Background of 2 Broke Girls
2 Broke Girls is an American sitcom about two women from two very different backgrounds, waitressing together at a greasy spoon diner. Max is described by many synopsis authors as ‘sassy’ and “streetwise”, whereas the character Caroline is summarised as being a ‘sophisticated trust fund princess’.
The program aired from 2011 – 2017 on the CBS network and just this year has been made available to watch on Amazon Prime.
The program itself is a comedy, one of which that plays heavily on the humorous aspect of both main characters being stark opposites. This can be evidenced in the YouTube video embedded below where this fact is repeated several times by not only the executive producers but the actresses as well. The comedy genre coupled with the fact that this TV show is fictional leads you to question the extent to which the show is completely realistic. As a result, we can deduce that there may be a higher frequency of archetypal language features for characters such as Caroline then there would be if this were a documentary.
Additionally, though we are not investigating accent in this group it can be noted that neither of the main characters have a Brooklyn accent despite the show being set in the Williamsburg neighbourhood, Brooklyn. This could suggest that the producers perhaps have a different goal as aforementioned, likely the main focus is to entertain rather than to be realistic.
Objective
The purpose of this sociolinguistic investigation is to explore how the media, more specifically television programs, use language to construct character. Our group chose mainly to focus on representation of the class and gender in the two characters Max and Caroline. We then go on further to analyse how viewers may perceive the linguistic varieties used by the two characters and how they reflect societal attitudes toward language. Therefore we have two main focuses in this investigation
Method of Analysis
- Split the investigation focuses. We split the investigation into three sections:
- Max’s construction of a working class identity
- Caroline’s construction of a middle/upper class identity
- Portrayal of femininity through the language of Caroline
This, as well as the introduction, was then split among the group.
- Watch the first episode of season one. This was the only episode we watched when analysing the show, one reason for doing so was to ensure that our analysis was more detailed than it was broad. Additionally, the first episode also known as the ‘Pilot’ tends to be the main episode in which a program establishes the identities of its main characters. Therefore, we wished to analyse the archetypes portrayed by the writers and directors from the most vital episode of character introduction.
- During the episode our group’s members individually took notes regarding the two main character’s language variations and what implications these had in regards to the topic they were allocated. Each character’s phonological, lexical and grammatical features were analysed here as well as any body language and other non-linguistic choices e.g. clothing/choice of actress.
- Wider reading on language and gender and language and class. This was to ensure that our analysis could be linked to pre-existing literature which made it easier to compare which features were or were not stereotypical accordingly.
- Conclusion.
2 Broke Girls: A Sociolinguistic Analysis 