LANGUAGE

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LANGUAGE
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What is language?
A form of communication that is a systematic set
of arbitrary symbols shared among a group and
passed on from generation to generation
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A form of Communication
What is Conveyed or transmitted?
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Other forms of communication

• Direct facial expression, body stance, gesture,
  tone of voice
• Indirect writing, algebra, music, painting,
  signs

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System

• sounds
• system of sounds that when put together
  according to certain rules results in meanings
• Systematic nature of language is usually
  unconscious

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arbitrary symbols

• associations between words/sounds and the things
  they represent are arbitrary
• not natural or self-evident meaning.
• meaning provided by tradition and consensus
• Because symbols are arbitrary they have to be
  learned.

Rabbit Conejo Usagi Kanninchen Cuniglio
Eng Sp Jp Gr It
grab hold of this
look at this
lobster
Descriptive symbols
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Shared

• profoundly social
• we use language to send social messages about
• who we are
• where we come from
• who we associate with

• we may judge a person's background, character,
  and intentions based upon the person's language,
  dialect, or, in some instances, even the choice
  of a single word. Eh!

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http//www.bbc.co.uk/voices/recordings/
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Sociolingusitics

• study of language(s) in relation to society -
  Social Uses of Language
• Language expresses, symbolizes and maintains the
  social order
• Social variables influence a person's use of
  language

• Class
• Gender
• Status
• Age
• education
• National/ ethnic/ regional identity

• A child learning a language also acquires social
  competence i.e. the ability to recognize and
  interpret the social activity taking place.
• e.g. opening or closing a conversation
• taking conversational turns

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• Social Identity
• language use is fundamental to the creation and
  expression of social identity and difference.
• the social prestige or stigma attached to
  linguistic varieties often supports and expresses
  the value attached to social identities.
• Eg. the Queens English vs Cockney English
• distinctive aspects of language from
  pronunciation to syntax, to slang, i.e. any
  aspect of linguistic code

• Glottal stop City Ciy water wa'er
• Dropped h house ouse, hammer ammer
• TH fronting three free bath barf
• Vowel lowering dinner dinna, marrow marra

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(No Transcript)
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• Least Prestigious form associated with low
  status, low education.

• Most prestigious form will be that of the most
  powerful group in society because this group
  controls education and the media.

http//www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/
http//www.bbc.co.uk/jersey/realmedia/queens_speec
h.ram

• Prestige form often forms the standard language
• a national language permits internal cohesion
  and fosters external distinction
• forms a powerful base for national identity
• minority languages serve to mark off ethnic
  difference within multiethnic societies.

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Restoration of languages in decline may be taken
as an aspect of ethnic revival eg. Irish

• English was the language of social prestige in
  the mid 16th century when the English colonized
  Ireland and Irish went into decline
• Irish was the language of the poor
• In the mid 19th century Irish nationalist
  movement emerged and sought to encourage and
  revive the original language
• part of a national movement which led to the
  Irish Free State
• Irish was made the official language

• support for it in the form of compulsory
  education, bilingual publications etc.

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• 90 of Paraguans speak Guarani, yet until 1992
  Spanish was the official language, the language
  of prestige and was used in government, schools,
  and commerce.
• Guarani is used in informal settings with friends
  and relatives, in talking with status inferiors.
• Guaraní raises feelings of pride and linguistic
  loyalty in the people

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EBONICS A slang dialect used by certain groups
of the African-American community.Yo, Big Daddy
upstairs,You be chillinSo be yo hoodYou be
sayin' it, I be doin' itIn this here hood and
yo'sGimme some eatsAnd cut me some slack,
BloodSos I be doin' it to dem dat diss me Don't
be pushing me into no jiveAng keep dem crips
awayCause you always be da man, GStraight
up.Aa-men.
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English First
English First is a national, non-profit
grassroots lobbying organization founded in 1986.
The goal is to Make English America's official
language
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Indexicals

• items that mark features of the speakers and for
  the hearers identity
• include pronouns, kinship terms, forms of
  address, and speech levels
• they create and sustain a relational social
  identity

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The grammar of English names

• Three word-classes
• Title (Mr, Prof, )
• Given name (John, Mary, )
• Family name (Holdsworth, Smith, )
• Normal order

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Possible combinations

• T G F Professor Christopher Holdsworth
• T F Professor Holdsworth
• G F Christopher /Chris Holdsworth
• G Christopher / Chris
• T Doctor ok for some titles
• F Holdsworth NB old-fashioned!
• NotT F Professor Chris ungrammatical!!

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Terms of address

• Who am I?
• Christopher John Holdsworth
• Christopher Holdsworth
• Chris Holdsworth
• Holdsworth, Christopher
• Christopher John
• Professor Holdsworth
• Dr. Holdsworth
• Dr C. J Holdsworth
• Holdsworth
• Christopher
• Chris
• Dad

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Terms of address
What contextual elements influence the form
used?

• Is the formality of the setting relevant?
• Is the kinship relation or other social
  relationship relevant?
• Is age or generation relevant in selecting the
  appropriate form?
• Is relative status or rank relevant in selecting
  an appropriate term?
• Is the gender of the speakers relevant

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The sociolinguistics of English names

• Classification Sex (Mr/Mrs John/Mary)
• The Solidarity hierarchy
• The Power hierarchy

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Solidarity relations to a
Stranger
Acquaintance
Friend/relative
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Power relations to a
Superior
Equal
Subordinate
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To a close equal a young friend
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To a close equal an old friend
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To an even closer equal
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To a close subordinate a child
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Even more subordinate a pet
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To equal acquaintances
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To a superior stranger
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What name do you use?

• To superior stranger TF (Mr Smith)
• To subordinate relative G (John)
• To superior relative T (Dad)
• To equal acquaintance G
• To superior acquaintance ?

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Inequality reigns
dentist is superior to patient
teacher is superior to student
salesperson is subordinate to customer
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Power Semantic

• Determines which pronoun will be used on the
  basis of the difference in social status (or
  power) between the speaker and addressee.
• wealth, age, sex, institutionalised role in the
  church, the state, the army, the family ...
• The T of "intimacy" versus the V of "formality"
  (French tu or vous)
• Based on an asymmetrical relation and is
  non-reciprocal.

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Does naming matter?

• To the hearer Yes.
• To the speaker Yes.
• A wrong choice can offend or hurt.
• Decisions are difficult.
• The better you speak English, the more a wrong
  choice will offend.

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Forms of address

• vary with the nature of the relationship between
  speakers
• reciprocal use of first names generally signifies
  an informal intimate relationship
• title and last name used reciprocally indicates
  a more formal or businesslike relationship
  between individuals of roughly equal status
• nonreciprocal use of first names and titles is
  reserved for speakers who recognize a marked
  difference in status between themselves
• this status can be a function of age (as when a
  child refers to her mother's friend as Mrs Miller
  and is in returned referred to as Sally)
• or it can be along occupational lines as when as
  person refers to his boss by title and last name
  and is in return addressed as John

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Politeness

• Use of polite language was one aspect of the
  enactment of social hierarchy in the Thai court
• politeness entailed the correct use of formal
  modes of addressing royalty with linguistic terms
  that exalted royalty and humbled those of lower
  status.
• The first person pronoun used when addressing
  the king meant I the slave of the Lord Buddha'
• second person meant the dust beneath the sole
  of your august feet' meaning that the speaker
  did not dare address the king directly but to the
  dirt on the floor.
• The Thai person who addresses his comments to
  the dirt beneath the king's shoe is invoking a
  cultural image of low status' but he is also
  indexing relative identity in the social
  interaction of discourse.

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Language and gender

• Three issues
• Do women and men speak a different language /
  genderlect?
• Do women and men behave differently in
  conversations?
• How sexist is the English language?

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Do Men and Women Use Language Differently?

• Who talks more?
• Who interrupts more?
• Who introduces topics?
• Who asks questions?
• Who is more supportive?

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Men and women in conversation Who talks more?

• Stereotype says that women talk more than men
• Proverbs
• A woman's tongue wags like a lamb's tail.
• Foxes are all tail and women are all tongue.
• The North Sea will sooner be found wanting in
  water than a woman be at a loss for a word.
• But
• In numerous studies it has been shown that it is
  the men who do most of the talking.

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Who Interrupts and overlaps more?
Zimmerman and West (1975)
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Turn taking behaviour in mixed sex conversations

• Turn-length men take more and longer turns
• interruptions mainly by men
• Silence (after speakers turn before addressee
  continues) women's silence far longer
• back-channels (e.g. um hmm, oh really?) women
  use more (supportive behaviour)
• questions 70 per cent by women, e.g. as a means
  for topic introduction ("Dya know what?")
• topics men tried 29 times and succeed 28 times
  women tried 47 times and succeeded 17 times
• women talk to other women about family and
  interpersonal matters while men talk to male
  friends about cars, sports, work, motorcycles,
  carpentry, and politics
• women are more sensitive to social connotations
  of speech

(Tannen 1992 75)
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Genderlects
What a divine idea!
What a terrific idea!
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THE CUP

• Give me the cup
• The Cup
• Could you please give me the cup
• Would you give me the cup?
• Give me the cup, wont you
• Can you give me the cup?
• I cant reach that cup
• I want that cup
• Can you get that cup for me?
• I need that cup

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Genderlects
Shit! Youve put the peanut butter in the fridge
again!
Oh dear! Youve putthe peanut butter inthe
fridge again!
Male speakers often use socially disfavored
variants of sociolinguistic variables while women
tend to avoid these in favor of socially more
favored variants. women's language which consists
of polite deferential ways of speaking which
ultimately subordinate women in society
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Some explanations for differences

• Subordinate groups must be polite
• Womans role as guardian of societys values
• Vernacular forms express machismo
• Women have less access to power and status they
  make up for this by their preferences for the
  prestige (standard) linguistic forms. This is
  thought to give them respect and some status.
• Women and men are socialised in different ways
  which is reflected in their language use
  patterns.
• women may be more status conscious than men
  because
• society sets more standards for women and
• Womens typical activities do not confer status
  itself.
• (7) Women and men have different networks which
  lead to women and men using different ways of
  speaking.

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Japanese differences
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Sexism in the English language
Generic use of man and he

• The words he and man are sometimes used to refer
  to humans in general
• -man used as a kind of suffix (Bolinger
  1980, quoted by Graddol and Swann 1989 103)

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Sexism in the English language

• The feminine as a marked category
• dog - bitch (masc. neutral term)
• lion - lioness /tiger - tigress (masc.
  neutral term)
• actor - actress (fem. nowadays often
  avoided)
• manager - manageress (fem. suggests lower
  status, e.g. of laundrette but not of bank)
• Generally, masculine terms often unmarked in the
  sense that
• it is the feminine term that takes an ending
• only the masculine term can be used both for
  males and females.

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Lexicon lexical Asymetries

• Mistress v Master
• Queen v King
• Spinster v Bachelor
• Witch v Warlock
• Governess v Governor
• Lady v Lord
• Cow v Bull

• the lexical bias reflects a social bias in the
  culture
• What happens when you try to correct lexical
  bias?
• Once alternatives have been offered, each speaker
  is faced with a choice of which form to use.

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Semantic derogation/pejoration

• Semantic derogation words referring to women
  tend to take on derogatory or pejorative meanings
  through time
• What was the original meaning of these words?

Woman in charge of spinning A young child of
either sex A lover of either sex A fellow of
either sex housewife Term of endearment for young
women a female sovereign ruler a youthful female
person a woman who has power, authority, or
ownership

• Queen
• Hussy
• Spinster
• Tart
• Girl
• Mistress
• Wench
• Whore
• Harlot

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Which word seems to go with each picture?
taketa naluma
Which one is Masculine and which one Feminine?
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Sound Symbolism The vast majority of people pair
taketa with the angular illustration and naluma
with the curved one.
taketa Because the consonants are hard it is
perceived as harder and more masculine
naluma consonants are sonorants perceived as
softer and more feminine
Clorox, a hard-working laundry product
Chanel, a perfume
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Does Language determine how we Perceive the world?
Is Our thinking and Our Behaviour determined by
our language?
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Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
'Human beings do not live in the objective world
alone, nor alone in the world of social activity
as ordinarily understood, but are very much at
the mercy of the particular language which has
become the medium of expression for their
society. It is quite an illusion to imagine that
one adjusts to reality essentially without the
use of language and that language is merely an
incidental means of solving specific problems of
communication and reflection. The fact of the
matter is that the "real world" is to a large
extent unconsciously built up on the language
habits of the group.' 1929
Two different cultures with different languages
will have different perceptual experiences
Benjamin Lee Whorf Edward Sapir
(1897-1941)
(1884-1939)
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Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

• two basic principles
• 1. linguistic determinism
• the language we use to some extent determines
  the way in which we view and think about the
  world
• Strong determinism
• language actually determines thought, that
  language and thought are identical.
• Weak determinism
• thought is merely affected by or influenced by
  our language

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2. linguistic relativity

• distinctions encoded in one language are unique
  to that language alone.
• Eg. The Colour spectrum, is a continuum, each
  colour gradually blending into the next there
  are no sharp boundaries. But we impose
  boundaries we talk of red, orange, yellow,
  green, blue, indigo, and violet.
• these discriminations are arbitrary and in other
  languages the boundaries are different

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• Colour Terms
• Dani (New Guinea) have only two colour categories
• mili which means dark, cold colours such as black
• mola which means warm, bright colours such as
  white
• languages with three colour terms add Red
• those with four add yellow
• English has 11

(red, yellow, black, white, green, blue, purple,
pink, brown, orange, grey)
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Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

• Sapir Whorf says habitual thought might be
  influenced, if not determined, by linguistic
  structures.
• We perceive the world through language - the
  colors we see is predetermined by what our
  culture prepares us to see
• do we see blue and green colours because our
  language has two different names for these two
  neighbouring parts of the colour spectrum?
• Can the Tiv perceive or distinguish between Red
  and yellow?

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Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

• The physiology of our eyes is essentially the
  same.
• All normal humans share similar sense perceptions
  of color despite differences in color terminology
  from one language to another.   
• People can see subtle gradations of color and can
  comprehend other ways of dividing up the spectrum
  of visible light. 
• However, as a society's economy and technology
  increase in complexity, the number of color terms
  usually also increases. 
• i.e. the spectrum of visible light gets
  subdivided into more categories. 
• As the environment changes, culture and language
  typically respond by creating new terminology to
  describe it.

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Which belong together? The green things and the
blue things Or the circles and the bars ?
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• Carroll and Casagrande looked at Navaho Indians
• they place great stress on form and shape,
  rigidity and material from which an object is
  constructed
• they gave three groups of children
• one Navaho speaking
• one English speaking
• one bilingual
• showed them a green stick, a green rope and a
  blue rope and a blue stick
• asked them which objects went together
• Navaho speakers said objects with the same form
  i.e. ropes went together
• English speakers categorize by colour rather
  than form put green stick and green rope together
• confirms the relativity of language hypothesis

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Language and Gender Concept

• do children learn to recognize themselves as boys
  or girls when their language emphasizes gender?
• Alexander Guiora looked at children in Hebrew
  speaking homes, Finnish, speaking homes and
  English speaking homes
• Hebrew has the most gender emphasis of the three
  languages - nouns are either masculine or
  feminine and even second person and plurals are
  differentiated by gender

"Land" is feminine, but "field" is masculine
"mountain" is masculine, but "hill" is feminine
"bed" is feminine, but "table" and "chair" are
masculine "month" is masculine, but "year" is
feminine "lamp" is masculine, but "lampstand" is
feminine.
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English emphasizes gender less, only in third
person singular his and hers
Finish emphasizes gender least, only man and
woman convey gender
Consistent with the idea that language may
influence thought Hebrew speaking children
acquired the concept of gender identity the
earliest on the average and Finnish speaking
children the latest
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Criticisms of Sapir Whorf

• If language determines thought then language must
  precede thought
• - but even pre-linguistic babies can think
• - not all activities involve language but do
  involve thought
• Differences are not in thought but in ways of
  expressing the same thoughts
• if this were not so then it would be impossible
  to translate
• Sapir-Whorf hypothesis not generally accepted
  that language channels thought
• general view now is that language sets up a
  filter between the human being and the world he
  or she perceives that heightens certain
  perceptions and dims others.