Phonostylistical variables in the speech of youth of Glasgow (case study of consonant variables in video blogs)

The article addresses the issues of phonostylistical variation in computer-mediated communication. Five consonant variables are analysed in reading and spontaneous speech contexts to reveal the pronuncia­tion features that characterise video blogging speech style of young people from Glasgow. A video blog is regarded as a series of videos created by an author using a webcam in a familiar atmosphere in order to ex­press his/her own point of view on a particular issue. Predisposition to casual conversation, desire to get pub­lic interested and deliberate use of speech forms that can be easily understood by wide audience often de­scribe video blogging «strategy». These observations led to a presumption that young people prefer to use universally recognized standard and colloquial forms of pronunciation while using the Internet to communi­cate with young international audience.