Social Constructionism Essay

One key aspect that sets us apart from any other species is our development of language and how we grow and utilize it. Moreover, the theory of Social Constructionism, which is the idea that we all share a subjective meaning in a particular society and continue to develop and give meaning, has had a large role in developing our own discourse, the language used in social context and created due to institutions and social practices (Ainsworth et al. 31). Reflecting on the theory of Social Constructionism and the concept of discourse and its development, our life experiences show how language, unconsciously, relates to our theories and concepts of sociology and human development through the lifespan.

As a child growing up, my exposure to Spanish

There was something different about Oxford, especially my graduating class. My school was one of the top schools in the nation, so you would expect seriousness in attitudes and work from the student body, but Oxford’s was a school that had a unique slang called the “Oxford Lingo” that gave somewhat a silly side to their serious work ethics, which I grew accustomed to within the first two weeks of school. On my first day of school, a group of newly acquainted friends in my grade motioned me to sit at their table. Immediately upon hearing their conversation, confusion filled me. “That was faf” (funny as ___), “That is sketch”, “This is haf” (hot as ___). Sketch? Haf? Faf? The words honestly sounded peculiar but I soon grew accustomed to using the language. It felt accidental at first, but then it slowly intertwined with my language. I, unknowingly, agreed to this subjective meaning and began to use it. Rather than saying it was funny, I would say “It was faf”, and when something was “shady”, it was “sketch”. Within our high school years, the social interactions among classmates spread the discourse from just our group of friends to our entire grade and even teachers. The spread of our unique discourse created a shared meaning and communal identity of the school, which therefore relates to how our social construction continues to drive discourse. In this case, the discourse was the

The difference in our experiences in terms of social constructionism was the origin of how the language and meaning of that language occurred. David gained his Oxford Lingo from his peers, which still technically was in the realm of English, whereas Hailey learned language based on a combination of Spanish and English she