Names and Naming in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice: A Sociolinguistic Study
Rudayna Mohammed Badi
Tikrit University/ College of Arts
Elaf Fkran Ismael
Samarra University-College of Education
Yasir Mohammed Saleh
Samarra University-College of Education
DOI: https://doi.org/10.25130/jls.4.4.38
Keywords: Naming, Pride and Prejudice, semantics, sociolinguistics, novel
Abstract
This study is concerned with introducing a sociolinguistic analysis of personal names and the process of naming in English. It is based on the hypothesis that naming practice is not done randomly even when it is done fictionally. Writers/Novelists are having certain aims and intentions in choosing names for their fictional characters. The specific aim of this paper is formulated to examine the role that society plays in character naming by the writers. Studies on naming are various and tackled from the viewpoint of semantics, anthropology and other disciplines. No study is done in sociolinguistics that analyzes data taken from a novel, i.e. fictional characters’ names. This study is limited to the investigation of names of the characters in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. Thus, the data necessary to complete the study have obtained from the novel. The paper presents enough amount of names and naming in English and particularly in Austen’s aforementioned novel with sufficient explanation of the method followed in the analyzation.
