LIN204 - DISCUSSION

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LIN204 - DISCUSSION
Mtholeni N. Ngcobo 11 MARCH 2010 www.ngcobmn.yolas
ite.com
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Outline

• Outcomes
• Language change through history
• The European Classical languages
• The development of the English language
• Social class and language change
• The development of new languages
• Language change in multilingual society
• Language death, language shift and language
  maintenance

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Outcomes

• Outcomes for the module LIN2046
• After you have worked through this study guide
  you should be able to
• 1. identify changes in the world around you
• 2. recognise their effect on you
• 3. relate language change to historical change in
  the world, in various contexts and settings
• 4. identify the influence of languages on each
  other in a multicultural society.

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Language change throughout history

• The central theme of this module changes in
  society bring about changes inlanguage
• Language is not static it always changing
  over a period of time
• The change affects people and the change in the
  world affects language
• Historical and social contexts

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Change

• the process by which the future invades our
  lives
• Here is the opening extract from the Lord's
  Prayer from different periods of English
• Old English (c 400 AD to c 1100) Fñder ure, "u
  "e art on heofonum, si "in nama gehalgod. To
  becume "in rice. (West Saxon text, end of tenth
  century, in W.B. Lockwood 1972132)
• Middle English (c 1100 to c 1500) Fader oure "at
  is i heuen. blessid bi "i name to neuen. Come to
  us "i kingdome. (In C. Jones 1972)
• Early Modern English (c 1500 to c 1800) Our
  father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
  Thy kingdom come. (King James Bible)
• Modern English (from c 1800) Our father who is
  in heaven, may your name be sacred. Let your
  kingdom come. (A modern rendition)
• (Mesthrie 2000114)

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Change

• Semantic change Change in meaning or semantic
  representation of words and linguistic
  expressions may
• Three types of semantic change that can occur
  the meanings of words may become broader,
  narrower or be shifted
• Broadening
• When the meaning of a word is broadened, it
  means that the meaning is expanded to refer to
  more than it did before. Example, the word
  holiday is derived from holy day, the day on
  which a religious festival takes place. Today the
  meaning of the word has been broadened to refer
  to any day on which we do not have to work. A
  Sepedi example is tshekase which originally
  referred to a plastic bag found in Checkers
  shops, but has now broadened its meaning to refer
  to any plastic bag.
• 2. Narrowing
• In contrast to the word dog, the Middle English
  word hound was a general word for dog and was
  used to refer to all types of dog. Today hound is
  no longer generally used to refer to all types of
  dog. Now it is often used to refer to a
  particular type of dog used for hunting, e.g.
  foxhound. It has acquired a narrower, more
  specific meaning. Another example is lerema
  (expert hunter') in Sepedi which refers to a
  particular person who is an expert in hunting and
  not just any hunter.
• 3. Semantic shift
• Semantic shift occurs when words (or lexical
  items) undergo a shift or change in meaning. In
  the Middle Ages the word bead meant prayer'.
  Because of the custom of saying repeated prayers
  and counting the number of prayers by means of
  little wooden balls on a rosary, the meaning of
  bead shifted from prayer to the little wooden
  balls on the rosary. Today beads are made of
  plastic, glass or other materials. A more recent
  example of semantic shift is the word mouse. The
  word originally referred only to a small
  rodent'. In computer terminology mouse now refers
  to a device used to operate the computer.

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Change

• Phonological change
• Sound changes - Example, there are manywords in
  English where the gh sound, used to be pronounced
  like the Afrikaans g (as in lig light'), e.g.
  light, night, laugh, drought. Today the gh has
  fallen away in the pronunciation of these words.
  In other words, the gh sound is not pronounced
  any more in words like light, but the spelling
  has remained the same.
• Another major sound change in English occurred in
  the pronunciation of vowels.
• Between 1400 and 1600 the so-called Great Vowel
  Shift took place when a number of vowels in
  Middle English underwent major changes, e.g.
  there used to be a long vowel in mice (the i in
  mice was pronounced like ee in see) which became
  a diphthong in Modern English.
• Syntactic change
• The rules of syntax (or grammar) of a language
  often undergo changes over time.
• Consider the changes that have taken place in the
  Old English example "ht he na si""an geboren ne
  wurde (Old English) that he never after born not
  would-be (gloss, literal translation) that he
  should never be born after that' (Modern English
  translation)
• Besides the changes in word order, note the use
  of the double negative (represented by na and ne)
  in Old English which would be considered
  ungrammatical in Modern English.
• Change in use
• Apart from changes in meaning, old words may
  disappear from a language, e.g. the following
  words taken from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet,
  written in the 16th century, are no longer used
  in English today
• wot to know', wherefore why', fain gladly',
  mammet a doll or puppet'
• New words may also appear in a language.
• The following words which are commonly used in
  21st Century English were totally unknown in
  Shakespeare's day aeroplane, computer, e-mail,
  jazz, jeans, motor car, television

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Historical perspective of change

• 500 BC AD 500 1500 19th century
  20th century
• __________________________________________________
  _____________________________________________
• Prehistory Classical period Middle Ages
  Renaissance Industrial Revolution Information
  Age
• 1.1 The Greek and Roman civilisations flourished
  during the ....................
• 1.2 English became the dominant global
  (international) language during the
  ....................
• 1.3 The European vernaculars (like English) began
  to develop as literary languages during the
  ....................
• 1.4 During the Latin was the main language of the
  church .................... And education in
  Europe.

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Ancient Greek

• The Greeks of Ancient Greece influenced Western
  society in many ways.
• The Greeksproduced outstanding achievements in
  the areas of art, sculpture, architecture,
  medicine, mathematics and science and in these
  domains we find remnants of the Greek language.
• It is important to remember that the development
  of the Greek civilisation was built on important
  precursors in the Middle East, Egypt and Africa.
• We only start with Ancient Greece here because we
  can still see the influence of the Greek language
  in modern English.
• Medical domain
• Greek root Meaning
• Algesi(a) pain
• Hem(a) blood
• Path(y) disease
• Cardi(o) heart
• Greek prefixes found in English words
• Greek prefix Meaning Engish example
• Amphi- both or around amphitheatre or amphibian
• Anti against anti-apartheid
• ETC.

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Latin

• It is possible to separate Greek from Latin
  influence.
• The Romans conquered the Greeks.
• The Romans recruited soldiers from the conquered
  nation and as a result Latin was used for
  communication.
• Latin was used in all the parts of the known
  ancient (Western) world and it became the
  dominant language of the Western world.
• After the fall of the Roman Empire, Latin
  continued to be used by the Roman Catholic
  Church.
• Latin also became a language of the scholars,
  diplomats and scientists. (Examples of words
  derived from Latin must be included, e.g. names
  of months).
• French Italian Spanish Portuguese Romanian
  Latin English
• un uno uno um
  un unus one

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Traces of Latin in SA English

• Latin English
• a.m. (ante meriden) before noon
• p.m. (post meriden) afternoon
• AD (Anno Domini) In the year of the Lord
• i.e. (id est) that is
• e.g. (exempli gratia) for example
• Sine qua non without which nothing

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The development of English

• English a global language a lingau franca
  language of wider communication
• Pre-Old English (before AD 500)
• Old English (from 500-1150)
• Middle English (from 1150-1450)
• Early mode English (from 1450-1700)
• Modern English (from 1700-1945)
• World Englishe(s) (from 1945)

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World Englishes
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World Englishes

• With the spread of English around the world, many
  new varieties of English have arisen.
• These varieties are often referred to as
  different Englishes.
• Kachru presents the spread of English around the
  world as three concentric circles.
• Each circle represents different ways in which
  the language has been acquired and is currently
  used.
• The core, or inner circle is where English is the
  primary language, e.g. UK, US etc.
• The outer circle is represented by settings where
  English plays an important role in
  second-language teaching because of the role of
  this language in a multilingual country, e.g.
  Botswana, South Africa, etc.
• The expanding circle is where English is only
  regarded as an international language. In this
  situation the countries have no history of being
  colonized by the members of the inner circle. In
  these countries, English does not have a special
  place in their language policy, it is not an
  official language, e.g. China, Japan, etc.

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Social class and language change

• LABOV IN MARTHARS VINEYARD Why he conducted
  this research? As a sociolinguists, he wanted to
  investigate the changes in pronunciation of
  certain speech sounds on the island of Marthas
  Vineyard and the effect that this linguistic
  change had on the islanders and their summer
  visitors.
•  How he conducted his research? He recorded the
  speech of various islanders and looked
  specifically at the way in which they pronounced
  certain words. He noted that approximately 30
  years earlier another linguist had visited the
  island and made a study. This linguist had
  interviewed members of the old families on the
  island.
•  What this change was? Labov compared his study
  with the 30 year-old record and he discovered
  that the vowel sound ou in the words such as out,
  trout and pounds seemed to be changing. The vowel
  sound in this word is a diphthong and is
  pronounced as (aw). He noticed that this
  diphthong was being centered. He also noticed a
  similar change in the diphthong (ay) in words
  such as white, by, and writes, which was also
  being centred. He also interviewed a
  cross-section of the islanders, excluding the
  summer visitors, to test their use of vowels. He
  found out that the islanders were not aware that
  this change was happening. It was not a conscious
  change. He also discovered that the change was
  least evident in over 75 year-olds and most
  prominent in the 31 to 45 age group. The speech
  of those under 30 was less affected that that of
  the 40 year-olds. Geographically, he change was
  far more widespread in the rural, western
  Up-Island than in more densely populated
  Down-Island. It was particularly noticeable in a
  place called Chilmark where most of the fishermen
  (about 2.5) lived.

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Social class and language change

• Where it originated and why it took place? The
  change has probably originated from a small group
  of fishermen, and had then spread to other people
  on the island, particularly those in the 31 to 45
  year-old age group.
• The fishermen had not suddenly changed the way
  they spoke.
• They started to exaggerate the tendency that was
  already there.
• The vowel shift represented the old-fashioned
  feature in the fishermens pronunciation
  prevalent in the mainland America in the 18th and
  19 centuries.
• While this vowel pronunciation had changed in
  mainland America over a period of 30 years, the
  fishermen had retained the older pronunciation
  and started to exaggerate it.
• The change to the traditional way of speech was
  due to the fact that many foreigners were
  visiting the island and the older inhabitants saw
  visitors as the intruders to their traditional
  way of life.
• Those in the age group 31 to 45 were imitating
  the fishermen and they intended to live in the
  island. This type of change is called change from
  below.

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Language variation in NY City

• William Labovs Department Store Study
• Saks Fifth Avenue
• At 50th Street and 5th Avenue, near the center
  of the high fashion shopping district
• Macy's
• Herald Square. 34th Street and Sixth Avenue,
  near the garment district
• S. Klein
• Union Square. 14th Street and Broadway, not far
  from the Lower East Side
• The three stores are classified by
• Their location
• The number of pages of advertising in The New
  York Times and in The Daily News
• The prices of comparable items (e.g., in 1962,
  women's coats averaged 90 in Sacks, 79.95 in
  Macy's, and 23 in Klein's)
• The size and layout of the store

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Language variation

• The interviewer asked
• Excuse me, where are the (women's shoes)?
• The salesperson answered
• Fourth floor.
• The interviewer then leaned forward and said
• Excuse me?
• The salesperson answered
• Fourth floor.
• In New York City the pronunciation of postvocalic
  (r) in words like fourth and floor is
  variable.
• William Labov hypothesized Salespeople in the
  highest ranked stores will have the most (r),
  those in the middle ranked store will have an
  intermediate value, and those in the lowest
  ranked store will have the least.

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Language variation

• The pronunciation of postvocalic (r) varies
  according to its position in a word.
• Before a consonant fourth
• At the end of a word floor
• The pronunciation of postvocalic (r) varies
  according to how much attention the speaker pays
  to what s/he is saying.
• First mention of fourth floor
• Emphatic repeat of fourth floor
• The same linguistic variable is likely to have
  different values in different speech communities.
• In New York City, (r) is pronounced more by
  higher social classes.
• But in Reading, England, (r) is pronounced less
  by higher social classes.
• Lower Middle Class speakers sometimes use
  prestige features at a greater rate than Upper
  Middle Class speakers.
• And LMC speakers use stigmatized features at a
  lower rate than the UMC.
• Because the LMC wish to achieve the next higher
  level of status, they attempt to talk like
  members of the next higher class, but they go too
  far. HYPERCORRECTION.
• This type of change is called Change from above

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Variation and change in South Africa

• In some studies of South African English (SAE) an
  attempt has been made to apply Labov's approach
  to variation.
• For instance, Lanham and Prinsloo identify the
  following sociological variables which could be
  used in classifying SAE speakers
• social class (upper, middle and lower classes)
• recent British descent
• Afrikaans kinship ties
• residence in centres of either Afrikaans or
  English influence
• urban vs rural residence
• school background (private or government school)
• associations with Britain
• age
• According to Lanham and Macdonald speakers of SAE
  can be classified into three groups (please note
  that speakers of SAE exclude speakers of BSAE)
• Cultivated Middle-class speakers having
  associations with England.
• General Middle-class speakers.
• Broad Mostly lower middle-class or upper
  working-class identifying with the outdoors and
  sport and significant contacts with Afrikaans
  speakers, and hence partially influenced by
  Afrikaans norms.
• These three groups correlate roughly with three
  of Labov's classes UMC, LMC and WC.
• The linguistic variables which Lanham and
  Macdonald use to characterise these groups are
  the vowel system which the speakers typically
  use. Cultivated or UMC speakers of SAE use the
  vowel system close to Standard British English.
  Broad or WC speakers use vowels which are the
  least like standard British English vowels.

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The development of new languages

• Pidgin a language in embryo
• Characteristics
• Limited vocabulary, e.g. Hand gt shoulder,
  wing, paw, etc.
• Simplified phonology e.g. Tok Pisin 5 vowels,
  laughgtlap, leafgtlip. The contrast between p and
  f is neutralised
• Simplified morphology, e.g. han belong dok
• Simplified syntax, e.g. The los of auxiliary
  verbs, beam very strong gt the beam is very strong
• Slow speech rate
• It is an unstable language
• Creole Develop from pidgin
• Pidgin Creole
• No first language speakers Many first language
  speakers
• Used in a restricted communicative context
  only Used in wide variety of communicative
  contexts
• Relatively slow speech Fast normal speech with
  elision, assimilation, etc.
• Very limited number of lexical items Wide range
  of lexical items
• Syntactically simple More complex syntax
• Decreolisation (the death of a pidgin) when a
  hypothetical phenomenon whereby over time a
  creole language reconverges with one of the
  standard languages from which it originally
  derived

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The development of Afrikaans

• 1652 - The arrival of Dutch settlers in the Cape,
  Jan van Riebeek
• Side by side with the Khoi community
• Slaves also arrived from the East who spoke
  Malay-Portuguese
• 1688 - More settlers arrived including French
  Huguenots
• The cape became the British colony in 1806 as a
  result of the Napoleonic wars in Europe
• English became the official language of the
  colony
• In 1820 more British arrived in the eastern cape
• In 1834 slavery was abolished the Dutch
  settlers were dissatisfied and they trekked into
  the interior of South Africa
• They set two republics the Orange Free State and
  the South African Republic.
• Dutch spread to other parts of Southern Africa.

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Afrikaans

• Afrikaans gt originated from Dutch, Eastern
  languages, Khoi languages, etc.
• Farmers who lived in the eastern border of cape
  spoke Dutch that was influenced by othe European
  languages Boarder Afrikaans.
• The slaves spoke Dutch that was influenced by
  Malay-Portuguese Cape Afrikaans
• The Khoi influenced Dutch Orange river
  Afrikaans
• By 19th centrury Dutch lost its standardisation
• In 1925 Afrikaans replaced Dutch

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Fanakalo

• A Zulu based contact language (pidgin)
• A simplified Zulu with words derived from English
  and, to a lesser extent, Afrikaans
• It is still alive today as a pidgin in
  KwaZulu-Natal, mines, etc despite the fact that
  many people have learnt English
• It is believed that it was began as communication
  between settlers, Indians and Zulus in Natal
• It later spread to Transvaal, mines and as far as
  Zimbabwe where it was introduced as Chilapalapa
• The attitudes towards Fanakalo have changed as
  many people see it as a legacy of the apartheid
  era

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Language change in multilingual society

• Multilingualism contributes to language change
• Monolingualism the use of one language
• Bilingualism the use of two languages
• Societal bilingualism when two or more languages
  are spoken within a particular society
• Individual bilingualism a persons ability to
  use two languages
• Diagonal bilingualism a form of a diglossia
  where a dialect or a non-standard language
  functions together with a genetically unrelated
  standard language in society
• Diglosia when two languages or language
  varieties exist side by side in a community and
  each one is used for different purposes

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Codeswitching and codemixing

• Codeswitching the use of two or more languages
  in the same conversation, usually within the same
  conversational turn, or even within the same
  sentence of the turn. It is the shifting by a
  speaker from language A to language B.
•  
• Codemixing is a more rapid switching, where the
  speaker borrows words or phrases from a second
  language in the course of a conversation
  conducted mainly in one of the languages.
• Example It depends ukuthi unobani. For instance
  if nginabangane bam kuya ngokuthi bathole
  sikhulumani. If bafike ngikhuluma isiZulu
  bazojoyina. If islang sabangane ons sal almal
  witie. The situation ukuthi unabobani.

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Slang and Tsotsitaal

• Slang a fashion item a marker of identity and
  delineator of groups separating young from old
  urban from rural a marker of in-group from
  out-group. It is secretive and deviant.
• Greeting Response
• Was'sup? Hallo, how are you? Cool, nigga!
  Mellow, shwarka, maintaining, pashash, sweet
• Tsotsitaal was used formerly by gangsters and
  thugs - is a mixture of languages, mainly Zulu
  and Afrikaans  
• In standard language, ilahle is coal' and it can
  be cold or hot. To the tsotsis, ilahle means a
  stolen
• vehicle. If they say ilahle liyashisa it means
  the stolen vehicle has not been changed.
• Slang and Tsotsitaal both are use for in-group
  communication and they are secretive. They are
  both informal languages. Now Tsotsitaal is also
  used by youth even if they are not thugs.
  (examples must be provided).
• The following is a list of some of the words that
  show the dynamic nature of Tsotsitaal
• mfethu/mfowethu (brother')
• izingamule/abelungu (white people')
• istaka/nyoko/ismeke (money')
• umfana/intwana (a small boy')
• intwana/incosi (a young person')
• ubaba/ithayima (father')

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Language death, shift and maitenance

• Language death when a language has died out
• Linguicide language death due to genocide
• Language shift when people start to speak a
  dominant language.
• Sudden language death language dies very
  rapidly
• Gradual language death a gradual process of
  language change.  
• Language maintenance a situation where a
  language holds on despite the influence of
  powerful neighbours.
• Maintaining factors education, cultural
  organizations, religion, the role of the family,
  attitudes and maintaining contact with the mother
  country.

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• !