Unit 1 – The Linguistics of Slang

Lesson 9 – LAB DAY – Extracting and Analyzing Data

Class time: 57 minutes

Objective: To allow students a chance to work with their own slang data, extracting clips from the larger audio files, and begin working on the dictionary entries of their data clips.

Materials Needed:

-  Computers for each student

-  Flash Drives of student data

-  Slang Data List Handout (Project Materials: Slang Dictionary – Slang Data List)

-  Ethnographic Info Handout (Project Materials: Slang Dictionary – Ethnographic Identification)

-  Audacity Guidelines from Lesson 7 (for anyone absent, or any instructors who were not in class the previous day) (Interactive Slides: Audacity Lab Workshop)

INTRODUCTION (5 min)

Ask students if there are any questions from the previous lesson about using Audacity, data collection, or what they have been working on with their own data thus far. Take students to the computer lab, and inform them they will be in the lab for the duration of the class period to continue working on their data.

Inform students that by the end of the class day, they should have come up with which three of their 10 slang words they are extracting they wish to present in front of the class during the presentation days.

LAB DAY (45-50 min)

Students should be working on filling in their 10 slang terms on Handout 1.6, including their handwritten IPA transcriptions, the definitions of the word, the meaning, and the social information. Instructors should go around to students and make sure their definitions are correct, complete, and sufficiently descriptive; definitions should describe the word and its use without using other slang terms to do so. Have other students who finish early help students check their work and make sure the definitions make sense. Continue extracting; anyone who’s done can start filling out handout for their 10 slang terms (Handout1.6).

Any student who finishes early can take Handout 1.7 and identify each speaker in the recording (whether or not they used that speaker in one of their 10 slang term clips), by name, age, gender, ethnicity (based on a given list of panethnic categories), class year, and other information as outlined on the handout.

WRAP-UP (5-10 min)

Have each student give you their list of three slang words they are going to present on for presentation days, and check that they are all acceptable words to be used. If any word is not useable, ask the student to come up with a back-up word to do instead.