For the English language RP is most appropriate for public speaking, formal occasions. The standard is stylistically differentiated, as there are situations when a more informal way of talking is quite appropriate.
The speaker's judgment of formality willdepend on a number of factors,such as the relative statusof the person he/she is talking to, which results in their different social roles,how well they know each other, the theme (topic)they are discussing, to what purpose(aim of the talk) and in what setting.public meeting, lecture, consultation, conversation, chat.
In what the speaker sees as a very formal situation he will tend to articulate more slowly and carefully. In a very informal situation, on the other hand, he will be more likely to speak quickly, less carefully.
Variation conditioned in this way by a person's perception of the situation in which he is speaking we refer to as stylistic.
It is not only situational factors which determine the style of pronunciation, but also the speaker's personality. Social psychologists define the speaker's strategy in varying social situations as "politeness-solidarity" choice. When talking formally to seniors one is expected to be very polite, as a sign of deference; the same tone of voice in the company of peers could be understood as either a joke or an attempt to demonstrate social distance, or even hostility.
Although the English of education is real enough, it will tend to be limited to a single variety of the language, one chosen to serve as a model
As it has already been demonstrated, a foreigner may not always be sensitive enough to cultural constraints of the situation, as well as to the stylistic power of certain word and sound connotations. But it is his/her task to understand what he/she hears, and as far as listening comprehension is concerned, the samples of English he/she is exposed to while learning must really be varied.
William Labov was the first to quantify and measure stylistic variation in four modes of speech which he called "styles": (1) reading a word list, (2) reading a text, (3) interview, (4) casual speech.
Casual informal speech is most difficult to get. Formal speech is the style which an interviewer will normally elicit in a field interview.Reading atext aloud is still more formal.
The linguistic variables were: (a) -ing endings pronounced either as [rj] or [n], (b) glottal stop replacing [t] — [?], (c) h -drop: the sound [h] replaced by zero, i.e. omitted at the beginning of words, (d) dese — dose words where the interdental fricatives were replaced by dental stops [d, t], (e) rhoticity: the presence of [r] after a vowel which was omitted in lower New York classes, New York being an r-less area of the U.S.A.
The basic findings were: there is a pattern of steady increase in the values of non-standard forms as the speaker moves from the most formal to the most casual style.
Another finding indicated that the direction of style shifting along the formality scale is the same in all social classes but the values are graded: the formal style in a relatively low class resembles that of the casual style of the speaker in a higher class.
It sometimes happens that the style shift of a lower middle class (LM) or the upper working class (UW) is so abrupt, especially with women, that it overtakes the style shift of a higher, middle middle (MM) class. This was found in the r-variable by W. Labov in New York. The phenomenon is called "hypercorrection".
To sum it up, standard forms tend to be used in formal styles of speech, while non-standard forms are more likely to occur in the informal casual speech. The style shift is common for all classes, but the values of particular linguistic variables reveal that there is gradience in the values as you move from one class to the other. The society standards present a continuum of changing sound forms.
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THE NOTIONS OF PHONEME AND ALLOPHONE. FUNCTIONS OF PHONEME (7)
A phoneme – is a minimal contrastive unit of a language => a reliable method of establishing phonemes. The comutation test: 2 phonemes (sounds) are realization of different phonemes if they provide phonological contrast (= if they occur in at least one minimal pair). Minimal pair – a pair of words differing in only one sound (bit – pit).
The relationships between the phoneme and the phone (speech sound) may be illustrated by the following scheme: Allophones of the same phoneme, no matter how different their articulation may be, function as the same linguistic unit. Phonemes differentiate words like tie and die from each other, and to be able to hear and produce phonemic differences is part of what it means to be a competent speaker of the language.
Allophones, on the other hand, have no such function: they usually occur in different positions in the word (i.e. in different environments) and hence cannot be opposed to each other to make meaningful distinctions. For example the dark [ł] occurs following a vowel as in pill cold, but it is not found before a vowel, whereas the clear [l] only occurs before a vowel, as in lip, like. These two vowels cannot therefore contrast with each other in the way that [1] contrasts with [r] in lip — rip or lake — rake, there are no pairs of words which differ only in that one has [ł] and the other — [1].
Allophones of each phoneme possess a bundle of distinctive features, that makes this phoneme functionally different from all other phonemes of the language concerned. This functionally relevant bundle of articulatory features is called the invariant of the phoneme.
The behavior of allophones in phonetic context, their ability to occur in certain definite positions – distribution.
There are 3 types of distribution:
1) constrastive/parallel/overlapping – in this position these types of distribution are typical: [n] – [ŋ]
2) complementary – allophones of one and the same phoneme. Never in the same position: [k] – [k] (aspirated – non-aspirated).
3) free variation – allophones of one and the same phoneme that allocate in the same position. They aren’t able to differentiate the meaning: Good night with glottal stop and without it.
Functions of phoneme:
1. constituetive – phoneme constitutes words, word combinations etc. Phonemes have no meaning of their own, linguistically important for in the material form of their allophones they serve as a building material for words and morphemes;
2. distinctive – phonemes help to distinguish the meanings of words, morphemes;
3. identificatory (recognitive) – phoneme makes up gr-l forms of words, sentences, so the right use of allophones.
Some phonologists single out delimiting function.
The function of phonemes is to distinguish the meaning of morphemes and words. So the phoneme is an abstract linguistic unit, it is an abstraction from actual speech sounds, that is allophonic modifications.