Developing linguistic register across text types

The case of modern Hebrew

Bibliographic Data

ID20484639
AuthorsDorit Ravid (0000-0002-4919-0007, Tel Aviv University), Ruth A Berman
Year2009
Volume17
Issue1
Pages108-145
Publication date2009-02-18
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenuePragmatics & Cognition (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0929-0907 • E-ISSN: 1569-9943
PublisherJohn Benjamins Publishing Company (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1075/pc.17.1.04rav
OpenAlexW1983058496
LanguageEN
Citations received16

The study considers the topic of linguistic register by examining how schoolchildren, adolescents, and adults vary the texts that they construct across the dimensions of modality (spoken/written discourse) and genre (narrative/expository discourse). Although register variation is presumably universal, it is realized in language-specific ways, and so our analysis focuses on Israeli Hebrew, a language that evolved under peculiar socio-historical circumstances. An original procedure for characterizing register — as low, neutral, or high — was applied to four text types produced by the same speaker-writers. We found that across all age groups, “neutral” items constituted the bulk of the material, and that the lexicon accounted for some 80% of variation. Developmentally, we found that acquisition of fully flexible register variation continues beyond adolescence. Finally, we observed that text types range on a cline from everyday colloquial usage in oral narratives to more formal, high-level language in written expository essays. These results are discussed in light of their implications for the nature of register variation, later language development, and the sociolinguistics of contemporary Hebrew

Hebrew · Lexicon · Linguistics · Narrative · Sociolinguistics · Computer Science · Discourse Analysis in Language Studies · History · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Multilingual Education and Policy · Psychology

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