Idea's about attitudes to language change UNFINISHED

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/06/language-fashion-weather-speak
This link is to an article in which David Shariatmadari explores language change. The article includes other links which could be interesting to explore for more information on language change.


Jean Aitchison's metaphors for prescriptive language change:


There are two main attitudes to language change, they are : Prescriptive and Descriptive. Descriptive tries to explain things how they actually are and not what we want them to be, tries to find the unconscious rules that people follow then they are writing and speaking. Prescriptive tries to tell us how we should speak and write and what rules of language people should know.


Jean Aitchison is a descriptivist who came up with three metaphors to describe how the prescriptive view could be a myth. There are three myth idea's:


1. The crumbling castle: This is used to describe the English Language as once being a great castle but how overtime it has crumbled and decayed. However, Aitchison disagrees with this as she believes that language is constantly changing and there has been no time in history where language ahs remained the same and is perfect.


2. The damp spoon: This myth suggests that 'Bad English' sticks to people who are lazy and passive. Jean says, that this is not the case


Bibliography:
https://a2englishlanguagerevision.wikispaces.com/Attitudes+towards+Change+and+Variation
http://akinomisoon.blogspot.co.uk/2009/11/7-what-is-meant-by-prescriptive-and.html

Language Change

Howard Giles developed a theory whereby people accommodate their language in accordance with who they are talking to called Communication Accommodation Theory. There are two types of accommodation processes in Giles’ Theory:

Convergence– convergence is a process where people tend to adapt the other person’s communication characteristics to reduce the social differences

Divergence-the process contradicts the method of adaptation and in this context the individual emphasise is on the social difference and nonverbal differences between the interactants. It is often linked to overt prestige.


Either one depends on the characteristics of the interactant.

Dr. Baratta is a lecture of sociolinguistics in University of Manchester; he looked at ‘accentism’. He looked at how people modify their accents; his investigation has 98 participants varying from young children to adults and from teachers to students and other staff members from a variety of institutes.

Dr. Baratta said: “Many Brits consciously modify their accent in social situations as a means to create a better impression.” Many of the participants of the investigation

 

Bibliography:

http://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/article/?id=12449

 

Child's language acquisition

                                      Child Directed Speech (CDS)

Researchers of CDS:

Clarke Stewart: Found that children whose mothers talks more have larger vocabularies.

Katherine Nelson: Found that children in the holophrastic stage whose mothers have corrected them on word choice actually develop more slowly than those with mothers who were more accepting.

Berko and Brown: ‘Fis’ and ‘Fish’ phenomenon, this found that children do not hear themselves in the same way that they hear others.

Features:

Phonology

• Separate phrases more distinctly, leaving longer pauses between them.

• Speak more s-l-o-w-l-y.

• Use exaggerated  ‘singsong’ intonation, which helps to emphasise key words.  Also to exaggerate the difference between questions, statements and commands.

• Use a higher and wider pitch range.

Lexis and semantics

• Use of concrete nouns (cat, train) and dynamic verbs (give, put).

• Adopt child’s own words for things (doggie, wickle babbit).

• Frequent use of child’s name and an absence of pronouns.

Grammar

• Simpler constructions

• Frequent use of imperatives

• High degree of repetition

• Use of personal names instead of pronouns (e.g. ‘Mummy’ not ‘I’)

• Fewer verbs, modifiers and adjectives

Large number of one-word utterances

• Deixis used to point child’s attention to objects or people

• Repeated sentence frames eg. “that’s a ……”

• Use more simple sentences and fewer complex and passives.

• Omission of past tenses, inflections (plurals and possessives).

• Use more commands, questions and tag questions.

• Use of expansions – where the adult fills out the child’s utterance.

• Use of re-casting – where the child’s vocabulary is put into a new utterance.

Pragmatics

• Lots of gesture and warm body language.

• Fewer utterances per turn – stopping frequently for child to respond.

• Supportive language (expansions and re-castings).

Bibliography:

http://revisionworld.com/a2-level-level-revision/english-language/child-language-acquisition/child-directed-speech


http://revisionworld.com/a2-level-level-revision/english-language/child-language-acquisition/phonological-development

                                      Children’s language features

 Phonological development

Simplifying language:

Deletion:

Children will often simplify pronunciation by deleting certain sounds:

• Final consonants maybe dropped eg) the ‘t’ sound in ‘hat’ and ‘cat’

• Unstressed syllables are often deleted eg) ‘banana’ becomes ‘nana’

• Consonant clusters are reduced eg) ‘snake’ becomes ‘nake’ , ‘sleep’ becomes ‘seep’

Substitution:

Another form of simplification involves substituting harder sounds with easier ones.

• R (as in rock or story) becomes w

• Th (as in there, that or thumb) becomes d, n or f

• T (as in toe) becomes d

• P (as in pig) becomes b

 

 

Standardisation as a language change issue- 11/04/16

Standardisation is a gradual process and began in England around the 14^th century. One of the most influential factors is Samuel Jonson’s Dictionary which developed in 1755 which brought standardisation to spelling, definitions and meanings. Jonson was well educated and wealthy which contributes to a social and political issue as it is seems to always be people of a higher social class that decides things for the rest of us.

English is a hybrid language and made up of different dialects which resulted in a language that was inconsistent, therefore it was important that English needed to become standard if it was going to be taken seriously. The diagram to the left shows the 4 stages of standardisation, by Haugen in 1966.

Robert Lowth was a bishop and wrote one of the most influential textbooks of English grammar “ A short introduction to English grammar” . This website https://archive.org/details/shortintroductio00lowtrich is his book and shows some really interesting bits of information and comments on the way in which Shakespeare writes.

 

Bibliography:

https://elevate.cambridge.org/elevate/Reader/viewer.aspx#book/151/Ch16_07

http://nfgsa2englishlanguage.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/standardisation.html

 

 

 

Reasons for language change

Language is always changing and adapting this is due to many different factor including external factors and internal factors. We borrow words from foreign influences as well as, clipping, using initialisms, blends, propriety names and many other ways. Types of external factors such as: Technology, society and foreign influences are some of the main points in language change. In my opinion technology is possibly the biggest factor as the internet is used by millions of people from all over the world, each generation coining new words and meanings by blending, clipping, using jargon and lots more. The influence that technology has on today’s generation will no doubt increase into the next generation and language will keep on expanding. In addition society plays a big part in language change especially when children start going to school, as they are mixing with children their own age they start to pick up new words and phrases. This could have more of an influence of language change as teenagers and young adults as you more commonly socialise with a variety of people, who each speak in a different way and are from different places. We pick up new words and phrases from different people that we talk to and sometimes these turn into constructions that can be particular for one generation. However, sometimes there is resurgence in popularity which can be due to a Sociolect e.g. fab was a popular word which started to weaken and now is slowly making its way back. Foreign influences are what have made the English language what it is; the English language has borrowed many different words from all over the world which is due to globalisation but more commonly due to music, television and sometimes fashion. Rap is one of the main genres of music in today’s generation, especially American rap the language and the way that they talk impact the way that teenagers talk. As that genre of music is associated with being ‘cool’ and well known it then makes some people feel as though they are accepted in society if they listen to that type of music and act or dress in a certain way. It then can mean that anyone who doesn’t look a certain way could be looked down upon or ‘not cool’.

Bibliography:

http://revisionworld.com/a2-level-level-revision/english-language/language-change-0/language-change-0

http://www.linguisticsociety.org/content/english-changing

 

 

14/03/16 computer lesson. Language change- unfinished.

English is often perceived as a hybrid language, from periods in history where there were settlements and invasions- each one bringing in their own language. In addition to this it’s seen as hybrid because it is made up of so many sources of language; borrowing, technology, compounding and many more techniques have helped to shape the words we use and the way that English language is today.

Old English 5^th Century: Before we had English as a language, we used Celtic. English language was developing from: the Saxons (Anglo-saxons). The Anglo Saxons and Old Norse had the biggest impact as language was drawn from both. Latin was the basis of language and was one of the most influential factors in the English language growing. As with the UK now, back in the 5^th century different settlements resulted in different dialects.

Middle English 11^th Century:  The most significant event to influence English language was the Norman invasion; French was the verbal language of the court and was widely spoken alongside Latin which was still very important in written documentation.  Towards the end of the Middle English period English became well known.

Early Modern English 15^th Century: Caxton introduced printing press from Europe, many of them printed in English which helped establish the standard form of English. Shakespeare produced his work in English.

Modern English 18^th Century:  The English language was growing at an incredible rate as many words were being borrowed from Greek, Latin and more from all over the world. Grammarians established structure and patterns in the way that language is used and led to people establishing the correct ways of speaking and writing.  

Present Day English 20^th Century: English is an every changing language with the help of various influential factors including: technology, media and travel; therefore making English a global language.

The inkhorn Controversy:  During the 16-17^th Century the English language was spoken with pride as for many years with French rule it was important to speak the mother tongue with pride. Writers of the Renaissance expanded the vocabulary by coining, , compounding, borrowing  or affixation from many different languages such as: Latin, Greek, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian.   

Pidgin/ Creoles Research

Pidgin language is nobody's native language, this may occur when two speakers of different languages with no common language try to have a conversation. Creole was originally pidgin but has become nativized.

When children start learning a pidgin as their first language and it becomes the mother tongue of a community, it is called a creole. Like a pidgin, a creole is a distinct language which has taken most of its vocabulary from another language, the lexifier, but has its own unique grammatical rules. Unlike a pidgin, however, a creole is not restricted in use, and is like any other language in its full range of functions.

1. Pidgin language (origin in Engl. word `business'?) is nobody's native language; may arise when two speakers of different languages with no common language try to have a makeshift conversation. Lexicon usually comes from one language, structure often from the other. Because of colonialism, slavery etc. the prestige of Pidgin languages is very low. Many pidgins are `contact vernaculars', may only exist for one speech event.
2. Creole (orig. person of European descent born and raised in a tropical colony) is a language that was originally a pidgin but has become nativized, i.e. a community of speakers claims it as their first language. Next used to designate the language(s) of people of Caribbean and African descent in colonial and ex-colonial countries (Jamaica, Haiti, Mauritius, Réunion, Hawaii, Pitcairn, etc.)

Bibliography:
http://grammar.about.com/od/pq/g/pidginterm.htm
http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Linguistics/explainpidgin.html