An interactional sociolinguistic approach to the analysis of selected Pidgin-based buyer-seller exchanges
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Date
2021-08-15
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Department of Languages Linguistics, Federal University, Dutsin-ma
Abstract
The genre of social interactions determines the linguistic characteristics of interlocutors. Pidgin English is generally regarded as a code meant for informal discourse. Despite the informality of this code, it has formal structures. Hence, the aim of this study was to examine selected Pidgin-based exchanges from a sociolinguistic perspective. Using the survey method and the purposive sampling technique, ten exchanges were selected from buyer-seller interactions. The exchanges were recorded and transcribed for ease of analysis. The data were analysed based on Tannen (2005) and Beiley’s (2015) perspectives on Interactional Sociolinguistics approach. The analysis of the data revealed that impoliteness is not only associated with buyers, it also characterises the language of sellers with the influence of cognitive factors such as motivation and state of mind. Apart from this, it has been found that the economic status of sellers in terms of affluence does not guarantee their superiority over those of the buyers in the studied context. In conclusion, even though Pidgin English is contextually an informal code, it has f