Content area
Abstract
This dissertation examines the relationships among ethnic/nationalist identity, linguistic practice, and gang affiliation in a population of Latina girls in a Northern California high school. I employ the methodology of sociolinguistic variation studies, coupled with ethnographic fieldwork, to test the hypothesis that patterns of socio-phonetic variation in the English of this community are the product of the intersection of Chicana/Mexicana ethnic identity and gang affiliation.
I propose that the many varieties of identity among the Latina girls in this study are mediated through language choice between Spanish and English as well as through the use of low-level linguistic variation within Chicano English, instantiated in specific lexical items. I present a variationist analysis of the English vowel /I/ in the speech of twelve Latina girls from six different social groups in the high school. I examine the raising and lowering of /I/, paying special attention to the internal linguistic (segmental, lexical) and external social factors which pattern the variation in this community.
