linguistic practice and identity work: variation in taiwan mandarin at a taipei county high school

Linguistic practice and identity work:Variation in Taiwan Mandarinat a Taipei County high school1

Dominika BaranDuke University, North Carolina

This article examines variation in the use of two Taiwan Mandarin features,de-retroflection of sibilant fricatives [§] → [s], and labial glide deletion [wɔ] →[ɔ], in the speech of Taipei County high school students. The features becomeresources for thenegotiation of identity positionswithin thehighly structuredschool institution. I discuss the correlations between the use of TaiwanMandarin and two social factors: membership in the small culture (Holliday1999) of a particular b�anj�ı or class, and individual aspirations. Holliday’sconcept of small cultures is proposed as a variant of the Community ofPractice. I refer to Bucholtz and Hall’s (2004) tactics of intersubjectivityframework as a possible tool for explaining variation at the school. I arguethat the twoTaiwanMandarin features are invoked to performdifferent socialgoals,which is possible because they are imbuedwith related but significantlydifferent sociocultural meanings (Brubaker 2012; Baran 2007).

本研究探討台灣新北市高中高職生的發音使用,針對台灣華語中的兩個特徵:(1)捲舌嘶音[§]的齒音化[s],以及(2)[wɔ]韻尾唸做[ɔ],也就是雙唇滑音[w]被刪除的情形。學生常用這兩種範疇來劃定自己在高度結構化的學校社群中的身份地位。作者探討台灣華語的使用方式與以下兩種社交因素的關聯:(1)在某班級的「小文化」歸屬 (Holliday 1999),以及(2)個人發展志向。作者提議:Holliday的小文化概念與「實務社群」(Community ofPractice)概念相似,而Bucholtz and Hall (2004) 的互為主體性架構也可以做為分析學校差異性的工具。根據作者的論點,學生常運用上述兩種台灣華語的發音特徵來達成不同的社交目的,因為這兩個特徵各有不同卻相關的社會文化意涵(Brubaker 2012; Baran 2007)。[Chinese]

KEYWORDS: Variation, identity, intersubjectivity, Taiwan Mandarin,Chinese, small cultures

1. INTRODUCTION

Mandarin (gu�oyǔ or ‘national language’) became the official language ofTaiwan in 1946, after the Nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) government of theRepublic of China took control of the island (Chen 2010: 85). The regime’s

Journal of Sociolinguistics 18/1, 2014: 32–59

© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

aggressive ideological and language teaching campaign coupled withsuppression of local languages – Hoklo (Taiwanese), Hakka, and aboriginalAustronesian languages – established the prestige of Mandarin and led tolanguage shift by the late 1980s (Chan 1994; Hsiau 1997; Hsu 1999).However, large-scale language contact that accompanied the spread ofMandarin produced a set of local features that form today’s TaiwanMandarin. These are used in considerable variation due to continuedreinforcement of Standard Mandarin (gu�oyǔ) through education and the media.This paper examines two Taiwan Mandarin (TM) features as used by

students at a Taipei County high school: the de-retroflection of the sibilantfricative initial where [§] → [s], and the deletion of the pre-nuclear labio-velarglide [w] in words such as wǒ ‘I’ and gu�o ‘country’ where [wɔ] → [ɔ]. The twofeatures index related but different sociocultural meanings: de-retroflection ismainly associated with one’s educational level, and glide deletion linked tolocal affiliation, culture and values (cf. Brubaker 2012). The features becomeresources for students to negotiate dominant discourses and institutionalstructures that dictate how the school treats them and what it expects of theirfutures. The school, which I call Sunrise Senior High School (Sunrise SHS),houses a vocational division and a college-preparatory program. Uponenrollment, students are placed in b�anj�ı, which I translate as ‘classes’ –groups of 20 to 40 sharing the same curriculum, daily schedule andclassrooms throughout their three years of study. This paper is based on threesemesters of ethnographic fieldwork and sociolinguistic interviews with threeb�anj�ı: college-preparatory, office administration, and electronics.TM differs in status from local languages (e.g. Hoklo), which have

experienced a revival in recent decades thanks to the b�entǔhu�a or ‘localization’movement, including a raised prestige (Sandel 2003) and inclusion in schoolcurricula (Law 2002; Price 2009), because it is typically seen by speakers asa deviation from the prescriptive Standard Mandarin, and not as a legitimatelanguage variety. Due to the KMT regime’s language planning efforts,speakers of local languages and of TM were stereotyped as older, rural orworking-class people with a low level of education and a lack of culturalrefinement (Feifel 1994; Hsiau 1997; Su 2005). But today, there is a growingappreciation of values, customs, and ways of speaking perceived as b�entǔ,meaning ‘local’ or ‘native,’ that are associated with local languages, whereasTM remains culturally stigmatized as Mandarin ‘with a local accent.’ Su(2005) even argues that TM marks its speakers as especially unrefined andunsuccessfully imitative of sophisticated, modern lifestyles. By contrast, Hoklocan index positively evaluated aspects of being b�entǔ: directness, honesty, andnot pretending to be something one is not (Su 2005: 238–244).At the same time, however, many Taiwanese regularly choose TM features

over the prescriptive variants taught as Standard Mandarin in Taiwan. TMforms a local continuum: some features are widely used and treated in practiceas acceptable, while others are seen as a sign of poor education or

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backwardness. Crucially, although the stigmatized features are often describedas used by older people for whom Mandarin is a second language, manysurface in the speech of young, native speakers, including at Sunrise SHS.This paper makes two theoretical contributions. First, I show that the

concept of Communities of Practice, employed in studies of language andidentity in Western schools (Bucholtz 1999; Eckert 2000; Eckert andMcConnell-Ginet 1992, 1995; Lawson 2011; Mendoza-Denton 2008; Moore2004), has limitations in the context of this Taiwanese school, not becauseit is Taiwanese, since CofPs exist outside the West, but because of itsparticular institutional structure. Therefore, I draw on Holliday’s (1999)notion of small cultures to account more accurately for the relationshipsamong the institution, the b�anj�ı or class, and individual students. Second,I suggest that Bucholtz and Hall’s (2004) framework of tactics ofintersubjectivity can help to develop a possible account of what aVARBRUL analysis reveals to be complex and conflicting linguisticbehavior by groups and individuals in a context where institutionallydefined social roles conflict with personal goals.Finally, by exploring the range of social meanings invoked by different TM

features, this paper presents a multidimensional picture of numerous, variedand sometimes conflicting identities and stances that can be produced andnegotiated by TM speakers. As Zhang (2008) persuasively argues, exploringthe history of sociolinguistic variables and the processes that lead them to beimbued with specific sociocultural meanings provides insight into thesevariables’ potentials as meaning-making resources (Zhang 2008: 217). In thecase of TM, this helps to construct an account of how this localized Mandarincan evoke feelings of both pride and embarrassment, familiarity and distance,or how a speaker can in one conversation use TM to authenticate their localaffiliation and to make fun of someone’s perceived crudeness. Simultaneously,this paper offers a critique of approaching varieties such as TM as if they weremonolithic entities, associated uniformly with a single set of social meanings,which has been the case in most scholarship on TM.

2. GEOGRAPHIC AND ETHNOGRAPHIC CONTEXT

2.1 Taipei County and the city of Sanchong

Sunrise SHS is located in Northern Taiwan, in the city of Sanchong in TaipeiCounty. As Su (2005) observes, the North-South distinction is the most salientconceptual division of geographic regions in Taiwan’s popular discourse.According to Su, ‘the North’ is associated with the capital Taipei and thevalues, lifestyles, and linguistic practices connected with it. It represents urbansophistication, modernity, fashion and trendiness, cultural and architecturaldevelopment, Mainlander presence and culture, and the use of Mandarin. Onthe other hand, ‘the South’ tends to be associated with traditional norms and

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values, rural life, less development, less modern urban centers, local Taiwanesepopulation and culture, and more prevalent use of Hoklo and TM. The North-South division has roots in the history of KMT rule, during which Taipeireceived disproportionately more funds budgeted for regional developmentthan the rest of Taiwan (Su 2005: 76–77). Not coincidentally, the North andespecially Taipei was also where Mainlanders tended to settle, Taipei thusbecoming the Mandarin-dominant, cultural and business center of Taiwan,while the rest of the island remained primarily rural.The location of their school in Sanchong – across the Danshui river from

Taipei, and just a five-minute drive over a bridge connecting the two cities –foregrounds the opposition between ‘the North’ and ‘the South’ for Sunrisestudents. Although ‘the North’ is often understood as one entity (Su 2005), forNortherners there is a clear distinction between Taipei City and Taipei County.They tend to describe cities such as Sanchong as ‘more like Southern Taiwan.’Sanchong lacks Taipei’s big boulevards, major business centers, or luxuryhotels and shopping malls. The narrow streets are lined with small shops run bylocal vendors. The residents are mostly Hoklo-speaking migrants from theSouth, who came here in search of work in the industries developing aroundTaipei, and settled in Taipei County where living was more affordable.Sunrise SHS is thus located on one hand in the North, where Mandarin is

the dominant language, and where negative stereotypes of TM speakers persist,and on the other hand, in an area that stands in contrast to Taipei City becauseof the similarities it shares with the South. Sunrise students are acutely awareof the contrast between where they live and go to school, and the modernmetropolis across the river. They most commonly compared Taipei City andSanchong in terms of shuǐzhǔn ‘standard’ or d�engj�ı ‘status,’ and referred toSanchong as more b�entǔ. In doing so, they also articulated their own stancetowards b�entǔ identities. Many noted that Taipei City feels cleaner and moreprosperous. Some described Sanchong as lu�an ‘messy’ – a euphemism fordangerous, sketchy and gangster-run. If they spent free time in Taipei City,they tended to distance themselves from Sanchong residents by assessingperceived b�entǔ qualities negatively: as backward, messy and crude. But othersdisagreed: they judged the same qualities of Sanchong residents as indicative ofintimacy and familiarity, and they described Sanchong as friendly, relaxed, andnot uptight or pretentious like Taipei City.

2.2 Sunrise Senior High School

Sunrise SHS focuses on vocational education including office administration,computer technology, electronics and car mechanics. The first two courses ofstudy aim to prepare students for white-collar occupations, or for technicalcolleges. The second two are geared towards blue-collar jobs in factories orrepair shops. Sunrise also has a college-preparatory course, which offers generaleducation and whose students are all expected to go on to university. These



educational tracks, the placement in which depends on exam scores, definestudents’ status at the school, including norms and expectations for academicperformance, future opportunities, social behavior, and language use. Since thetracks mirror the main social class divisions (cf. Eckert 2000), the students,despite their shared Taipei County, ethnically Taiwanese and blue-collar familybackground, find a clear social hierarchy at Sunrise. Office administrationstudent Jerry2 describes this in our interview (my translation):

The school believes that college-prep is better. Of course. They first stresscollege-prep over vocational, and then next is our office admin class,because office admin has always been the best performing class in thevocational division. And then computer technology. The rest it feels like theschool treats them like cattle at pasture [lit. ‘let cows eat grass’]. Our[college] scholarship (. . .) if we get into a public college we get ten thousand,when they [college-prep students] get into a public – doesn’t matter if it’spublic or private, even for private school they get twenty thousand. Andscholarships for grades on tests, our grade average maybe is even higherthan college prep but they get ten thousand, we get one thousand. Sodifferent. Ten times different. That’s what the school does. But when weentered we paid the same tuition, so this is unfair.

Jerry sums up the school’s treatment of the blue-collar-geared courses withthe Chinese expression f�ang ni�u ch�ı cǎo or ‘let cows eat grass,’ meaning thatstudents are left to their own devices because they are seen as a lost cause. Tobe sure, many teachers I spoke with appear very committed to teachingvocational courses. But Jerry’s sentiment is not unique among the students,and does reflect some teachers’ attitudes. One veteran college-preparatoryEnglish teacher explained that at Sunrise, teacher performance is rewardedwith a ‘promotion’ from the vocational to the college-preparatory classrooms,especially when it comes to subjects such as English, which, according to him,do not need to be taught well to vocational students.Meanwhile, the extensive institutional organization of all aspects of student

life establishes the b�anj�ı as a fundamental unit. Each b�anj�ı shares the sameclassrooms and schedule for three years. The b�anj�ı remains in the classroomthroughout the day, and teachers come each hour to teach their subjects.Interaction among students in different tracks is discouraged. College-preparatory classrooms are housed in a separate building, which oneteacher explained to me as purposeful segregation designed to protectcollege-bound students from the ‘negative influence’ of their presumably lessstudious peers. Opportunities for socializing are limited: there are no freeperiods or extracurricular activities, and no cafeteria or social spaces. On theother hand, the school organizes activities that always center around the b�anj�ıas a unit: during festivals classes compete with each other in games, andweekend trips involve either one or more b�anj�ı in the same course of study. Inall these ways, boundaries between the b�anj�ı – and between college-

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preparatory and vocational students especially – are reinforced, as is intra-group camaraderie.

3. IDENTITY WORK IN THE SCHOOL COMMUNITY

Sunrise students’ use of TM reflects and enacts the tension betweeninstitutionally structured social categories, and identity work that orientsitself with respect to these categories. This paper aims to examine howstudents use the linguistic resources of variation to produce social meaningsand identities in the local context of the school, and thus to highlight thedynamic processes in which many social practices, including language use,together produce group identities and individual styles and stances(cf. Bucholtz 1999).The participant-centered Communities of Practice framework (Lave and

Wenger 1991) became a useful tool for sociolinguists to theorize theseprocesses of identity work because the hallmark of CofPs is that they emergeorganically through ongoing joint activities aimed at a shared goal. As such,according to Bucholtz (1999), CofPs offer several advantages over moretraditional speech community models: they allow researchers to take socialpractice instead of language as a starting point, to accommodate both conflictand consensus among members, to focus on individuals as well as groups, andto examine identity practices rather than identity categories. And forvariationists, the CofP framework provides a method for operationalizinglocally emergent social variables. Following Eckert’s (1989, 2000) seminalwork at Belten High, several studies of language and identity practices atschools have employed the CofP framework, including Mendoza-Denton(2008), Moore (2004), and Lawson (2011). But unlike the American andBritish schools in these studies, Sunrise organizes students’ lives around theb�anj�ı, which are both the most visible and significant social groups, and onesthat operate differently from typical CofPs. While it is certainly possible forSunrise students to form CofPs within the b�anj�ı, and perhaps in rare instancesacross the b�anj�ı, the b�anj�ı remains a central unit of social organization atSunrise, and one that I focus on in this study. To conceptualize its operationI draw on Holliday’s (1999) notion of small cultures, which, while similar toCofPs, emphasizes different elements of social organization that correspondmore accurately to the structure of the b�anj�ı unit at Sunrise.

3.1 Communities of Practice in schools

While Lave and Wenger (1991) focus specifically on CofPs as sites for learning,sociolinguists have expanded the concept to include more diverse groups(Eckert and McConnell-Ginet 1992, 1998). Holmes and Meyerhoff (1999),following Wenger (1998), offer a list of features that constitute a CofP’s ‘sharedrepertoire of joint resources for negotiating meaning’ (1999: 176), and that



help to identify a potential CofP. In addition, a CofP as envisioned by Lave andWenger (1991) and Lave (1991), and later further discussed byWenger (1998)and others (e.g. Contu and Willmott 2003; De Fina 2007; Handley et al. 2006;Hara 2009), exhibits two other crucial characteristics: it is self-constituted andorganic, and it reproduces itself through the process of learning. Newcomersmove from peripheral participation, through observation and increasingpractice, to core membership. In sociolinguistic studies of schools cited above,both of these conditions are satisfied in some way: younger students aresocialized in the existing practices of Jocks and Burnouts (Eckert 2000); newgang members are initiated as Norte~nas or Sure~nas (Mendoza-Denton 2008);nerd girls develop their own group culture available for learning by otherprospective nerds (Bucholtz 1999); Midlan High girls gradually differentiatethemselves into Populars and Townies by adopting a repertoire of practices(Moore 2004). These CofPs orient themselves towards or against institutionalnorms, but are self-constituted, forming independently of school structures.The Sunrise b�anj�ı resemble CofPs because of their long-term, daily

participation in a shared set of goals and activities focused aroundschoolwork. It remains questionable, however, whether this participationconstitutes mutual engagement. Some b�anj�ı develop a strong sense of unifiedgroup identity, but others remain relatively disjointed. Some classmates formclose friendships that extend into their lives outside school, while othersmaintain social networks separate from school, and their interactions withclassmates are minimal. Individual students also participate in the productionof b�anj�ı identity to different degrees, based on personal goals and attitudes. Forexample, not everyone is equally and mutually involved in maintaining a neatclassroom, or in demonstrating insubordination to school authorities. Thissituation resembles the Vanuatu speech community discussed by Meyerhoff(1999), who argues that where ‘levels of mutual engagement vary greatlyacross individuals,’ there is ‘a practical constraint on the extent to which[everyone] in the speech community might have some jointly negotiatedenterprise’ (1999: 237). Moreover, membership in the b�anj�ı is not self-selected,and the b�anj�ı does not reproduce itself by initiating new members into itspractices. There are no newcomers and old-timers. The school designates agroup of incoming students as a b�anj�ı, to study together and disband after threeyears.As pointed out above, typical CofPs have the potential to form within or, in

rare cases, across the b�anj�ı. Such CofPs would represent different levels of socialstructure from the b�anj�ı, and might comprise small groups of close friends orlarger cross-b�anj�ı networks of acquaintances. But the b�anj�ı is a cruciallyimportant construct with respect to which identity practices at Sunrise areoriented. How b�anj�ı identities are defined – i.e. how students in each group areseen as ‘typically’ behaving – derives from the school authorities’ expectationsand stereotypes. These essentialized identities have a massive impact on thestudents’ lives. The academic track in which a student is placed becomes the

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tag classifying that student in a category, and it also largely determines his orher present and future educational opportunities. The b�anj�ı dominate students’lives also because nearly all of their waking hours are spent in school, withtheir b�anj�ı classmates, where institutional practices constantly reinforce b�anj�ıcohesion. As a result, students tend to see each other in terms of b�anj�ımembership, and articulate many of the institutional stereotypes whendescribing other classes. To account for the particular institutional structureand function of the b�anj�ı, I analyze them as Holliday’s (1999) small cultures,which can be seen as a variant of CofPs.

3.2 Small cultures

Holliday (1999) introduces the concept of small cultures as an alternative towhat he terms the ‘large cultures’ paradigm encountered frequently in appliedlinguistics, whereby ‘culture’ is viewed in an essentialist, reductionistperspective, and defined a priori as a national or ethnic entity. The smallcultures paradigm, on the other hand, allows for a non-essentialist researchagenda focused on interpreting ‘emergent behavior within any socialgrouping’ (Holliday 1999: 241). Small culture is thus defined as ‘a dynamic,ongoing group process which operates in changing circumstances to enablegroup members to make sense of and operate meaningfully within thosecircumstances’ (1999: 248). Consequently, a social grouping ‘can be said tohave a small culture when there is a discernible set of behaviors andunderstandings connected with group cohesion’ (1999: 248).Several aspects of the small culture framework prove useful when thinking

about the b�anj�ı at Sunrise. First, small cultures are defined through activities,which is an approach shared with the CofP framework’s emphasis on practices,and with the approach to identities as ‘inher[ing] in actions, not in people’(Bucholtz and Hall 2004: 376). This approach allows for a focus on what b�anj�ımembers do within their groups, instead of explaining their behavior as derivingfrom b�anj�ımembership. Significantly, however, small culture behaviors emergespontaneously but not necessarily in self-selected groups. Holliday gives anexample of a classroomgroup ‘where a small culturewill form from scratchwhenthe group first comes together, each member using her or his culture-makingability to form rules and meanings in collaboration with others’ (1999: 248). AtSunrise, students are assigned to the b�anj�ı, and over the course of intensive dailyinteraction develop ‘rules and meanings’ that produce their group cohesion.Furthermore, Holliday emphasizes two ways in which small cultures interact

with essentialist ‘large cultures.’ On one hand, members contribute their‘cultural residues and influences’ (1999: 249) to the formation of new smallcultures. These ‘residues and influences’ are the cultural resources whosemeanings originally derive from other contexts and wider social structures,and may be connected with essentialist ideologies. At Sunrise SHS, theyinclude such elements as the notions that females must be refined, and that



certain speech forms betray a lack of education. On the other hand, Holliday,following Berger and Luckmann (1967), argues that essentialist reification ofculture is ‘a natural social process in theoretical and non-theoretical thought’(1999: 242). Essentialist definitions of culture and identity, because they aresocially constructed, are valid and powerful in shaping the worldviews andpractices of those who subscribe to them (cf. Bucholtz and Hall 2004).Language ideologies are a prime example of this. And, at Sunrise SHS, thereified and essentialized b�anj�ı identity is built around academic tracks and theirconnection to the socio-economic stratification in wider society.In summary, at Sunrise there is, on one hand, the institutionally established

social group – the b�anj�ı – which is expected to ‘exhibit’ certain identitycharacteristics based on its academic profile. On the other hand, the groupdevelops its own small culture which is in a dialogic relationship with the‘target identity’ assigned to it by the school. Students are aware of what they are‘supposed to’ be like, and they form their own small culture in response to theseexpectations, variously accepting, rejecting, or redefining them. The practicesthrough which the small culture is produced have roots in the ‘culturalresidues’ that group members bring with them – or, as Eckert and McConnell-Ginet (2003: 57) explain with reference to CofPs, they ‘orient to the practices oflarger and more diffuse speech communities, refining the practices of thosespeech communities to their own purposes.’ Finally, each student continuouslyworks to position himself or herself with respect to this local social structure.

3.3 Tactics of intersubjectivity

Bucholtz and Hall’s (2004) tactics of intersubjectivity framework offerspotentially helpful analytical tools for discussing how TM variation formspart of the complex identity-making process at Sunrise. The framework aims atexamining the ‘contextually relevant sociopolitical relations’ produced throughthe semiotic processes involved in identity work (Bucholtz and Hall 2004: 382).Bucholtz and Hall propose three pairs of tactics of intersubjectivity:

• adequation and distinction, which construct similarity or differencebetween subjects;

• authentication and denaturalization, which claim realness or exposefalseness of identities; and

• authorization and illegitimation, which support or negate the ‘legitimate’expression of identities.

A number of studies have employed this framework in analyses ofinteraction (Cashman 2008; Cashman and Williams 2008; Chen 2008; Fitts2006; Higgins 2007; Nylund 2009), demonstrating its usefulness in theorizingthe goals accomplished through specific, situated practices that individualsengage in as they position themselves in relation to socially available identitycategories and the ideologies surrounding them. In this paper, I suggest that

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linguistic choices seen in patterns of variation may also reflect speakers’employment of tactics of intersubjectivity.At Sunrise SHS, students face a number of oppositional identity choices that

intersect in complex ways. These include:

• local stereotypes of the college-preparatory versus vocational classes;

• the small cultures of specific b�anj�ı;

• career plans that invoke ideologies connecting language use witheducation;

• gender norms; and

• orientation towards local networks and b�entǔ values, or towards middle-class norms and lifestyles.

Mandarin variables emerge as resources for students as they continuouslynegotiate their positioning with respect to these social categories. While furtherqualitative evidence is needed to support the tactics of intersubjectivity analysisof variation at Sunrise, I suggest that the students’ use of TM features mayreflect acts of adequation, distinction, authentication and denaturalization.

3.4 Small cultures at Sunrise Senior High School: The three b�anj�ı

The college-preparatory b�anj�ı. The college-preparatory classroom was locatedin the newest building on campus, with the brightest and most modern rooms.Their curriculum consisted of general subjects such as Chinese, math, English,social studies, science, music and art, with additional evening and Saturdayclasses to give them extra preparation for the college entrance exam. Thesestudents were serious about academic achievement and teachers frequentlydescribed them as a model b�anj�ı, but they also formed a small, tight-knit groupnot afraid to challenge school authorities. Girls wore colorful socks, as opposedto the school-sanctioned white socks, and boys did not neatly tuck in theirshirts as school rules require. In a somewhat notorious incident that earnedthem the reputation of believing they are ‘princes and princesses,’ the classrefused to go on the school-organized graduation trip, and instead asked forfunds to organize one at a time more suitable to them.

The office administration b�anj�ı. The office administration b�anj�ı had theirclassroom in an older building. Their curriculum mostly focused onprofessional skills such as Excel, Photoshop, technical drawing, accounting,and economics, preparing the students to enter the white-collar job market, orto attend technical colleges. However, some planned on applying to universityand invested time in exam preparation.In contrast to the college-preparatory class, the office administration b�anj�ı

went well beyond regular expectations to please the school authorities. Theirclassroom floor was protected with tatami mats, and they were the only classwho changed outdoor shoes for slippers at the door. Their desks were covered



with protective rubber mats, and the walls were always decorated with postersand student art. The norms produced by this b�anj�ı as part of their small culturecentered around distinguishing themselves from other vocational students atSunrise. However, they did not form a tight-knit friendship group.

The electronics b�anj�ı. The electronics b�anj�ı was all male, and had thereputation of troublemakers. Teachers euphemistically described them as‘lively’ or ‘different,’ and other students wondered how I was not scared of‘these gangster types’ (li�um�ang). The boys seemed to take active pride in theirnotorious reputation. They regularly slept, talked, and read newspapers duringclass, and teachers rarely reprimanded them. Jackets and ties – required partsof the uniform – came off immediately upon arrival in class. Fights in theclassroom and with boys from other classes broke out regularly. Braggingabout bullying younger students, starting fights, smoking in the classroom,and talking back to teachers featured constantly in the stories the students toldme about their class, usually ending with ‘teachers simply can’t handle ourclass,’ ‘all the other students are scared of us,’ or ‘we are the scariest class inthe school.’ This b�anj�ı produced a small culture centered around cultivating anidentity defined in opposition to school values, and oriented towards working-class local culture and corresponding notions of masculinity (Willis 1977).

4. TAIWAN MANDARIN

Existing literature on TM lacks clear agreement on how TM is defined, whospeaks it, or what social meanings it indexes. KMT-era linguists described TMas the result of the local population’s second language learning (cf. Hsu andTse 2009: 228). For example, Lin (1983) writes that ‘Mandarin spoken inTaiwan today is far from being perfect’ and identifies retroflex sibilants as ‘thesounds in Mandarin that strike us most as the source of all trouble for non-native Mandarin speakers’ (Lin 1983: 1–2; cf. Li 1986; Lin 1987). On theother hand, researchers outside of KMT influence have observed that TM is acomplex product of the historical development of Mandarin in Taiwan. Cheng(1979) notes that the Mainlanders who followed the KMT to Taiwan did nottypically speak the Beijing standard, but other dialects of Mandarin or non-Mandarin varieties of Chinese, and subsequent research demonstrates that anumber of TM features emerged out of contact among these (e.g. Cheng 1984;Hsu and Tse 2009; Kuo 2005).Recent research has focused on specific TM features, including:

• retroflection (Li 1995);

• the syllable-final [N~n] merger (Fon et al. 2011; Hsu and Tse 2009;Li 1992; Su 2012);

• [ɻ~l] alternation (Liao 2010);

• tone leveling (Hsu and Tse 2009) and tone change (Liao 2010);

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• the grammaticalization of the numeral-classifier yi-ge as an indefinitearticle (Liu 2006); and

• discourse particles (Shen 2009; Starr and Tseng 2011).

Proposals have also been made to redefine what constitutes ‘standard’Mandarin in Taiwan, with many researchers pointing to the emergence of anew, distinct variety among native speakers of Mandarin in Taiwan, differentboth from Beijing Mandarin, and from Mandarin spoken as a secondlanguage by local Taiwanese (Hsu and Tse 2009; Kubler 1979; Li 1995; Li1992; Su 2009). However, little has been said about TM’s sociolinguisticcomplexity.In response to these various approaches to TM, in this paper TM is seen as a

continuum: on one end, there is the idealized, prescriptive Standard Mandarinor gu�oyǔ (Milroy 1999), which is based on but not identical to the Beijingstandard (p�ut�onghu�a), and which is recognized by everyone but used by few(Chung 2006); on the other end, there is the most stigmatized local Mandarin(Su 2005) which is also an imaginary construct – in Su’s (2009: 320) words,‘a cultural stereotype’ – containing all the features perceived by speakers asnon-standard. The model of TM as a continuum is suggested by Su (2005), andelaborated further by Baran (2007) and Brubaker (2012). Brubaker’sextensive study of metapragmatic discourse is the first to connect differentsets of TM features with different sociocultural meanings: retroflection is linkedwith educational level and occupation, while ‘labial alternations’ (2012: 112)including labial glide deletion and elision of labial features in [f] ? [h] and[y] ? [i] index crude but also localized speech.

4.1 Retroflection/de-retroflection and labial glide deletion

The two linguistic variables I analyzed in the Sunrise SHS data represent thetwo main categories outlined by Brubaker (2012):

(1) (sh) De-retroflection of retroflex sibilant initialsVariants: [§] ~ [S] ~ [s]Examples: sh�ı ‘to be;’ sh�ang ‘top;’ shu�o ‘to say, to speak’

(2) (wo) Pre-nuclear labio-velar glide deletionVariants: [wɔ] ~ [ɔ]Examples: gu�o ‘country;’ wǒ ‘I, me;’ shu�o ‘to say, to speak’

I selected these features because they are both salient in that they are singledout by speakers as ‘typical’ of TM (Labov 1972[1963]), unlike, for example, the[N~n] merger (cf. Li 1992) or tone leveling. Furthermore, my observationsduring my fieldwork suggested that they are evaluated differently and invokedifferent sociocultural meanings. Therefore, I felt that selecting glide deletion tocompare with the de-retroflection of [§] would offer more insight than selecting



de-retroflection of affricates [t§] and [dʐ], since de-retroflection in generalpatterns in a similar way (Li 1995).De-retroflection is a continuous variable (Chung 2006; Li 1995), following a

range of articulations from the retroflex [§] to the dental [s]. Full retroflection [§] isthe prescriptive Standard Mandarin form. Complete de-retroflection [§] → [s]is the most stigmatized variant (Su 2005), and the in-between realizations alongthe palato-alveolar area (Chung 2006: 4) appear to be the most neutral(Brubaker 2012; Li 1995).Full retroflection is seen as a hallmark of prescriptive Standard Mandarin and

of an educated speaker: an intellectual, a supervisor, someone with high socialstatus (Brubaker 2012: 100). When asked to describe Standard Mandarin, myTaiwanese acquaintances inevitably said that it has juǎnsh�e, literally ‘curledtongue,’ even if they rarely used it themselves, and Brubaker’s (2012) interviewsconfirm this observation. The connection with education is likely rooted in theexplicit teaching of retroflection in Taiwanese elementary schools (Kubler 1986).However, consistent use of retroflectionmay also be seen as ‘off-putting, affected,and show-offy’ (Chung 2006: 202), or unnatural and pretentious (Brubaker2012: 106). Conflicting attitudes also surfaced in my 2006 survey about TMconducted in my linguistics class at National Taiwan University; for example:

Lack of retroflection is an example of some old people who can’t speakMandarin. Also, Taiwanese [Hoklo] does not have retroflection. So when wehear some old people speak without retroflection, they might be defined aslow class or that they didn’t get a good education.

People in Taiwan do not overstress retroflection. We don’t want tooverstress that sound and be identified as people who come from Beijing orsomewhere in China. At least, not while R.O.C. [Taiwan] and China are stilltwo countries.

By appealing to national identity, the latter respondent invokes globallyrelevant sociocultural meanings of retroflection, highlighting the many levels atwhich the meanings of Mandarin features are constructed and interpreted.Glide deletion is also explicitly mentioned by the respondents in my survey:

About ten years ago, many lower-class Taiwanese could not pronounceMandarin well. For example gu�o → g�o. At that time, people who sounded likethis would be laughed at and thought of as illiterate. But now, many popularTV programs and famous people sound like this to show they are local-bornTaiwanese.

This respondent points to labial glide deletion as the marker of a ‘local-bornTaiwanese.’ Although several researchers (Cheng 1979; Kubler 1986; Li 1986)describe this feature, the first to explore the sociocultural meanings thatspeakers connect with it is Brubaker (2012). His respondents describe peoplewho use it as uncultured, peasant-like, unrefined and crude, but also as evokingfeelings of comfort and solidarity. One respondent states that T�aiw�an gu�oyǔ – the

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Mandarin term for the most stigmatized TM which this respondent describes asfeaturing labial alternations – ‘sounds rather comfortable, it has a “local” b�entǔfeeling’ (Brubaker 2012: 119). In fact, Brubaker observes that based on hisdata, ‘when identification with “native” aspects of identity increases, then non-standard usage of the labial feature increases as well’ (2012: 117).At Sunrise, both de-retroflection and labial glide deletion are used by young

native speakers of Mandarin; crucially, however, they have very differentfrequencies of overall use: 68.9 percent for full de-retroflection ([§] ? [s]),compared with 11 percent for glide deletion. Such distribution at a low-ranking,primarily vocational school next door to Taipei City seems to reflect the twofeatures’ social evaluations: as discussed above, de-retroflection is linked withlower education but generally less stigmatized, while labial features includingglide deletion are linked both with peasant-like and crude speech, and with localidentification. Full retroflection ([§]), which is a marker of education but can beseen as pretentious, has the frequency of only 7.5 percent. And most students atSunrise are not in academic tracks aimed at professional careers – but at thesame time, they are young and orient towards urban rather than b�entǔ or‘peasant-like’ lifestyles. This overall picture becomes more nuanced whenexamined in detail. In the next section, I explore how students invoke thecomplexity of the two TM features’ sociocultural meanings to construct groupand individual identity positions in the local context of Sunrise.

5. DATA AND DISCUSSION

The data in this section comes from 18 informal 45–90 minute interviews,with a balance of six from each b�anj�ı. There are three boys and three girls in thecollege preparatory group, two boys and four girls in office administration, andall boys in electronics. The interviews were recorded in the school’s conferenceroom during lunch or after school.

5.1 Dependent variables and internal factors

I coded the variables auditorily, coding each interview segment twice, andconsulting with a second listener in unclear cases. The total number of tokensfor (sh) is 3,174 (average number per speaker = 176; highest = 234; lowest =140), and for (wo) it is 2,733 (average number per speaker = 152; highest =221; lowest = 100). The data was analyzed using VARBRUL. For the (sh)variable, I collapsed the spectrum of intermediate realizations (between [§] and[s], and closer to [S]) into one category, because I was specifically interested inthe use of full retroflection and full de-retroflection.In the analysis of internal factors, full de-retroflection appears to be favored

when (sh) is followed by [+low, -round] vowels, with other environmentshaving a neutral or inhibiting effect. Glide deletion is favored when (wo) ispreceded by labials and coronals, inhibited by velars, and not affected by



sibilants. The discussion of internal factors is presented in detail in Baran(2007). The analysis of social variables presented below includes the internalvariables in the model.

5.2 Social variables

The three social variables include the b�anj�ı/course of study (college-preparatory,office administration, and electronics), gender, and plans and aspirations.‘Course of study’ reflects institutional expectations of students’ future careerpaths, and the small culture of the particular b�anj�ı. As discussed in section 3,b�anj�ı produce small cultures whose norms and behaviors respond to but alsoreinterpret the school’s expectations. Gender is important because both Hoklo(Taiwanese) and TM are often associated with masculinity. Since normativefemininity demands a display of q�ızh�ı or refinement, in mainstream ideologies itis incompatible with TM (Brubaker 2012; Su 2005, 2008). The third socialvariable, ‘plans and aspirations,’ was derived by interviewing students abouttheir future hopes and plans after graduating from Sunrise, and it provides aninsight into the students’ self-perception vis-�a-vis institutional stereotypes andb�anj�ı small cultures. I grouped the students into those planning to attenduniversity, those planning to attend technical colleges, and those with noplans for higher education.

5.3 Socio-economic background

Socio-economic background was not considered as a variable in this studybecause too little difference exists among Sunrise students’ families to permitthe establishment of meaningful categories. All the parents are originally fromthe countryside, with a low level of education. Most are from the South, whilea few are from Taipei County. None of the 18 students in this study haveparents who are professionals or have received higher education, and in eachb�anj�ı parents’ occupations range from factory work to ownership of smallmanufacturing plants. For example, in the college-preparatory b�anj�ı, Ken’sparents own a betel-nut stand, Tania’s mother sells clothes at a night market,and Jenny’s family runs a small factory manufacturing machine parts. In theoffice administration b�anj�ı, Jerry’s father is a house painter and decorator, andOlga’s and Eddie’s parents have worked in manufacturing. Some studentsexplicitly discuss their financial difficulties: Nancy and Eddie both workpart-time to supplement their families’ incomes, which for families focused onhigher education tends to be viewed as an undesirable distraction from studies.In the electronics b�anj�ı, Xiao Qiu’s father is a police officer, Ting’s parentsowned a scooter repair shop, Xue-dai’s father is a construction worker, whileWen-hua’s father owns a successful construction business. Families that owntheir own businesses typically work in them alongside a few employees: whileon one hand they are business owners, on the other they themselves engage in

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manual labor. Sunrise families thus share a blue-collar background in thesense of engaging in manual labor as opposed to white-collar work.

5.4 Group identities: The b�anj�ı small cultures

Figure 1 shows VARBRUL results3 for the (sh) and (wo) variables. For both,the use of the stigmatized or localized variant tends to be favored by studying ina working-class geared track, and disfavored by having university plans. Butthere are important points to note. First, in both cases, office administration

De-retroflection (sh) > [s]

Glide deletion

College-prep0.416

Office admin0.387

Electronics0.712

University0.389

Tech college0.549

No higher ed0.718

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Fact

or w

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ght

Figure 1: Comparison of VARBRUL results for: (a) de-retroflection (sh) > [s] (Loglikelihood: -1717.971, Significance: 0.000); and (b) glide deletion (Log likelihood:-768.046, Significance: 0.000)



students appear less likely to use the TM variants than college-preparatorystudents, at the same time diverging greatly from the behavior of the othervocational group, the electronics students – despite the fact that officeadministration students are not being groomed for academic or professionalcareers. Second, there is a clear direct relationship between post-graduationplans and the use of TM for (sh), but not for (wo): having university plansdisfavors glide deletion, but no significant difference exists between the othertwo groups. Finally, gender has an effect on glide deletion – with boys,unsurprisingly, more likely to use the stereotypically ‘unrefined’ TM variant –but not on de-retroflection, where it emerged as not significant.Further analysis reveals the interplay among the school-sanctioned ‘target

identity’ of each course of study, the small culture of each b�anj�ı, and individualidentity positions that students take up through their practices, invokingideologies of social class, gender and localness. Figures 2 and 3 show theresults of a refined analysis, in which the ‘course of study’ and ‘plans/aspirations’ factor groups are combined so that each factor in the ‘course ofstudy’ group is further split into ‘university plans,’ ‘technical college plans’ and‘no higher education plans’ factors.Figure 2 shows a direct relationship between future plans and the use of [s] for

the office administration students, which follows the pattern observed for ‘plansand aspirations’ in Figure 1. From the school’s perspective, office administrationis a vocational track: its students are not expected to be outstandingacademically, and their access to school resources is correspondingly limited

0.3160.269

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University Techcollege

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Figure 2: Factor weights for de-retroflection (sh) > [s] by course and plans/aspirations; number of speakers per bar from left: 6, 3, 2, 1, 1, 2, 3 (Log likelihood:-1711.244, Significance: 0.000)

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compared to the college-preparatory group. However, the students in this b�anj�ıcontinuously engage in practices that establish distinction between them andother vocational classes: they comply with school rules, maintain animmaculate classroom, and engage actively in school-sponsored activities.Their b�anj�ı small culture is based around resisting the institutional stereotype ofthe mediocre and ‘difficult’ vocational student by developing a reputation ascooperative and well-behaved, unlike the unruly electronics or car mechanicsstudents. Their avoidance of TM features (Figure 1) is part of this endeavor. ButFigure 2 shows that linguistic practices vary based on students’ individualplans. Those with university plans are not only least likely to de-retroflex, butless likely to do so than the college-preparatory group. Similar ‘over-compensating’ behavior is described among the lower middle class in Labov(1972) and Trudgill (1974). At Sunrise, the extreme avoidance of thestigmatized [s] specifically by those office administration students who plan toapply to university may reflect the tactic of authentication: if [s] indexes a lack ofeducation, then by limiting its use these students emphasize that despite theirvocational trajectory, they can become credible university candidates who speakwith the accent of those with higher education.By contrast, electronics students’ extensive use of de-retroflection may be an

adequation tactic, erasing differences within their group – such as those inpersonal plans – and solidifying the anti-school stance that unites them. Theelectronics students’ small culture practices involve an exaggeration ofinstitutional stereotypes: they openly reject the value of education and theauthority of teachers, and constantly work to reaffirm their reputation as themost unmanageable b�anj�ı in the school. Even those who privately express an

0.381 0.380

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Plans/aspirations

Figure 3: Factor weights for glide deletion by course and plans/aspirations; numberof speakers per bar same as Figure 2 (Log likelihood: -765.568, Significance: 0.000)



interest in school, in group settings collaborate to construct the anti-schoolimage, as I saw in jointly produced narratives of the b�anj�ı’s exploits or inencouraging each other to break school rules.Figure 3 presents a messier picture. In the office administration b�anj�ı, glide

deletion is favored by having technical college plans and, surprisingly, inhibitedby having no higher education plans to the same degree as by having universityplans. A likely explanation is interaction with the gender factor group in theVARBRUL model, since gender is a significant factor for glide deletion. Since thethree social variables at times overlap – all college preparatory students also haveuniversity plans, and all electronics students are male – such interaction isinevitable, and effects of each separate factor are difficult to tease out when allthree factors are significant. This is especially problematic in the officeadministration group, where the two students with technical college plans arealso female, and the student with no higher education plans is male.To address this problem, the effects of gender on glide deletion in each b�anj�ı

are illustrated separately in Figure 4, which shows a very clear pattern: in bothof the co-ed b�anj�ı girls are much less likely to use glide deletion than boys. So onone hand, in the co-ed b�anj�ı gender emerges as a more consistent predictor ofglide deletion than future plans, but on the other hand, Figure 3 shows thatwithin the all-male electronics b�anj�ı, having university plans means a muchlower likelihood of glide deletion than either technical college or no highereducation plans. Taken together, these results suggest that variation in glidedeletion within the different b�anj�ı is motivated by multiple strategies, withgender norms playing an important role. But, crucially, gender norms are also

0

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College-prepboys

Office admingirls

Office adminboys

Electronicsboys

Fact

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t

Figure 4: Factor weights for the effect of gender on glide deletion in each b�anj�ı;number of speakers per bar from left: 3, 3, 4, 2, 6 (Log likelihood: -768.000,Significance: 0.000)

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bound up with the expression of b�entǔ identities. And while glide deletioncertainly indexes a lower educational level, unlike de-retroflection it isprimarily linked not with schooling as such – and thus perhaps not as muchwith future plans – but with b�entǔ or ‘local’ cultural identity, with Hokloethnicity and with a Hoklo ‘accent.’ Meanwhile, dominant ideology sees b�entǔidentity as unrefined, and refinement is a quality required of a well-bred female(Su 2008). Such views may not be representative of Taiwan as a whole, butthey form the dominant discourse in the Taipei area. Although not all Sunrisegirls accept these ideologies of femininity or of b�entǔ culture, they nonethelessmust make identity choices within these dominant structures.

5.5 Individual choices

Figure 5 shows the frequency of two variants of (sh), full retroflection ([§]) andfull de-retroflection ([s]), and of glide deletion, for each Sunrise student. Seen inconjunction with other cultural practices and with personal aspirations, views,and feelings about Sunrise, Sanchong, Taipei, and Taiwanese-ness as expressedby students in interviews and conversations, these individual language choicesallow us to theorize how the students position themselves with respect to widersocial discourses, institutional expectations at Sunrise, and their b�anj�ı smallcultures. Below, I discuss a few students whose linguistic practices especially

0

Richard

Jenny

Mandy Ken

BrianTan

iaNao

miJer

ryOlgaTina Sue

Eddie

Xue-D

ai J.R.

Xiao-Q

iu

Zhen-y

i

Wen

-huaTing

10

20

30

40

50

60

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[s][-glide]


%

Figure 5: Percent frequency of full de-retroflection (sh) > [s], glide deletion, and fullretroflection (sh) > [§] for individual speakers in each class



stand out. Significantly, these students’ socio-economic background is typicalwithin the sample as discussed in section 5.3.Full retroflection is rare at Sunrise, but there are exceptions: Naomi and Jerry

in office administration at a surprising 60 percent and 30 percent, respectively,comparable only to Jenny in college-preparatory at 20 percent. Naomi also hasthe lowest full de-retroflection rates in the study; in fact, she is the only onewhose use of [§] for the (sh) variable is greater than [s], in contrast to otherswho choose the in-between variant [S]. Given that [§] can be seen aspretentious, while [S] is neutral (Brubaker 2012), the preference for [S] or [s]over [§] makes sense at Sunrise, where students must negotiate their stancetowards the local, working-class values of Sanchong, and the urban, modernlifestyle of Taipei City. But Naomi and Jerry are office administration studentswith serious academic dreams: Naomi hopes to become a lawyer, and Jerry aChinese teacher. For them, opting for the prescriptive [§] sets them apart notonly from other vocational students, but also from those in their own b�anj�ı whomay have less ambitious plans. It also possibly authenticates Naomi and Jerry’spotential as future university students and professionals: with each instance of[§], they invoke the speech style associated with an educated person. Forexample, when Jerry explains that in comparison to his peers he is more maturebecause he thinks about his education and his future, his pronunciation of (sh)in ch�engsh�ou ‘mature’ as [§] brings to mind the speech style of an educatedprofessional rather than a vocational high school graduate.Naomi and Jerry greatly differ, however, in their use of glide deletion: Naomi’s

rate is 0.6 percent, while Jerry’s, at 9.4 percent, is among the highest in thecollege-preparatory and office administration b�anj�ı. Since labial features likeglide deletion are seen as b�entǔ, and dominant discourses see b�entǔ speech as amale province, Naomi’s virtual lack of glide deletion distances her from b�entǔculture and also conforms to mainstream femininity. By the same token, Jerry’suse of this feature invokes affiliation with b�entǔ and masculine identities. AndJerry’s overall feelings towards local Taiwanese culture are positive: in hisinterview he discusses at length how Hoklo and b�entǔ speech enhance malebonding. Naomi and Jerry’s example illustrates how the sociocultural meaningsof the two TM features are invoked to accomplish different social goals.Figure 5 also shows that the only girls who use glide deletion to any

significant degree are Tina and Tania. They both have strong ties to localnetworks in Sanchong. Tina hopes for a life in the country, she appreciatestraditional culture and is proud of her Southern origins. Tania’s linguisticbehavior may seem surprising for a college-preparatory student: not only doesshe use glide-deletion, but her rate of de-retroflection is comparable to that ofthe electronics boys. But like Naomi and Jerry, Tania challenges institutionalassumptions. She is one of the best students in her b�anj�ı who will easily get intocollege, and she is also proud of her local background and loves Sanchong.Tania does not conform to dominant cultural ideologies: she criticizesportrayals of Hoklo as crude or unrefined, and speaks it fluently and often.

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In this, she is joined by Mandy, another college-preparatory girl who uses glidedeletion, albeit less than Tania. Mandy grew up with her mother and sisters ina female-only household, and she only speaks Hoklo at home. She sees it as thelanguage of intimacy and friendship, and dismisses the notion that it isunrefined as ‘ridiculous.’ Tania’s behavior, however, additionally challengesgender norms and produces distinction from her b�anj�ı small culture: she goes toconcerts and stays out late, and admitted to me that she smokes cigarettes,which is deemed highly inappropriate for Taiwanese girls and which she keepsa secret from her classmates. Tania’s linguistic choices together with her othercultural practices appear to denaturalize connections between b�entǔ culturalidentity and a lack of education or sophistication, as well as essentialistassumptions about femininity.In the electronics b�anj�ı, only J.R. plans to attend university, but his use of de-

retroflection does not diverge substantially from that of his classmates. In fact,Figure 5 shows that all electronics students use this feature – which in thiscontext represents rejection of education and school values – at a very similarhigh rate. Their overwhelming preference for the [s] variant contributes to theproduction of their ‘troublemaker’ image – a joint enterprise in which J.R.frequently participates through displays of an anti-school stance. Unlike Naomior Jerry, he does not rely on the resources of retroflection to highlight hiscollege candidacy, aligning himself instead with his b�anj�ı through the use ofde-retroflection, which may be seen as adequation.But J.R.’s rate of glide deletion is the lowest among the electronics students.

Less strongly linked to educational achievement than de-retroflection, glidedeletion carries meanings bound up with a local orientation. And J.R. is notjust a university hopeful: he is also a hip-hop dancer who travels extensivelyabroad to attend dance competitions, including the United States, Korea, andJapan. He does not want to stay in Sanchong; instead, he hopes to live abroadafter studying physical education in college, and his low rate of glide deletionunderscores his international orientation. J.R. thus negotiates his positioningor ‘location within the social order’ (Bucholtz 2011: 10) at Sunrise: hisfrequent de-retroflection may possibly be interpreted as the tactic of adequationwith his b�anj�ı, and his avoidance of glide deletion as one of distinction betweenhim and the local community outside of school.For the electronics b�anj�ı as a whole, Figure 5 reveals an important contrast

between the (sh) and (wo) variables. The former patterns almost uniformly forthis group: the [s] variant is used at a consistently high rate, while the standard[§] variant is virtually at zero percent. This consistent linguistic behavior is partof performing the non-academic, almost anti-academic, identity for this b�anj�ı.But the use of glide deletion varies quite widely among the electronics students,and as such accomplishes other goals. It is a resource for the performance ofmasculinity, and, perhaps more importantly, for enacting one’s ties to localculture and networks.



6. CONCLUSION

Like all Taiwanese high schools, Sunrise SHS is a highly structured institution,regulating all aspects of student life including the composition of the primarysocial group within the school – the b�anj�ı. Within this context, studentsproduce distinct b�anj�ı small cultures, and accordingly cultivate a particularclass image: the troublemakers, the better-than-vocational group, the brightand independent group. In this process, they align themselves with or againstthe school’s categorization and expectations. Individual students furthernegotiate their position with respect to the range of identities available at theschool in part by drawing on the resources of TM variation.Speaking Taiwan Mandarin can be a way of rejecting the values of the

school institution by those who feel marginalized (cf. Eckert 1989), but it canalso serve to display stances such as appreciation for local culture or rejectionof traditional femininity by those already confident in their privileged status atthe school. Conversely, opting for Standard Mandarin features can serve as anauthentication tactic for students who seek to prove their scholastic aptitudeand worth. TM can also represent the claiming and localizing of Mandarin,thus allowing students to bring local identities into the school domain whereMandarin and not Hoklo is the expected language choice. Thus the electronicsstudents, who outside of school position themselves as b�entǔ partly by speakingHoklo, in their Mandarin-dominant classroom accomplish this goal throughtheir frequent use of TM features.Students’ attitudes towards b�entǔ identities and values are complicated

by the geographic location of Sunrise. The proximity of the developed,middle-class, culturally Mainlander-oriented Taipei City provides a foil for thelocal character of Sanchong and other Taipei County cities where the studentslive. The intersection between personal ambitions, including plans for highereducation and future careers, and affiliation with local life, emerges as a pointof convergence or conflict. For some, attending university reinforces theattractiveness of life beyond Sanchong, and of values associated with TaipeiCity. Motivations behind this process differ: Jenny thinks that Sanchong isdirty, Naomi sees it as backward, while J.R.’s music and dance interests frameTaipei City as opening more opportunities in Taiwan and beyond. For others,entering the local working-class job market goes hand in hand with a strongidentification with the local area. Still other students, like Tania, aim for aprofessional career but also reject the idea that b�entǔ Taiwanese-ness issomehow crude or low class, and have a fondness for Sanchong.In this article, I have sought to show that linguistic practices such as the use

or avoidance of TM features at Sunrise can be used by speakers to positionthemselves with respect to local identity categories, which in turn invoke andreinterpret wider social discourses. And describing the connection betweenlocal practices and larger social structures is what allows variationist researchto effectively address critiques of traditional variationism that charge it with

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treating correlations as explanations (Cameron 1990). This enterprisenecessitates an understanding of the range of sociocultural meaningsassociated with sociolinguistic variables. Thus, in the present study, TM de-retroflection can be demonstrated to symbolize educational failure in some ofthe dominant discourses in Taiwan, while glide deletion is linked with a localorientation and b�entǔ culture, and, indirectly, with masculinity, sinceperforming local Taiwanese-ness is seen as unfeminine. Invoking thesymbolic resources of these variables allows Sunrise students to accomplishidentity-making goals. Drawing on the tactics of intersubjectivity framework,student practices may be seen as establishing adequation with others in theirb�anj�ı, producing distinction between themselves and other student groups,authenticating their identity positions as, for example, credible universitycandidates, or denaturalizing ideologies of gender and of b�entǔ culture.This study demonstrates how two specific variables can become resources for

different aspects of identity work, yet they are both part of a variety that isfrequently constructed as monolithic. This is the case in academic research,where Taiwan Mandarin is often studied without an in-depth analysis of thesociocultural meanings of its individual features, and in popular discourse,where it is envisioned as representing the stereotype of an uneducated,unrefined person. This study highlights the importance for variationistresearch on language and identity to understand both local social groupsand identities relevant to them, and the complexity of meanings invoked byspecific variables within a language variety. It is also hoped that this study willencourage future research on Taiwan Mandarin, a new and as yet poorlyunderstood variety of Chinese.

NOTES

1. I wish to thank Peter L. Patrick, Robin Dodsworth, Luciana Fellin, theanonymous reviewers, and editors Allan Bell and Devyani Sharma for insightfulcomments on earlier versions of this article, and Peter L. Patrick for his supportand insight throughout all stages of this study. I received invaluable input fromGregory R. Guy, Penelope Eckert, Marcyliena Morgan, Karen Chung, Robert L.Cheng, and Chin-An Li. All remaining weaknesses are mine alone. The researchwas supported by grants from the Fulbright Foundation, the Center for ChineseStudies at the National Central Library in Taipei, and the Harvard UniversityAsia Center.

2. All names are pseudonyms. Some are given in English and some in Chinese. Inthis, they follow the language of the name by which a given student asked me tocall them. College-preparatory and office administration students tended tointroduce themselves with English names, while none of the electronics studentsdid. An exception is J.R., who referred to himself with English initials.

3. In this article, graphs are used to present results rather than standard VARBRULtables in order to show a clear visual representation of results, accessiblefor variationists and non-variationists alike. While this practice may be less



common, it follows, for example, Eckert (1989, 1998, 2000) and Mendoza-Denton (2008).

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linguistic practice and identity work: variation in taiwan mandarin at a taipei county high school

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