Reviews

134 Links & Letters 1, 1994 Reviews Their Correlates. Cambridge, Ma.: ~lications are briefly sketched in MIT Press. 4-13. The three principles on whic RaB" t is LADEFOGED, P. (1971). Preliminaries to theory is built concern, (i) the impossibi- Linguistic Phonetics. Chicago: The lity of observing language independentl~ University of Chicago Press. of society, (ii) the impossibility of descri- MOORE, B.C.J. (1982). An Introduction bing language structures independently to the Psychology of Hearing. London: of society, and (iii) the necessity of ac- Academic Press. counting for language maintenance as a preliminary to any social approach to linjoan E carbonell, guistic change. Milroy then turns to dis- University College London cuss some aspects of Weinreich, Labov and Herzogs Empirical foundations (1968), which, despite their emphasis on fieldwork methods, constitute a still mdy system-oriented approach. According JAMES MILROY. Linguistic Eriation to Milroy, it is this internal orientation and change: on the ~j~~~ri~~l that has made the actuation problem (i.e., the deterrnination of the causes oflinguis- Sociolinguistics of English. Oxford: tic change) an insoluble one, Blackwell, 1992. xii + 243 pages. Chapter 2, Social and historicallinguistics (pp. 20-47), opens with a discus- This book consists of a brief Editor's presion ofsome of he main system-oriented face by Peter Trudgill, a preface, and seven trends concerning the determination of chapters; by and large, the first chapter is the locus of language change. The author a theoretical statement about the need for points, that these tren& have systemati- a social model of language change, which cally neglected the role of speakers in the the author goes on to build in the subprocess of change. In a similar way, Labov sequent chapters. The theme throughout argues that the locus of change is in the is the integration of the theory of linguisgroup, not in the individual. As Milroy tic change into a broader theory of social points out, linguistic change is locared in change. The author, former Professor of speaker-interaction and is negotiated be- Linguistics at the University of Sheffield tween speakers in &e course of interac- and Senior Lecturer in English at Queens tion, much as other aspects of discourse University, is now engaged in research and are negotiated between them (Milroy writing, and has done considerable work 1992: 36). on various hisrorical and dialectal aspects Chapters 3 and 4 (pp. 48-80 and 81- of English, mostly related to Belfast En- 122, respectively) deal with the analysis glish. and interpretation of linguistic patterns Chapter 1, Introduction: Language revealed by the community. Both chapchange and variation (pp. 1-19), begins ters are based on previous research carried with a discussion on de Saussure's stateout by James and Lesley Milroy in the ments about the uniformity of langua e Belfast area. The question of the embedk which, according to Milroy, are not se fding of language variation in society is evidently true. The elimination of these approached from a variationist point of structuralist assumptions is thus a preview, following Weinreich, Labov and vious step towards the question of the Herzog's quantitative paradigm. As for study of language change. Contrary to the interpretative phase of the model, the most other approaches proposed in the most important concern of the author is last decades about the process followed by the relation of the variations previously linguistic change, James Milroy is concerned patterned to the social variables of age, with a strictly sociolinguistic theory of sex, class, and, most important of all, the language change, whose theoretical imethnographic concept of social network. Reviews Links & Letters 1, 1994 135 Chapter 5, On the time-depth ofvarzability in English (pp. 123-163), concerns the ~roiection of the method ~reviouslv I I sketched to past states of language change. Orderly variation in speiling, which has traditionally been related to scribal habits, is presented by Milroy in a brief discussion on /h/-dropping in Middle English with the following result: /h/-loss might have been current at a relativelv high so- , " cial stratum during the medieval period. In a second application of the method, Milroy attempts to relate some of the patterns of variation established in previous research in the city of Belfast to the vowel system of Early Modern English with similar results. A brief appendix on some etymological . . applications of variationism closes the chapter. In Chapter 6, Speaker-innouation and linguistic change (pp. 164-205), the author explores the applications of a network-based approach to the study of linguistic change. This approach, which is primarily based on recent work in social anthropology (Boissevain 1974, Granovetter 1982), dows the researcher to account for the individual linmiistic behaviour in u communities. The main implication of this approach lies on the assumption that linguistic changes, just like other social changes, diffuse through the different social groups through weak-ties (i.e. multiple, casual ties). The last chapter in rhe book, Towards an integrated social modelfor the interpretation of language change (pp. 206- 222), is substantially based on Thomas Hajrups theory of Life-Modes. The Danish sociologist proposes a division of the population into life-modes, which are differenti-ated bv a common ideoloeical u orientation to work, leisure and family. The most important implication of Hajrups theory is the possibility of linking the micro and macro levels of sociolinguistic analysis in a coherentway. However, the complete development of such an integratedmodel is left aside for aforthcoming paper by the Milroys, provisiondy referred to as So$/ network and so&/ ckw towardr an integmed sociolinguzrhc mohL The Bibliography (pp. 229-239) is quite complete and up-to-date, including an impressive range of material in terms of disciplines (mostly linguistics, sociology and ethnology), and referentes to forth coming materials by the Milroys. This fresh outlook sketched by James Milroy, which 1 find surprisingly novel and - - lively; is a serious attempt to solve the actuation problem (the very heart of the matter) as stated by Weinreich, Labov and Herzog in 1968, providing a full range of possibilities for future research in the different areas of diachronic linguistics. BOISSEVAIN, JOHN (1974). Friends of friends; networks, manipulators and coalitions. Oxford: Blackwell. GRANOVESTER, ~MARK ( 1 9 82). "The strength of weak ties: a nenvork theory revisited. Marsden, I?N. and Lin, N. (eds.) SocialStructureandNetwork Anal~sis, 105-135. London: Sage. HOJRUI>,THOMAS. (1983). "The concept of life-mode". Ethnologia Scandinavica, 15-50. LABOU, WILLIAM (1972). Sociolinguistic Patterns. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. WEINREICH, U., MOV, W. and HERZOG, M. (1968). "Empirical foundations for a theory of language changen. In Lehman, W.I? and Malhel, Y. (eds.) Directions for Historical Linpistics, 2 1- 188. Austin: University of Texas. Javier E. Díaz Vera Dpto. de Filología Moderna Facultad de Letras Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha Ciudad Real