Variation (linguistics)

Variation is a characteristic of language: there is more than one way of saying the same thing in a given language. Variation can exist in domains such as pronunciation (e.g., more than one way of pronouncing the same phoneme or the same word), lexicon (e.g., multiple words with the same meaning), grammar (e.g., different syntactic constructions expressing the same grammatical function), and other features. Different communities or individuals speaking the same language may differ from each other in their choices of which of the available linguistic features to use (inter-speaker variation), and the same speaker may make different choices on different occasions (intra-speaker variation).^[1]

While diversity of variation exists, there are also some general boundaries on variation. For instance, speakers across distinct dialects of a language tend to preserve the same word order or fit new sounds into the language's established inventory of phonemes (the study of such restrictions known as phonotactics, morphotactics, etc.); however, exceptions to these restrictions are possible too.^[2] Linguistic variation does not equate to ungrammatical usage of the language, but speakers are still (often unconsciously) sensitive to what is and is not possible in their native lect.

Language variation is a core concept in sociolinguistics. Sociolinguists investigate how linguistic variation can be influenced by differences in the social characteristics and circumstances of the speakers using the language, but also investigate whether elements of the surrounding linguistic context promote or inhibit the usage of certain structures.

Variation is an essential component of language change. This is because language change is gradual; a language does not shift from one state to another instantaneously, but old and new linguistic features coexist for a period of time in variation with each other, as new variants gradually increase in frequency and old variants decline. Variationists therefore study language change by observing variation while a change is in progress. ^[3] However, not all variation is involved in change; it is possible for competing ways of "saying the same thing" to coexist with each other in "stable variation" for an extended period of time.^[4]

Studies of language variation and its correlation with sociological categories, such as William Labov's 1963 paper "The social motivation of a sound change," led to the foundation of sociolinguistics as a subfield of linguistics.^[5][6] Although contemporary sociolinguistics includes other topics, language variation and change remains an important issue at the heart of the field.