A literature review on the mediation of sociolinguistic style in television and cinematic fiction: Sustaining the ideology of authenticity

Abstract

A shift of contemporary sociolinguistic research towards media and pop cultural discourse has been observed (e.g. Lopez, 2009; Meek, 2006). Despite the proliferation of studies, there has not been a systematic attempt to chart this field of research. In the light of this, in the present article I review research on the representations of sociolinguistic style in TV and film fictional discourse. The review reveals that although the epistemology of social construction has privileged the analysis of fictional data, the paradigm upon which most of the reviewed studies have drawn remains a traditional one. Similarly, a view of fiction as a reflection of sociolinguistic style is still a dominant conceptual framework from which many researchers tend to interpret their analyses. In conclusion, it is suggested that this research strand tends to confirm the ‘artificiality’ of fiction, by eventually sustaining the ideology of sociolinguistic authenticity.