Whaddayaknow?: The modes of folk linguistic awareness¹

I use ‘awareness’ here in a sense not usually applied in this publication. Language Awareness has most often promoted the understanding of what linguists (and others) have discovered about language and what those findings have to say to teachers, lawyers, doctors, and other non‐linguists, a goal I heartily endorse. I mean, by ‘awareness’, the ‘degree’ of consciousness non‐linguists have in general about language, and I relate this to the broader field of study recognised (at least for those most overtly known pieces of linguistic information) as ‘folk linguistics’. In short, I assume it is important not only to know what language is and how people use it but also what they think about it.

A common approach to language awareness is through the contrast between folk and scientific knowledge, the former usually getting brief attention and being assigned little value. This paper argues that the folk awareness of language may be characterised in several different ways, having to do with a wide variety of linguistic characterisations (e.g. overt ‘availability’, ‘degree of accuracy’, ability to ‘control’ language varieties, and the level of specificity of folk knowledge). Only the second of these has to do directly with the folk versus linguist dichotomy, although cognitive constraints on what non‐linguists ‘usually’ know are important factors. More important, however, at least for speakers of American English, are the constraints imposed by notions of language ‘correctness’. In addition, folk linguistics is shown here to be a dynamic area of study, perhaps best uncovered by the analysis of ongoing discourses about language in speech communities. Finally, the value of folk linguistic awareness for both its scientific merit and its importance to applied concerns is briefly discussed.

Notes

I use ‘awareness’ here in a sense not usually applied in this publication. Language Awareness has most often promoted the understanding of what linguists (and others) have discovered about language and what those findings have to say to teachers, lawyers, doctors, and other non‐linguists, a goal I heartily endorse. I mean, by ‘awareness’, the ‘degree’ of consciousness non‐linguists have in general about language, and I relate this to the broader field of study recognised (at least for those most overtly known pieces of linguistic information) as ‘folk linguistics’. In short, I assume it is important not only to know what language is and how people use it but also what they think about it.