A dialect is the variety of language associated with a particular place, social level, ethnic group, sex, age, and so on. Most of us have a normal way of using language that is an intersection of such dialects and that marks us as being, for example, a middle-aged, white, cultured, female Charlestonian of old family or a young, urban, working-class, male Hispanic from New York City. A dialect spoken by everyone of a particular community is the symbol of a part of his social status. So in the specific situation and context, dialect, a local symbol, becomes the social cultural symbol.
In order to reveal the characters that have different language habits representing different social positions, in the novel, Flags in the Dust, William Faulkner compared the spelling variation of pronunciation in American southern dialect with the standard spelling of the standard pronunciation in American English. Characters can be divided into three types according to their language habits in this novel. The southern upper-class persons spoke standard English, the following dialogue between Miss Jenny and Nacisy belongs to this type: .
"Not children's parties," she protested.
"I'm talking about parties, not about having a good time," Miss Jenny retorted.
"Speaking of children: What's the news from Horace?".
"Oh, hadn't I told you?" the other said quickly. "I had a wire yesterday. He landed in New York Wednesday. It was such a mixed-up sort of message, I never could understand what he was trying to tell me, except that he would have to stay in New York for a few days. It was over fifty words long".
From the dialogue we can see two upper-class ladies of southern America was talking in standard English.
The second type is the language spoken by blank servant, Simon, who represented the lower strata of American southern society. They were uneducated, and could only speak local dialect. The following dialogue is between Miss Jenny and blank servant Simon, reflecting their different social levels:.
