Ronald Wardhaugh Quick Facts

Ronald Wardhaugh is a Canadian retired professor of linguistics.

 

Profile

Full Name: Ronald Wardhaugh
Date of Birth: 1932
Place of Birth: Canada
Nationality: Canadian
Ethnicity: White
Known for: his book An Introduction to Sociolinguistics

Major Works

• English for a Changing World Level 1 (1984)
• How Conversation Works (1985)
• An Introduction to Sociolinguistics (1986)
• Reading: A Linguistic Perspective (1969)
• Introduction to Linguistics (1971)
• The Contexts of Language (1976)
• Investigating Language (1993)
• Language and Nationhood  (1983)
• Languages in Competition: Dominance, Diversity, and Decline (1987)
• Understanding English Grammar (1995)
• Proper English: Myths and Misunderstandings about Language (1999)

Quotes

“When two or more people communicate with each other in speech, we can call the system of communication that they employ a code. In most cases that code will be something we may also want to call a language.”

― Ronald Wardhaugh, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics

“… sociolinguistics is concerned with investigating the relationships between language and society with the goal being a better understanding of the structure of language and of how languages function in communication; the equivalent goal in the sociology of language is trying to discover how social structure can be better understood through the study of language, e.g., how certain linguistic features serve to characterize particular social arrangements.”
― Ronald Wardhaugh, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics

“While people do usually know what language they speak, they may not always lay claim to be fully qualified speakers of that language. They may experience difficulty in deciding whether what they speak should be called a language proper or merely a dialect of some language.”
― Ronald Wardhaugh, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics

“Taboo is the prohibition or avoidance in any society of behavior believed to be harmful to its members in that it would cause them anxiety, embarrassment, or shame. It is an extremely strong politeness constraint. Consequently, so far as language is concerned, certain things are not to be said or certain objects can be referred to only in certain circumstances, for example, only by certain people, or through deliberate circumlocutions, i.e., euphemistically. Of course, there are always those who are prepared to break the taboos in an attempt to show their own freedom from such social constraints or to expose the taboos as irrational and unjustified, as in certain movements for ‘free speech.’”

― Ronald Wardhaugh, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics

Did you know?

• Ronald Wardhaugh held the position of professor from 1975 to 1995 in the Department of Linguistics, University of Toronto.
• Wardhaugh served in various capacities, such as Assistant Professor (1966 to 1968), Associate Professor (1968 to 1972), and Professor of Linguistics (1972 to 1975) in the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
• He held the position of Chairman in the Department of Linguistics, University of Toronto from 1975 to 1986.
• In 1995 the University of Toronto conferred him the position of Emeritus Professor.
• His book  An Introduction To Sociolinguistics (1986) has been widely deemed to be the most resourceful and comprehensive work on sociolinguistic literature.