Hypervernacularisation and speaker design: A case study

In dialect contact situations, hyperdialectisms are a common form of hyperadaptation. They are the result of the production of overgeneralised forms in non-standard dialects due to bad analysis. They occur either because of insufficient knowledge about a given linguistic feature or because of excessive effort to show vernacular identity. Adopting the framework of Speaker-Design Theory, which assumes that speakers mould their speech to project a particular image, the present article shows the use of the related phenomenon of hypervernacularisation. This refers to non-standard forms used correctly, though inappropriately, according to socio-demographic and/or stylistic parameters. Though both hyperdialectism and hypervernacularisation are linguistic processes resulting from dialect contact, hyperdialectism is related to incorrectness, whereas hypervernacularisation is associated with inappropriateness. The unexpected use of vernacular forms by an upper-class speaker in non-informal contexts appears to be a strategy to project downward social mobility and a working-class image.