Abstract
In the past, linguistic geography has been sharply differentiated from sociolinguistics. The former assumed homogeneity in a community and dealt with local variations in a language, whereas the latter assumed heterogeneity and dealt with social variations. The author's computerized Generalized Linguistic Atlas Printing System (GLAPS) makes it easy for linguistic geographers to produce a wide variety of linguistic atlases using computers. It thus opens up the possibility of advancing the field of linguistic geography by the easy incorporation, and analysis, of complex sociolingustic variables. The following investigation illustrates this.
A team of the Department of Linguistics, University of Tokyo, conducted an investigation of Tokunoshima Island, Kagoshima Prefecture, in July 1976. The team selected and interviewed 124 informants in order to examine distribution patterns of word-forms within the local dialect. Our findings have been reported in a book listed in the bibliography. The author, a member of the team, was assigned to analyse four items, including the word “palm ”.
Fig.5, an ordinary linguistic map of “palm ”, is a ‘GLAPS’ output. Its distribution pattern suggests how various words spread from Kametsu, the largest community of Tokunoshima Island. Other ‘GLAPS’ outputs show the data of fig. 5 in terms of sociolinguistic variables. For example, figs. 6-10 show the correspondence between word-forms and age. Fig. 11, a cross tabulation, reveals that people who often go to Kametsu tend to use words widely used there. Other variables are indicated in fig. 4, lines 3 through 6.
The inclusion of sociolinguistic variables in linguistic geography research thus allows us a more sophisticated understanding of dialect distribution patterns.
