ABSTRACT
The relations between language and society are highly complex, and can be approached from different angles. Some approaches have grown into disciplines of their own, informed by different theoretical views of both language and society. Those who stress their shared properties place them all under the umbrella term of sociolinguistics (Crystal 1991: 319-320). But a line can also be drawn between sociolinguistics and the sociology of language. Although both disciplines study the relationships between language and society, the sociology of language may be said to do so in order to understand society, whereas the goal of sociolinguistics is to understand language (Chambers 1995: 10-11).
