refusers and nonres.pondents, provided similar results in the context of careful speech.

SOCIAL MOBILITY ON T H E LOWER EAST SIDESocioeconomic classification of the Lower East Side subjects is based

on characteristics they acquired at different times in their lives. Educa-tional level is the earliest, occupations reflect decisions made some-what later in life, and incomes reflect only present status. In manycases, income by itself would be a poor measure of status-in the caseof a college student, for example, who has a high expectation of up-ward social mobility, or that of a plumber with a sixth grade educa-tion, who may retain behavior more characteristic of the working class

1s The scale is adjusted by subtracting 100 points, so that consistent use of the prestige formis rated as dh)-100. The values given for the upper middle class exclude one speaker with ahighly idiosyncratic use of dh-3), initial If1 for th), and other speech characteristiw whichspecifically prevented from him pursuing an academic career. This case is discussed in detail inThe Social Stmtificat ion of Engl i sh in N e w Y ork Ci ty , op. c i t . , Chapter 8. With the values ofthis individual included, the upper middle class figures are dh)-29, 15.5, 14.5.



192 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYthan of the middle class despite his high income level. These caes ofstatus incongruence are not always resolved by the equal weightingof the three indicators in the socioeconomic index. More regular corre-lations existed between phonological variables and socioeconomicstatus once analysis was restricted only to where there was status con-gruence among the three indicators.

The members of any one class also differ among themselves in char-acteristics which antedate the three SES indicators. One would expectthat the status of the family of origin and their own earliest occupa-tions, would provide social experience which would in turn be reflectedin linguistic behavior. Lower middle class speakers with a history ofupward social mobility should indeed be different than speakers whoseparents were members of the same social class and who themselveshad always maintained middle class status. The first, most obvioushypothesis would be that such steady middle class speakers wouldexemplify the norms of middle class society more completely than up-wardly mobile speakers who grew up in a working class environment.One would expect members of the upward group to show erraticbehavior and inconsistent performance, because they had not beentrained in middle class linguistic norms early enough to have inter-nalized them. Therefore, the structure of social and stylistic stratifica-tion would appear most clearly if we considered only the steadygroups with a history of two generations of membership in the sameclass.

This reasoning fails to take into account the specific structure ofNew York City society, especially the fact that upward social mobilityis normal, even normative, for the middle class groups. The subdivisionof class groups along the additional dimension of social mobility doesindeed clarify our view of sociolinguistic stratification, but in preciselythe opposite manner from that suggested above.

MEASURES OF SOCIAL MOBILITYThe original survey of the Lower East Side carried out by Mobiliza-

tion for Youth provides two data that can serve as measures of socialmobility: (1) the occupation of the subjects father, and 2) the firstoccupation of the subject after leaving school. Combining these twomeasures provides an overall measure of social mobility.

Ideally, one would prefer a status history which made use of allthree indicators of the SES scale. But the income levels and educationalattainments of parents are difficult to ascertain, unreliable a t best, andhard to calibrate against todays standards. Occupational data aremore reliable, more comparable, and provide a fair measure of socialmobility to use in conjunction with the current SES index. The cate-



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 193gories by which occupations were recorded follow Census Bureauspractices with minor deviations. For the study of social mobility it isuseful to establish the following four levels:

Leuel occupations1234

Professionals, semi-professionals, proprietors or managers of large andmedium businessesProprietors or managers of small businesses, clerical, sales, or kindredworkersCraftsmen, foremen, or kindred workersOperatives or kindred workers, service workers, laborers

I t might have been possible to use seven categories, following thecensus in separating proprietors from clerical workers and operativesfrom service workers and laborers. But in the Lower East Side, smallbusinessmen were chiefly shopkeepers; thus, it was more realistic togroup them with clerical workers. Among the three lowest occupa-tional groups, i t would be difficult to assert that operatives performingsemi-skilled work in a factory at minimum wages should be rankedhigher than policemen, firemen, nurses aides, or other service workers.Furthermore, the status of laborer was more common fifty years agoand approximately equivalent to that of factory operative today. I twould also be difficult to maintain that an operative had risen i n thesocial scale because his father had been a laborer. When studyingsocial mobility, therefore, i t seems appropriate to refrain from makingdistinctions among these three occupational groups. The resultingtypes of social mobility are the following:

Mobi l i ty Ocupational HistoryUpward [U] Fathers occupational level or earliest occupational level lowerthan present level, and neither higher than presentSteady [SI Fathers occupational level and earliest occupational level

same as present levelDownward [D] Fathers occupational level or earliest occupational level higherthan present level, and neither lower than presentU p and Down Earliest or earlier) occupational level higher than fathersoccupational level, and also higher than present level

A fifth possible type, Down and Up, does not appear to any notice-able degree.17 Additional information about the subjects presentstatus was used to correct his formal reply to the question about cur-rent occupation. Some subjects had not worked for many years, depend-ing entirely on welfare and living under poor conditions at a baresubsistence level; their occupations of record were no longer relevant.Unless it was known that their parents had also lived under thesesame conditions, they were considered downwardly mobile. Married

[ UD]

IIt would be difficult to detect such a pattern from the information we have on most sub-jects. It is not unusual for a persons first job to be relatively low ranking, as a temporaryexpedient in his upward career. It would be necessary to show that this first Occupation did notimply future advancement to establish a Down and Up class.



194 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYwomen yielded a further datum: husbands occupation in addition tolast occupation of record. The former is taken as the primary datum.In almost every such case there was no difference between last occupa-tion and earliest occupation; consequently no new types occurred.

SOCIAL DISTRIBUTION OF MOBILITY TYPESThe top portion of Table 3 shows the distribution of mobility

types among those informants whose linguistic behavior has beenexhibited in Tables 1 and 2. Reliable social mobility data were avail-able for 74 of the 81 subjects.

T A B L E 3DISTRIBUTIONF SOC~ALMOBILILTY YPESSocioeconomic Class

6 8 9tddle Middle Classes

M o b i l i t y 0-2 3-5T y p e L o w e r Working Ferubjectslass lass Class class

All Subjects U 0 5 12 9 26Raised in N e w S 9 13 4 0 26Yielded Full U D 1 3 3 1 8Interviews

ALL TYPES 19 24 21 10 74All Subjects U 0 9 15 12 36Raised in S 10 14 6 0 30

U D 2 5 3 1 11ALL T Y P E S 25 35 26 13 99

All Subjects U 0 11 19 13 43S 17 19 9 2 41D 13 10 2 0 25U D 10 12 9 2 33

ALL TYPES 40 52 39 17 148

York City Who D 9 . 1 0 14

New York City D 13 7 2 0 22

The Upward and Downward type has no immediate value forthe analysis, since the eight cases are distributed among four smallcells. Furthermore, the UD class is not a consistent type. Some arewomen who had held white collar jobs but married working classmen; others are people who had followed a normal upward pathbut who were subsequently disabled, blinded, or addicted to drinkor drugs.

The three principal mobility types, U, S, and D, form athree-by-four matrix considered together with the four SES groups.The U cell for the lower class and the D cell for the upper middleclass are empty by definition. The only other empty cell is the S



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 195category within the upper middle class. The absence of a steady seg-ment of the upper middle class is a reflection of the particular socialhistory of the Lower East Side. I t is a port of entry for immigrantsand a place of nurture for those to the way up, but normally not apermanent home for children of upper middle class parents.18The middle of Table 3 shows the distribution of mobility types forall adult informants who were raised in New York City, includingthose interviewed by brief, anonymous methods. The distribution isapproximately the same for these 99 subjects as for the basic set of 74.A somewhat different distribution appears in the lower part of thetable, which enumerates types among all adult subjects, includingthose raised outside of New York City. I t is apparent that the Up-and-Down type is much more heavily represented among the out-of-town informants than for New Yorkers; this category appears as 22per cent of the total compared with eleven per cent in other parts oEthe table. Two steady upper middle class persons also appear amongthe subjects from out-of-town.

T H E EFFECT OF SOCIAL MOBILITYUPON LINGUISTIC VARIABLES

The most extensive and reliable data are available for the 74 sub-jects at the top of Table 3. The association between mobility type andlinguistic behavior will first be examined within this group, using thelarger samples for corroboration wherever possible. There are fourcomparisons which can be made within class groups: (1) between Dand S in the lower class, (2) between U and S in the workingclass, 3) between S nd D in the working class, and (4) betweenU and S n the lower middle class.

Table 4 shows the relation of (r) to mobility types for 66 nativeNew York City informants interviewed at length who were of theU, S and D types. Th e table gives the distribution of mean(r) values for each mobility type within each socioeconomic class undereach of five contextual styles, from casual speech to minimal pairs.In each socioeconomic class regular association may be seen betweenmobility type and the use of (r). Among lower class subjects the Sclass used the prestige form [r] considerably more than did the Dtype. The lower class Ds show a minimum tendency to use [r] incareful speech, just as they show the least recognition of the prestigevalue of [r] in subjective response tests.19 T he U group shows byfar the highest (r) values among working class subjects and the S

1sA number of the subjects were raised in other parts of New York City, and there is reason18 See Table 9.to think that this characterization is generally true for the city as a whole.



196 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYTABLE 4DISIXI~UTIONF MEAN(r) VALUESBY CONTEXTUALTYLE,SOCIOECONOMICLASS ND

MOBILITY YPEOR SUBJECTS AISED N NEW YORKCITYWHOYIELDIDFULLINTERVIEWS

Socioeconomic ClassC o n t e x t u a l Mobili ty 0-2 6 8 93-5 h w e r u p p e r Altiddle Middle ClassesClass

Style Type Lower WorkingClass Class cl vCasual Speech

Careful Speech

Reading Style

Word Lists

Minimal Pairs

tU 12 4 18 1044 2 7DALL TYPES

USD

ALL TYPESUSD

ALL TYPESUSD

ALL TYPESUSDALL TYPES

23

1438

1741

401128703153

t

.

56

1781512231626195827453772467057

52320222921276248

5872543368

t

.

44

1834

3435

3449

4957.57

3

26127

291612

573726

675644

No cases of this type.group the lowest. It is perhaps surprising to find that the workingclass Ds do not show the lowest (r) indexes; for all five styles Dis intermediate between U and S. Two considerations may be rele-vant here. First, there is good reason to believe that the working classis the chief exponent of a value system opposed to that of the middleclass. This does not prevent overt endorsement of middle class values,as shown in subjective reaction tests; but underlying opposition intheir covert values could produce that extreme stratification in speechactually used which is characteristic of New York City. The lowerclass, by way of contrast, does not participate as actively in this systemof dual sociolinguistic norms-a system exemplified most clearly inthe generalization that those who have the highest incidence of a stig-matized feature are most sensitive to its use by others.

The second consideration concerns an apparent difference in thecomposition of the two D groups. Most members of the lower class



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 197D group seemed to be less intelligent than average, were slower intheir speech, and misunderstood questions more often. From theirreferences to successful, upwardly mobile brothers and sisters it couldbe seen that they frequently deviate from their own family pattern.On the other hand, there appears to be no such psychological correlateof downward mobility in the working class. Broad social and economicforces seem to account for the inability to maintain middle class status.The fact that a majority of the working class Ds are Negroes is con-sistent with this observation.

The working class U shows a surprisingly high set of (r) scores,almost equal to that of the lower middle class U In actual fact,these persons are members of an upper stratum of the working class,having higher occupationaI skills than most of the S group.

The lower middle class Us show the archetypal pattern of hyper-c o r r e c t i o n in the use of (r). As compared to the smaller lower middleclass S group, the U group shows a much wider range of (r) usageshifting from near zero in casual speech to 72 in the most formal con-textual style. Both the Us among the working class and those in thelower middle class show this hypercorrect pattern, going beyond theupper middle class standard in their more formal speech. Therefore,we can infer that the shift to the hypercorrect pattern is more charac-teristic of upward mobility than of membership in any particular socio-economic group.20

Because these comparisons. involve small numbers, in most cases thefigures are not conclusive for any one variable under any one style.21But repeating the comparison under many styles and for several vari-ables, yields strong confirmation that these differences are indeedamong linguistic characteristics of the subjects. We can further investi-gate the question whether these subjects are characteristic of the popu-lation by considering an extended sample-one which includes thebriefly interviewed and anonymous r-less regions, where r is not pro-nounced in the vernacular of casual speech when it is in final or pre-consonantal positions. Thus this group includes a large number ofNegro subjects who were born in the South. Table 5 shows the dis-tribution of (r) for the careful speech of 99 subjects.

I n general, this table shows an increase in association with mobility,the larger differences occurring in the middle class groups and the

Z O T h i s suggestion is generalized to include linguistic stratification as a whole in New YorkCity in the concluding section of this paper. For the role of hypercorrection in linguistic changesee Hypercorrection by the Lower Middle Class as a Factor in Linguistic Change, op. cita1A large portion of the difference between the U and S roups is due to a singlemember of the S group whose dh) values are quite high. This subject is a plumber whosehigh income raises his objective socioeconomic index to the level of the lower middle class group-an example of status incongruence. Without his values, the S group shows considerablylower average dh).



198 SOCIOLOGICAL NQUIRYT A B L E 5DISTRIBUTIONF MEAN r) VALUESY SOCIOECONOMICLASS ND MOBILITYTYPEORCAREFULPEECH OF ALL SUBJECTS

A l l-5 1 8 9Lower U p p e r

o b i l i t y 0-2TrPe w ic g M i d d l e C l a s s M i d d l e ClassU 25 37 260907S 08 07 18D 03 12 t

ALL TYPES 06 09 23 37No cases of this type.

smaller ones in the two lower groups. The D working class is herea t a level with the U group; this hints at the special position of theNegro subjects, for whom objective socioeconomic position and socialmobility may not be accurate indexes of participation in the culturalnorms of middle class society.

Comparable data are shown on Table 6 for the (dh) variable, theform of the first consonant in the , then , these, etc. This variable differsfrom (r) in that it is not an instance of linguistic change in progress;therefore, a hypercorrect cross-over pattern was not expected. Onlythree contextual styles are used for this variable. In the lower middleclass group, there is a sharp difference between the U and S sub-sets, the roup showing much freer use of the stigmatized formand the U group holding much closer to the upper middle class

T A B L E 6MEAN dh) VALUES Y CONTEXTUALnm, SOCIOECONOMICLASS, N D MOBILITYYPEFOR SUBJEC ~S AISED N N E W YORK C m WHO YIELDEDFULL INTERVIEWS

Socioeconomic ClassCo n te x tu a l Mo b i l i t y 0 2 6 8 93-5 L o w e r U p p e r A U

class Class ClassT y p e Work ing Mi dd le Mzdd le ClassesSty le

Casual Speech U 27 17 28 2370. 8363 80 50D 83

ALL TYPES 72 68 30 288 1255. 43Careful Speech U 27 9S 52 62 38D 44 40

ALL TYPES 48 51 19 8t 6 8

t 40eading Style U 17 6S 26 52 29D 69 69tALL TYPES 43 42 12 6

*No ases of this type.



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 199norm. A similar contrast exists between U and Sn the workingclass. Th e working class Ds hown in careful speech only, occupythe same intermediate position as with (r). Finally the situation appearsto be somewhat irregular in the lower class group. Though the D typehas a higher (dh) index in casual speech, as expected, the situation isreversed during careful speech. As in all of these tables, the most real-istic and accurate view is a vertical one across styles. The S groupconforms to the most general social norms by showing a regular down-ward trend in the (dh) index with increasing formality of style, butthe D group shows lack of participation in these norms throughfailure to display such a regular pattern of stylistic variation.

TABLE 7MEAN dh) VALUES Y SOCIOECONOMICLASS A N D MOBILITYTYP SN CAREFUL SPEECHFOR ALL UBJECTS

All-2 3-5 6-8 9Lower Working Lower U p p e robili tyTYPe Class Class Middle Class Middle ClassI0 1843

41U 38 12S 47 55 21D 46 34 tALL TYPES 46 45 23 10

*No cases of this type.Table 7 shows the distribution of (dh) in an enlarged sample of all107 subjects tested under conditions of careful speech. Similar results

obtain. In this case, the differences within the lower class seem to dis-appear, while the other differences are maintained. Again, we seethat downwardly mobile members of the working class do not showa linguistic pattern that corresponds to its objective socioeconomicposition.

Table 8 shows the related variable, (th), an index for the form ofthe first consonant in thing, three, etc.22 The pattern is approximatelythat of Table 6,with the following characteristics:1) T h e lower class Ds do not follow a regular pattern of stylisticstratification, while the Ss do.2) The working class Us are more like the lower middle classthan they are like the working class Ss, the latter showing a highincidence of nonstandard (th) forms. Again the D group is inter-mediate rather than being lower.

3) The lower middle class U group shows a much lower (th) indexthan does the S group and a much lower percentage of nonstandardforms.

22 This consonant is phonologicalIy parallel to dh). and uses the same three-point scale offricative th-I), the prestige form; affricate th-fL), the intermediate form, and stop th-3). thestigmatized form. The th) varianw are voiceless, while dh) is voiced.



200 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYT A B L E 8MEAN th) VALUES Y CONTEXTUALTYLE, SOCIOECDNOMICLASS, ND M OBILITY YPE

FOR SUBJECTXRAISE^ IN NEWYORKCITYWHOY I E L ~ E DULL NTERVIEWSSocioeconomic Class

Casual Speech U 26 9 19. 8260S 97 95 35D 65A L L TYPES 80 7 8 29 9

Careful Speech U 19 18 8 65360..65 84 39D 6 8 4 3

A L L TYPES 66 61 22 8Reading Style U 14 6 2 5.. t 3048S 20 35 28D 80

A L L TYPES 46 25 11 2No cases of this type.

RESPONSES T O SUBJECTIVE EVALUATION TESTSBY MOBILITY TYPE

T he high rate of agreement in recognizing middle class norms ofcareful speech is reflected by three different kinds of data from theLower East Side survey: by regular patterns of stylistic stratification,by responses to subjective reaction tests, and by answers to directquestions about values associated with language. In all of these sourceswe found confirmation of the following scheme:

1) The highest degree of uniformity in the endorsement of thesenorms, and the most extreme values, appear in the second higheststatus group.2) More moderate values are shown by the highest status group.3) Least recognition of middle class values regarding language occursin the lowest status group. For many types of data, there is sharpseparation in this respect between the lowest class and all of the others.

Table 9 shows the responses to the subjective reaction tests for(r) and (dh)23 for those adults who were raised in New York City andprovided complete interviews. In the case of (r), we can see that thedata parallel its actual use in Table 4. Eleven out of twelve of thelower middle class U group responded in a way which indicatesthat they recognized the prestige of (r). No differentiation appears

23 Th e subjective response test for dh) is actually a joint response to dh) and th).



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 201TABLE 9

SUBJECTIVEVALUATIONSF r) A N D dh) BY SOCIOEC~NOMICLASS N D MOBILITYTYPEFOR SUBJECTS RAISEDN NEWYORKCITY HOYIELDEDFULL NTERVIEWS

Socioeconomic Class6 8 9

Class ClassAllClassesLower

obility 0-2 3-5TYPe L o w e r W w k i n g Middle M8ddleClass Class

Ratio of r)-PositiveResponse 19/2514/253/ 10

U 2/5 11/12 6 / 8S 4/8 8/13 2 4D 1/7 213ALL TYPES 5/15 12/21 13/16 6/8

Ratio of IdhbPositive Resoonse 8 9 29/3320/255/11

5/i lO/lI1/13 3/4U 6 8S 6 / 8D 3/7 2/4

ALL TYPES 15/23 19/22 13 15 8 / 9*No cases of this type.

within the working class, but in the lower class it seems clear thatthe D group is practically outside the value system which governsthe behavior of the other subgroups. Only one out of seven of thelower class Ds showed an (r)-positive response.

In the case of (dh) there is an even cIoser parallel with speech data(see Table 5 . Again, the lower middle class U group shows the high-est percentage of agreement, though not significantly higher thanUs in the upper middle class. The working class also shows a highdegree of agreement about the value of this variable, the U groupmore consistently so, however, than the S group. The only signifi-cant deviation from a (dh)-sensitive response was found in the lowerclass D group-and this it will be recalled, was the only group whichdid not follow a regular pattern of stylistic stratification.

CONCLUSIONS AND FURTHER IMPLICATIONSThat English in the Lower East Side is socially stratified may be

regarded as confirmed by a large body of evidence. Confidence in thesefindings is provided by many sets of correlations and crosschecks withinthe survey as well as by independent corroboration in another survey ofa completely different t y ~ e . ~ 4he findings on the relation of mobilitytype to socioeconomic status and linguistic behavior of sample subjectshave been described. Whether the small cells of the sample are typicalof those found in the population as a whole is difficult to state with

2See Chapter 3 of The Social Stratification of EngIish in New York City op. cit., for a dia-cussion of the survey of New York City department stores.



202 SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRYcomplete confidence. The conclusions of this paper must therefore beconsidered as hypotheses which are subject to further confirmation.

The most striking finding of this discussion is that a group ofspeakers with a past history of upward mobility is more apt to resemblethe next higher socioeconomic group in their linguistic behavior thanthe one with which they are currently associated. Despite the factthat these speakers may be expected to show traces of their class originsby retaining behavior patterns of the next lower class group, we findexactly the reverse. This finding is consistent with the view that lin-guistic behavior reflects participation in a set of norms which arewidely recognized through all (or almost all) segments of the commu-nity. This observation may be specified as follows:

1 Upwardly mobile persons adopt the norms of an exterior refer-ence group-as a rule, the norms of the next higher group with whichthey are in contact.262) A group which shows a past history of social stability tends to begoverned more by its own linguistic norms-more precisely, to achievea balance in which own and external norms are reflected in fairly con-sistent performance, without a wide range of style shifting.3) A downward mobile category deviates in i ts nonacceptance of thenormative patterns which other segments recognize. Here we arespeaking of a set of individuals who deviate from the principal sub-group in which they were raised. This finding does not apply to anentire group, such as the Negro subjects, who were downwardly mobilethrough broad social factors almost independently of their ownbehavior.

It has been suggested in previous studies that a speech communitycan be defined as a group of speakers who have a common set of valuesregarding language. We might amplify this suggestion by saying that,in an urban society linguistic stratification is the direct reflection ofunderlying sets of social values, rather than sets of habits which areproduced by close contact and are differentiated by discontinuities inthe communication system.

In a large city like New York, we cannot explain the differentialspread of a linguistic trait in terms of differential density in the com-munication network. Everyone is exposed to the prestige patterns ofradio and television. If a person borrows a prestige element from anexterior group, it is reasonable to say that this act symbolizes morethan his recognition of the values of that group; it symbolizes the adop-tion of at least some of these values as critical for his own behavior.This act is characteristic of an upwardly mobile person. Thus most

*sit appears that relatively few speakers are directly influenced by the speech patterns heardon radio and television. Some type of personal contact seems to be required as a rule.



MOBILITY AND LINGUISTIC BEHAVIOR 203New Yorkers can agree in deciding on the type of speech appropriatefor high-ranking occupations; but this does not mean that such recogni-tion results in the same range of behavior for all. For many NewYorkers the application of such middle class values would appearlimited by conflict with other values-namely, the value system sym-bolized by their ~ Q U P Sernacular from early adolescence onward.Upwardly mobile individuals show the maximum tendency to applythe values of an external reference group to their own behavior.As a result we find that mobility types offer as good a basis as socio-economic position or better for stratifying New York City speech. Thevertical totals on the right of Tables 4 through 8 compare favorablywith the horizontal totals26 in terms of identifying discrete levels. Thedifference in reference group behavior reflected in mobility types maytherefore be viewed as an intervening variable between social andlinguistic stratification.

This line of reasoning applies to a relatively open society wheresuch reference group behavior can bring about changes in objectivesocioeconomic position. The situation is quite different for groupsthat have limited opportunities for mobility, such as the Negro groupin New York City; and linguistic behavior must be analyzed alongother dimensions.

m These totals for mobility classes and socioeconomic classes include small cells such as Dlower middle class, which are not shown independently in the tables.

labov(64) the effect of social mobility on linguistic behavior

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