Identity and ethnicity in /t/ in Glasgow-Pakistani high-school girls

Alam, F. and Stuart-Smith, J. (2011) Identity and ethnicity in /t/ in Glasgow-Pakistani high-school girls. In: ICPhS XVII, Hong Kong, 17-21 Aug 2011, pp. 216-219.

Abstract

This paper presents an acoustic phonetic analysis of Glasgow Asian syllable-initial /t/, in speech data collected from Pakistani-Muslim girls in a Glasgow high school after a long-term participant observation into their shared and differing social practices. The results show differences in spectral energy and shape according to following phonetic segment, and to membership in two contrasting Communities of Practice, more conservative girls maintaining traditional cultural practices, and more rebellious girls whose behaviour challenges such norms. The findings demonstrate that ethnicity is integrally linked with locally-salient identity, and hence that fine phonetic variation which indexes ethnicity is in fact indexical of local ethnic identity.

• Item Type: Conference Proceedings
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Stuart-Smith, Professor Jane
• Authors: Alam, F., and Stuart-Smith, J.
• Subjects: P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics
• College/School: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Critical Studies > English Language and Linguistics
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2011 The Authors
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced with the permission of the authors