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Human Development

Language Socialization Theory

Robert Purple
HMD 306:
Language Narrative and Self
Professor Welles-Nyström
Due October 11th

Robert Purple

Language Socialization Theory and "Once Upon a Time When We Were Colored"

The language socialization theory can be defined as the perspective that socio-cultural information is generally encoded in the organization of conversational discourse and this encoded information aids in the gain of tacit knowledge of principles of social order and systems of belief. In other words, part of the meaning of grammatical and conversational structures is socio-cultural and can affect others being introduced to that culture. Language socialization research has traditionally focused on how young children and outsiders of a culture are socialized into the norms and patterns of their culture by and through language. To understand what language socialization is, the word language must first be defined. The dictionary gives many definitions of what language is but the one that pertains most to the language socialization theory is this, "any system of formalized symbols, signs, sounds, gestures, or the like used or conceived as a means of communicating thought, emotion, etc." By this definition language can be anything that a person does to communicate a thought or feeling. Body language, facial expressions, hand gestures and speech are all forms of language. So in this paper when language is refer to it include all types of language, both spoken and non-spoken.

When language is looked at from a cultural perspective, many people have said that language is what shapes the person we become. It is obvious that all cultures have there own form of language as well as there own ways of socializing the members of that specific culture. Culture is defined as "the behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group" Culture is the most important factor involved in how language and moral-persona develops in an...