Sociolinguistics and Language Education.pdf

76 Part 1: Language and Ideology
strange language ideology that has arisen at a particular cultural and historical
moment (Makoni & Pennycook, 2007). Furthermore, to the extent
that many hip hoppers come from marginalized communities where the
straightjackets of linguistic normativity have had less effect, their mixedcode
language will likely refl ect local language use. It would be strange
for someone from Zamboanga not to use at least Chavacano, Tagalog,
Cebuano, Tausug and English in different daily interactions. This is not
only a question, however, of refl ecting local language use.
Choices in language use are deeply embedded in local conditions, from
the economy and the local music industry infrastructure (limited recording
facilities may militate against local practices and languages, for example)
to the historical background, language policies, language ideologies,
aesthetics, and other local and regional concerns. Berger (2003: xiv–xv)
points out that while, on the one hand, language choice in music refl ects
local or dominant language ideologies, the effects of particular language
use in music provide a context for listeners to refl ect on those language
practices: ‘rather than merely reproducing existing ideologies, singers,
culture workers, and listeners may use music to actively think about,
debate, or resist the ideologies at play in the social world around them’.
Language choice and use, particularly in domains of public performance,
need to be seen as far more than refl ective of local circumstances since ‘an
appropriation of own or other cultures is an active and intellectually intensive
and demanding exercise which mobilizes rational and sensual faculties,
always’ (Gurnah, 1997: 126). With respect to language performances
in general, Bauman (2004) argues that when language is publicly put on
display, made available for scrutiny, rendered an object of conscious consideration,
it takes on different transformative possibilities.
Following Bauman, it is also of course important to take questions of
genre and style into account here. A focus on genres (‘the integrated, multilevel
analyses that participants themselves implicitly formulate for their
own practical activity’), Rampton (2006: 128) suggests, can provide the
key for understanding the relationship between popular culture and linguistic
practice. Drawing on the work of Bakhtin (1986), Rampton argues
that these temporary stabilizations of form provide insights into the ways
in which styles may transfer from the realm of popular culture to domains
of everyday language use. Likewise focusing on the active use of style,
Coupland (2007: 3) points to the importance of understanding ‘how people
use or enact or perform social styles for a range of symbolic purposes’. This
enables us to see that ‘style (like language) is not a thing but a practice’
(Eckert, 2004: 43; see also Jaspers, this volume). A focus on style can thus
shed light on several aspects of the role of hip hop in relation to everyday
language practices: People engage in particular language practices because
they are seen as having a certain style. Once a group of rappers put a
creole language such as Chavacano on stage as part of both a profoundly