The Sociolinguistics of Singing: Dialect and Style in Classical Choral Singing in Trinidad

Doctoral examination procedure finished at: Doctoral examination procedure at University of Münster

Start date of doctoral examination procedure: 01/10/2010

End date of doctoral examination procedure: 27/11/2013

Name of the doctoral candidate: Wilson, Guyanne

Doctoral subject: Englische Philologie

Doctoral degree: Dr. phil.

Awarded by: Department 09 - Philologies

This study looks at issues of dialect and style that arise in choral singing in Trinidad. It poses the question of what accent is preferred for classical choral singing in Trinidad, and then goes on to look closely at perceived and real difficulties secondary school choral singers face in producing the target accents. It considers these findings in light of larger discussions of norm-setting and language attitudes in post-colonial contexts, and afterwards with reference to debates about language style, particularly in performance. Questionnaires and interviews reveal that choral singers and conductors in Trinidad prefer Standard British English pronunciations in classical choral singing, while the use of features associated with mesolectal varieties of Trinidadian English/ Creole is highly stigmatized in this context. Observations at choral rehearsals further show that these mesolectal features are avoided, sometimes to the point of hyper-correction, but that the preferred features used in their stead are not necessarily Standard British English features, but could more accurately classified as acrolectal Trinidadian/English Creole, or Standard Trinidadian English. Thus, in the context of choral singing, we see there is strong evidence for endonormativity in the Trinidadian language context. This endonormativity takes a different shape than is expected; rather than an endonormative Creole only, as Schneider’s (2007) model predicts, there is evidence to support the creation and expansion of two endonormative varieties in Trinidad: a Creole and a local variety of Standard English. In addition to this, the data also reveal a range of pronunciations that are, in fact, part of neither the British nor the Trinidadian English phonemic inventories, but that are nonetheless identified by singers as absolutely necessary for choral singing and that also occur in several choir rehearsals. These features were labeled classical choral singing style, since they seem to be performance requirements of choral singing.