Research Methods in Sociolinguistics

This single-volume guide equips students of sociolinguistics with a full set of methodological tools including data collection and analysis techniques, explained in clear and accessible terms by leading experts. It features project suggestions, troubleshooting tips, and data assessment across diverse languages.

• Explores an array of anthropological and scientific methods that cover the full spectrum of contemporary sociolinguistics, from the study of style and discourse analysis to the study of phonetics
• Details the types of data available, and explains collection methods ranging from sociolinguistic interviews to linguistic landscapes
• Provides comprehensive coverage of data analysis, subdivided into segments on linguistic and socio-cultural techniques, and linked to numerous languages
• Includes useful summaries, seasoned advice and troubleshooting tips, ideas for research projects, and a full directory of supplementary reading

Janet Holmes holds a personal Chair in Linguistics at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Her sociolinguistics teaching focuses on workplace discourse, New Zealand English, and language and gender. She is Director of the Wellington Language in the Workplace (LWP) project and a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand. Her many publications include The Handbook of Language and Gender (edited with M. Meyerhoff, Wiley-Blackwell, 2003), Leadership, Discourse and Ethnicity (with M. Marra and B. Vine, 2011), and An Introduction to Sociolinguistics, Fourth Edition (2013).

Kirk Hazen is Professor of Linguistics and director of the West Virginia Dialect Project at West Virginia University. He is the author of Dialect Change and Maintenance on the Outer Banks (with W. Wolfram and N. Schilling-Estes, 1998), Identity and Ethnicity in the Rural South: A Sociolinguistic View through Past and Present Be (2000), and An Introduction to Language (Wiley-Blackwell, 2014).