SOCIAL NETWORKING IN FACEBOOK: A SOCIOLINGUISTIC APPROACH

Abstract

Language and society always go hand in hand, so much so that the society determines the successful usage of linguistic items. Meanwhile, language changes and varies because society exists. Holmes acclaimed that “sociolinguistics aim is to move towards a theory which provides a motivated account of the way language is used in a community, and of the choices people make when they use language†(16). Akindele and Adegbite define sociolinguistics as “the relationship which exists between a language or languages and culture and tradition as well as the politics of a particular community†(3). Hardly does one board a bus, enter a classroom or any gathering or others of social cluster without a sizeable percentage interacting on a social network. One needs therefore to be knowledgeable about this new trend which is in vogue because the linguistic attributes and behaviours are unique and impeccable in the social network structure of the present age. The end point of the communicative competence among Facebook users is the ability to manipulate their various kinds of linguistic skill in their speech community. In other words, this paper seeks to look into the social norms of interactions among the Facebook and its users, the languages and attitudes involved, the normal interactivity to the monolingual, bilingual and multilingual network speech community in the social network: Facebook. The paper will be based on features in the home, wall and profile where the society takes part in the linguistic manipulation using features on the mobile phone.