Research
Interaction between Language Attitudes and Media
Media is often cited as a contributor to the creation and maintenance of language attitudes. Few empirical studies, however, have been performed to delve into this link. Studies of media effects in social psychology and communications have revealed a complex relationship between media and attitudes, oftentimes mediated by multiple other factors. One of my current projects combines methodologies from social psychology and communications and applies them to language attitudes. Specifically, I focus on the effect of media and how stereotyped performances of American Southern English affect (1) explicit attitudes towards an American Southern speaker the participant interacts with and (2) implicit attitudes towards American Southern English. This project is the first step in developing a cross-disciplinary methodology to study language attitudes and media based in sociolinguistics, communications, and social psychology.
Presenting research on implicit attitudes at the American Dialect Society conference (January 2018)
Dialect authenticity
Authenticity in media dialects is dependent on the producers' use of features they believe will index certain identities and the audience's interpretations of features used to index identities. Thus, two questions arise. What features do producers' think the audience needs to correctly identify a speaker? What features to does the audience actually need to identify a speaker as belonging to a group? To this end, I have worked with authenticity of American Southern accents in television through a case study of two American Southern television characters (Brenda in The Closer and Calleigh in CSI: Miami). Phonological and prosodic analyses (Heaton 2016) have been performed looking at what features are used and how the features are used in style-shifting. These production studies will guide future perception studies that delve further into authenticity as a theoretical construct and what it means to speak an authentic dialect.
On the perceptual side of authenticity, I investigate how successful listeners are at identifying native speakers of dialects versus performers. This research has implications for media studies (as many characters are played by actors who do not speak the dialect of the character), what features might be needed to identify speakers, and forensic linguistics.
Production of regional dialects
In the same vein as authenticity, I also do work examining what features are used to index identities. In one project, I examined Southern dialect in fictional television programs. Using a self-created corpus, I performed an acoustic study of 18 American Southern characters from 10 shows (including new and old era comedies and dramas) in which the characters were played by actors who were born and raised outside of the South. More prominent vowels in the Southern Vowel Shift (/e/ and /Ɛ/) were used more than less prominent vowels (/I/ and /æ/). My findings also indicated that the biggest indicator of vowel manipulation wasn't the creation of an obvious Southern vowel space, but instead inconsistency in the form of splits where some some vowels were Southern and others not. Splits were not phonetically conditioned.
Context and attitudes towards dialect speakers
Language attitudes show robust effects of dialect on attitudes towards speakers. Standard speakers tend to be seen as higher in status and lower in solidarity while non-standard speakers tend to be lower in status and higher in solidarity. To investigate these effects further, I examined language attitudes and the effect of topic/context of conversation. Listeners heard passages about medicine, investment, hunting, and cooking read by either Ohio or South Carolina speakers. They then completed a set of comprehension questions and filled out an attitudes assessment rating the speaker on a 7-point Likert scale on characteristics such as intelligence, friendliness, and good English. South Carolina speakers were rated higher on characteristics indicative of solidarity (friendliness, cheerfulness, etc.) while Ohio speakers were rated higher on characteristics indicative of status (intelligent, well-educated, etc.), confirming previous patterns found in research. There was also an interaction between passage topic and speaker dialect. When Ohio speakers were reading the Southern-stereotyped passages (hunting and cooking), they were rated significantly more cheerful, sociability, and likeability than when they were reading non-Southern stereotyped passages. Passage topic had no impact on attitudes towards Southern speakers. This finding may indicate that there is a hierarchy in judgments. When a Southern accent is present, the attitudes elicited are not impacted by topic. When there is a more standard dialect (as it was judged in pilot studies), the listeners move to conversation topic to make judgments about the speaker.
Sexual Harassment in Con Communities
Comic and science fiction conventions often involve cosplay, an activity where individuals creating and wearing costumes based on characters from television shows, movies, and literature. Cosplay creates a sense of community and belonging for many of those who do it. Many cosplayers, however, also experience sexual harassment at conventions they attend. Several movements (such as Cosplay is not CONsent) are making efforts to raise awareness of this issue. Because of the identity aspects that comes with cosplay, defining sexual harassment and how it affects those who experience it is an important step in understanding how to approach prevention of the act and treatment for those who have experienced it. To that end, I will be analyzing narratives of sexual harassment from within the con and cosplay community.
Other projects
I have done work on space (through discourse analysis), Lumbee English (a dialect of a Native American group in North Carolina), and Lebanese English in North Carolina.