A Sociolinguistic Study Of Labeling Phenomena

The interrelationship between language and society has always been a focus ofsociolinguistics research. The language as a social product is influenced by the socialfactors. In recent years, no matter whether on the Internet or in the real life, a variety of“new words” such as “affluent2ndgeneration”,“poor2ndgeneration”, emerge in anendless stream. Some of these words generalize a class or group of people in adistinctive or unique style, which fit people’s psychology and spread rapidly. The publicoften judge people and things around according to the new words. From the perspectiveof sociology, it often calls this type of behavior as “labeling”. With the development ofthe society and the media, labeling phenomena become more and more popular andprevalent.At present, these labeling phenomena have captured intensive attention from manyfamous scholars in various fields of study in China. They have done many valuableresearches. But so far, there are few scholars studying the labeling phenomena from theperspective of sociolinguistics. Inspired by the previous study on labeling phenomena,this thesis is a sociolinguistic research on the interrelationship between labelingphenomenon and social reality. And it explores the formations and functions of labelsand the hidden causes and influences of labeling phenomena as well as some socialproblems reflected from labeling phenomena specifically.Based on the research of labeling phenomena, the author firstly gives the definitionof labels and labeling phenomena respectively. Then, the author summarizes theformations and functions of labels according to the classification of the labels, and findsthat the formations of labels can be divided into six classifications: extension, metaphor,analogical method, abbreviation homophonic method, number and letter methodrespectively. At the same time, the author demonstrates functions of the same label forself and for others are different. For instance, the label “Diaosi” used for self meansself-mockery while it used for others means curse. In addition, from the perspective ofthe relation between language and society, linguistic factors, social factors, andpsychological factors, the author analyzes the hidden causes and influences of labelingphenomena and finds labeling phenomena are related with social identity. Social factors,such as the phenomena that social stratum of China splits up, economical factors, cultural factors, media competition and psychological factors are the hidden causes oflabeling phenomena. Moreover, the author finds labeling phenomena make socialcognition simple and people can relieve all kinds of pressure through the self-mockery.But, they make negative influences such as destructiveness, rapid pollution and uneasyelimination. Finally, this thesis examines some social problems caused to some extentby labeling phenomena, such as mentality problem, problems of social ecosystem, andproblems of cultural beliefs.