John Benjamins Publishing Company
Preacher, scholar, brother, friend
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Arja Nurmi
Abstract
no human being talks the same way all the time (Hymes 1984: 44) The article examines variation in the use of multilingual resources in the verbal repertoire of one individual in different social roles involving various contexts of discourse in eighteenth-century England. We discuss the language practices of Thomas Twining, scion of the tea merchant family, clergyman and classical scholar, in text representing different genres and registers in the public and private domains. The study shows that the writer’s varying social roles are reflected in patterns of code-switching, functioning as an index of the communicative situation and the interpersonal relationship between the interlocutors.
Abstract
no human being talks the same way all the time (Hymes 1984: 44) The article examines variation in the use of multilingual resources in the verbal repertoire of one individual in different social roles involving various contexts of discourse in eighteenth-century England. We discuss the language practices of Thomas Twining, scion of the tea merchant family, clergyman and classical scholar, in text representing different genres and registers in the public and private domains. The study shows that the writer’s varying social roles are reflected in patterns of code-switching, functioning as an index of the communicative situation and the interpersonal relationship between the interlocutors.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- Language practices in the construction of social roles in Late Modern English 1
- Mr Spectator, identity and social roles in an early eighteenth-century community of practice and the periodical discourse community 29
- How eighteenth-century book reviewers became language guardians 55
- “if You think me obstinate I can’t help it” 87
- Reporting and social role construction in eighteenth-century personal correspondence 111
- Preacher, scholar, brother, friend 135
- The social space of an eighteenth-century governess 163
- Building trust through (self-)appraisal in nineteenth-century business correspondence 191
- Good-natured fellows and poor mothers 211
- Name index 229
- Subject index 235
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- Language practices in the construction of social roles in Late Modern English 1
- Mr Spectator, identity and social roles in an early eighteenth-century community of practice and the periodical discourse community 29
- How eighteenth-century book reviewers became language guardians 55
- “if You think me obstinate I can’t help it” 87
- Reporting and social role construction in eighteenth-century personal correspondence 111
- Preacher, scholar, brother, friend 135
- The social space of an eighteenth-century governess 163
- Building trust through (self-)appraisal in nineteenth-century business correspondence 191
- Good-natured fellows and poor mothers 211
- Name index 229
- Subject index 235
