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It’s not all about you: New perspectives on address research
Edited by Bettina Kluge and María Irene Moyna
[Topics in Address Research 1] 2019
► pp. 397–414

Person-referring expressions, reference nominals, and address nominals

Informalization in an Illinois neighborhood social group

This chapter discusses reference nominals – closely related to address nominals – within a single-genre written corpus. It traces how the choice of reference nominals changed over five decades in the mid-20th century. Specifically, the chapter shows how the secretaries of a neighborhood social club referred to their neighbors as (for example) Mrs. Jones in the minutes from the 1940s, and by the late 1980s, used forms such as Sally Jones in writings in the same genre, meeting minutes. While this change is in keeping with the change from distance politeness to camaraderie posited by Lakoff (2005a), the dates of the corpus show that the change occurred earlier than Lakoff claimed. This corresponds to the view that informalization, which has been documented in address nominals, is a widespread rather than a localized trend.
Keywords: American Midwest, genre conventions, informalization, reference nominals, social change
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The corpus: Minute books and membership lists
    • 2.1The club year
  • 3.Meeting minutes as genre
  • 4.Analysis
    • 4.1Reference nominals in records from the 1940s
    • 4.2Reference nominals in club minutes from the 1950s
    • 4.3Reference nominals in club minutes from the 1960s
    • 4.4Reference nominal forms in the minutes of the 1970s
    • 4.5Reference and signature forms in the 1980s
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 28 November 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tar.1.16bur
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Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

Vismans, Roel
2023. Chapter 16. Address and politeness. In It's different with you [Topics in Address Research, 5], ► pp. 397 ff. DOI logo

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