Answer the prompt below with a clear and succinct answer of least 500 words. This question is required by General Education.

You are in the middle of a discussion with some friends who have never studied sociolinguistics. They ask you how the social and behavioral sciences can help them understand social issues. Since you have taken ENGL 4648, you are confident in answering them. Using some of the principles, concepts, and/or methods studied in this course explain how sociolinguistics contributes to your understanding of language bias and discrimination.

Hints: The movie, Amercian Tongues, containes many examples of how poeople are evaluated depending on the language or dialect that they use.

Studies in language variation (see Chapter 7) clearly show that even regions where one language is spoken may contain many regional and social dialects, not all of which are judged as equally good socially.