This study investigated whether and how pre-adolescent girls style-shift in Multicultural London English (MLE), a variety of English that is relatively new and potentially still changing. We looked at the extent to which five 11-year-old girls in a homework club in East London, where MLE is spoken, changed their pronunciations in different speech contexts. The results showed that the girls did indeed change their pronunciations in the different contexts (i.e. they style-shifted), and that the patterns of style-shifting varied between both the individual participants and the three vowels which were examined.

AbstractThis article adopts an interactional sociolinguistic perspective to investigate the forms and functions of breaking into song in in-group interaction. The data are approximately two hours of interaction among three sisters in their home, during which the sisters occasionally sing together or make references to songs they know. I examine how singing in interaction promotes affiliation and solidarity between participants. In terms of form, the turn-by turn format of instances of singing is investigated, and evidence is presented to argue that joint singing constitutes a speech activity. In terms of function, it is argued that joint singing is a site of shared affect. Singing also makes participants’ relationship with one another relevant in the interaction at hand by indexing the familiarity dimension of that relationship. These affordances of singing allow it to become a resource at moments of trouble to restore affiliation.