ABSTRACT
Many panel and trend studies of language change, like much of modern sociolinguistics, ignore stylistic variation (Rickford 2014a), even though ignoring such variation limits the reliability and validity of our work. The challenge is to see stylistic variation as a source of insight rather than a problem and to set up systematic strategies for considering it. As Labov noted, progress is “best reached with convergence of several kinds of data with complementary sources of error” (Labov 1972: 97). In attempting to incorporate stylistic variation more systematically in longitudinal studies of change, this chapter reviews different combinations of these style stylistic distinctions, drawing on early classics like Fischer (1958), as well as on new multi-situational corpus studies like Ghyselen (2016). Special focus is placed on panel studies that demonstrate the empirical significance of considering stylistic variation in longitudinal studies of specific communities and propose strategies for doing so more generally, e.g., using multiple linguistic variables, evaluating at least three comparison points in time, attending to the embodying function of quoted speech (Rickford and Price 2013), controlling for speech event, activity type, and other dimensions of discourse context (Gregersen et al. 2018a,b). New approaches to stylistic variation that emphasise speaker agency rather than response (Eckert 2018) and involve microstudy of lectal focusing in interaction (Sharma and Rampton 2015) are also considered.
