2) LANGUAGE VARIETIES: There are many ways of speaking, and each way of speaking

is a variety. In a more precise manner, a variety may be defined as a set of linguistic items
with similar social distribution (Upton & Widdowson, 1996).
The connection: Varieties carry social meanings and so can bring very different
attitudinal reactions, or even social disadvantage or advantage (Garette, 2010). For
example, Standard English is perceived as prestigious and proper than African-
American variety due to the word choice or syntactic structures of the varieties the
speech communities use.

3) GENDER : A social identity that emerges or is constructed through social actions
(Meyerhoff, 2006). This social action may lead to gendered language between the two
prominent genders (male and female) or even the seemingly accepted third gender which is
the LGBT and how these genders manifest their identities and language use in sharing a same
social activity such as in requesting for help.
The connection: Gendered language is very much reflected through attitude where
women are perceived to prefer indirect connotation in their speech rather than men
who are more straightforward and direct in their speech. Here, different genders
demonstrate their feelings and perception towards the other gender through social
activities which influence their word choice and speech manner.
UMBRELLA TERM
1) ATTITUDE: People usually tie up their attitudes towards languages and varieties to attitudes
that they have towards group of people (Moussadek Imane Hafida, 2012).It connects to the
feelings people have about their own language variety or the languages or language varieties of
others.


4) STEREOTYPES: A specific generalisation or judgment of attitude. It is characterised by
the agreement of members of the same group upon certain traits that are adopted as valid and
discriminated to describe other differences (Moussadek Imane Hafida, 2012)
The connection: The listener tends to label and have the positive or negative opinions
towards the speaker through the language used. For example, women tend to be
labelled as polite and status conscious than men because they always use the standard
language more than men. Men, also, think that women speak too much than them.

5) POLITENESS: Speaking to people appropriately in the light of their relationship to you
(Meyerhoff, 2006).
The connection: The listener perceives the speaker as polite or rude depending on
the language spoken and the relationship between them. For instance, a teacher will
have the perception that a student is rude when the student uses the language spoken
with his friends towards the teachers.

6) POLITENESS: Speaking to people appropriately in the light of their relationship to you
(Meyerhoff, 2006).
The connection: The listener perceives the speaker as polite or rude depending on
the language spoken and the relationship between them. For instance, a teacher will
have the perception that a student is rude when the student uses the language spoken
with his friends towards the teachers.

7) BILINGUALISM/ MULTILINGUALISM: It refers to an individuals ability to use more
than one language (Chien-Huei Wu, 2005). Bilingual or multilingual speakers may be fully
proficient in the language domains they speak for example speaking, reading, writing and
such.
The connection: In a community where different language groups coexist, language
attitudes play an important role in the lives of the users of these languages (Buja,
2008). For instance in Malaysia, being a multilingual speech community, Chinese
parents may have the concern of losing their heritage language for their children .The
new generations are slowing losing their heritage language when English is preferably
chosen as the medium of communication especially in the urban areas.