Age Grading in Sociolinguistic Theory Suzanne Evans Wagner* Michigan State University Abstract Distinguishing linguistic change at the community level (‘generational change’) from linguistic change at the individual level (‘age grading’) is ‘‘one of the major issues in contemporary sociolin- guistics’’ (Tagliamonte 2012:247). This article gives a brief history of the study of language change in the community, before turning to the types of linguistic behavior that have been observed across individuals’ lifespans. The article also discusses the meanings that have been attributed to the term ‘age grading’, arguing that consensus cannot be reached without more longitudinal work to determine the limits of lifespan linguistic change. 1. The Study of Language Change The goal of linguists who study language change is to understand its mechanisms and motivations. To do this, they must first reliably identify that a language change has actu- ally occurred or is still occurring. This article will first briefly describe the techniques developed by linguists to capture historical and ongoing language change. It will then explain how, in the latter case, change in progress might be misdiagnosed. Rather than having observed a linguistic innovation increasing in a community over time (‘genera- tional change’), the linguist might have captured a regular association of a variant with a particular lifestage (‘age grading’). A third possibility, which is perhaps the most common, is that both community and individual change are occurring simultaneously. This article will give examples of all three patterns, and discuss why they are important to a general understanding of language change. Human languages arise through a combination of universal shared capacities (Chomsky 1957) and the social interactions of individuals and communities. Like any other aspect of community social behavior, language is as subject to change over time as clothing, music, government policies, gender norms etc. The search for the mechanisms of language change was until the early 20th century the occupation of historical linguists. By carefully examining the writings of earlier generations or civilizations, historical linguists were able, through a process called ‘comparative reconstruction’, to make educated guesses at how, for instance, spoken Latin evolved into its daughter languages such as French, Spanish, Portuguese and Romanian, or how the vowels of English underwent a dramatic reorgani- zation in the late Middle Ages. This painstaking work has showed us that many dia- chronic changes (that is, operating over time) have progressed with a great deal of linguistic regularity. The identification of conditioning environments (e.g. following nasal consonants, following high front vowels) that favor certain kinds of historical changes helped to pave the way for the rule-based approach of synchronic (that is, relating to a particular point in time) generativist linguistics in the mid-20th century. Often missing from historical accounts of language change, however, was an under- standing of the social factors that motivate language change. Post-hoc descriptions of Language and Linguistics Compass 6/6 (2012): 371–382, 10.1002/lnc3.343 ª 2012 The Author Language and Linguistics Compass ª 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd