Genre Sensitivity in Preadolescents’ Sociolinguistic Evaluation

Background: When acquiring the social meaning of linguistic variation, young language users have to come to terms with the often broad indexical potential of specific variants and varieties, and their relationship with speech contexts, modes of communication and types of interlocutors. For instance, previous work on the use of English loanwords in Dutch has uncovered how these words on the one hand serve as youth language markers, used by teenagers to mark ingroup membership, but are for instance also associated with globalized professional contexts (Schuring et al. 2023), advertising (Gerritsen et al. 2007) and online communication (Verheijen & van Hout 2022).
Aim: This contribution aims to gauge how young language users tune into these layers of meanings and context-dependence of their activation. Reporting on two contextualized experiments, we particularly aim to assess whether preadolescents’ evaluation of the use of English loanwords in Belgian Dutch is generally favorable given its status as a youth language marker, or instead reveals more nuance and genre sensitivity.
Experiment 1 targets preadolescents’ evaluation of English loanwords in product advertising. Research has extensively shown how English is used in advertising for symbolic reasons, in the hope that attributes such as ‘modernity’, ‘fun’, or ‘wordliness’ rub off on the product advertised (Hornikx & van Meurs 2020). Also, research shows how Dutch TV commercials targeting young viewers also frequently include English words (Roberts et al. 2020). Based on these insights, we presented over 350 Belgian Dutch preadolescents with three guises of a TV commercial for a new cookie brand, viz. (1) Dutch-only; (2) a Dutch guise including English nouns (e.g. challenge vs. uitdaging); (3) a Dutch guise including English discourse markers (e.g. alright vs. mooi zo). Results of a forced-choice task reveal a preference for the English versions when children are asked for their personal attitudes, whereas the preference for the Dutch-only guise increases when children are asked to adopt the perspective of a marketeer.
Experiment 2 turns the attention to news broadcasting for children, a more normative context where the use of English is typically less expected. Waters (2022) for instance reveals how less than 1% of the news anchors language in Karrewiet, a TV news show for children and youth, contains English loanwords. Follow-up interviews with the anchors link up the results with the broadcaster’s desire for clear language. From the perspective of attractiveness, English loans might instead increase identifiability for children and can as such keep children on board as news consumers (Alon-Tirsh 2017). Assessing this tension, we presented 100 Belgian Dutch preadolescents with two guises of a news broadcast, viz. (1) a Dutch-only guise; (2) a Dutch guise including English evaluative adjectives (e.g. cool vs. leuk). Results are in line with Experiment 1, with participants themselves preferring English but emphasizing the importance of Dutch-only news anchors.
Combined, the experiments reveal genre-sensitive sociolinguistic evaluations, with clear differences between reported personal preference and reported overall appropriateness of the language used. In interpreting these findings, the concepts genre acquisition, media literacy and social identity are combined.



References
Alon-Tirosh, M. (2017). Children and news: opinions of children’s news program creators in Israel, journal of Children and Media 11, 2, 132-146 https://doi.org/10.1080/17482798.2017.1302489
Gerritsen, M., C. Nickerson, A. van Hooft, F. van Meurs, H. Korzilius, U. Nederstigt, M. Starren & R. Crijns. 2010. English in Product Advertisements in Non-English-Speaking Countries in Western Europe: Product Image and Comprehension of the Text. Journal of Global Marketing 22, 4, 349-365, doi:10.1080/08911762.2010.504523.
Hornikx, J. & F. van Meurs. 2022. Foreign Languages in Advertising. NY: Springer.
Schuring, M., Rosseel, L., Zenner, E. 2023. Says who? Language regard towards speaker groups using English loanwords in Dutch. Folia Linguistica. doi: 10.1515/flin-2023-2022
Verheijen, L. & R. van Hout. 2022. Manifold code-mixing in computer-mediated communication: The use of English in Dutch youths’ informal online writing. Ampersand 9, 100091, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amper.2022.100091.
Waters, Tadhg. 2022. Breaking the news: Een mixed-method onderzoek naar het gebruik van Engelstalige leenwoorden in Karrewiet. Unpublished MA thesis, KU Leuven.