Test 2 Definitions Flashcards
(12 cards)
Evaluation Problem
“How do speakers evaluate change?”, so is language change good or bad?
It is a question of power.
For example, the word “like”: the word “like” is now most commonly used as a substitute for “one said.” Many people and adults got irritated by it as they feel it is overused and unnecessary, but some people feel that it allows them to describe or explain things better. However, as time has passed on, some parents and most generations use the word in everyday sentences unconsciously. Some people find the word to be annoying, but others see the excessive use of the word as harmless.
Actuation Problem
“Why and when did a change begin?”
It is a question we want to answer as a sociolinguist.
You try to find the beginning of a change
For example, the smiley emoticon “:)” - it developed overtime, the symbols developing and changing until it let to the “:)”. It resulted in, the symbols imitating what the symbol looked like; a smiley face.
Acts of Identity
It is spoken about in the embedding problem, which is the location of a change in the social hierarchy, which encourages individuals to adopt or not adopt the new form.
Language use as an act of identity •
How do you get from language A to language B? At the level of the individual speaker, acts of identity are an important mechanism guiding the selection or adoption of forms.
Shows a social hierarchy, encouraging individuals to adopt or not adopt the new form.
“Individual changes in language because a person wants to be or sound more like someone else”
For example, someone who wants to sound posh in New York, will adopt the post vocalic /r/ as that is a marker of the highest ranking status group
Pidgin
“An outcome of contact between two or more groups of people who do not share a common language”
“A social and linguistic solution to the problem of intergroup communication”
It is not a case of laziness, but a language with its own grammar and Lexicon (it is not ‘bad grammar’)
It can arise in various political, economic and social contexts, for example:
• Chinese pidgin English arose from colonialism
• Russenorsk (trade, a seasonal language only spoken in summer)
• Vietnamese pidgin English arose after the war
They are languages which arise in areas of pronounced culture contacts, in situations where, broadl speaking, it is impossible for the people concerned to learn each others languages well. Their structure, relative to that of the languages from which they have been derived within comparatively recent times, is greatly broken down and simplified. Largely because of this broken-down structure, but also because of the circumstances under which they are spoken, they are often held in contemp by a large section of their speakers, by speakers if the parents language or both languages.
Pidgin languages have both grammatical rules and structure and so it is possible to speak a pidgin language badly.
Superstrate
It is the socially dominant language in the contact situation;
Most of the vocabulary of the contact language tends to come from this variety (therefore also called “lexifier”)
Often this was the colonial language (English, Portuguese and French). However, indigenous languages also functioned as superstrate languages, such as Fanagalo.
For example, the word “banan” (French: Seychelles Creole) is a superstrate for the English word “banana”
Mixed language
If you take English and afrikaans, and are a pidgeon and creole, you actually change the word. The speakers mix the languages using one word from language A and one word from language B
It is contact induced, so the mixing of language needs to happen between 2 nearby communities or 2 languages that are in close contact with each other.
For example, in “Xhonglish”, an “I” is added as a prefix to an English but word meanings don’t change (can still see the origin of the word - “pencil” to “ipencil”)
In other cases, some morphological material from afrikaans can be added to an English word (“gooi it in the box”)
Substrate
The subordinate language(s) in terms of political, economic and social power.
It tends to contribute grammar and pronounciation patterns to newly emerging language.
Sometimes, there were several substrate languages because the substrate community was not linguistically homogenous.
For example, oceanic languages
Intra-Sentential Switching
It is a type of code switching.
It can be defined as “switching inside the sentence or clause level”, for example at sentence or clause boundairies.
Myers-Scottson provided an example whereby he showed the conversation between a clerk and customer at a bank in Nairobi, for whom the unmarked code choice is Swahili. The customer begins speaking in the unmarked Swahili and later switches to Luo, their shared ethnic language, to index social solidarity with the clerk trying to solicit extra help.
There is grammar from both languages
For example: “Lete scotch on the rock hapa!”
“Bring scotch on the rock here!”
Individual bilingualism
Individual bilinguism occurs between individuals and these individuals need to know or use more than one language on a daily basis.
It is where code switching happens.
• highest demands: must be fully competent in both languages to be bilingual
• minimal requirements: skills in the second language (read, write, speak, listen, etc..)
It is the outcome of having 2 languages in contact with one speaker so they fuse and become one.
For example, an individual is fluent in both English and Afrikaans
Interference
It involves the question of interference (How well does the billingual keep his languages apart? To what extent does he fuse them together? How does one of his languages influence his use of the other?)
It is the outcome of having 2 languages in contact with one speaker so they fuse and become one.
For example, when translating from Mandarin to English, sentences might not be grammatically correct: “Please give full attention your children while they are swimming” or “I feel really am sorry” should be “I am feeling really sorry.”
Alternation
It involves the question of alteration (To what extent does he alternate between his languages? How does he change from one language to the other and under what conditions?)
- it is the shift from one language to another or it is a mix of languages
For example, “Can you ‘gooi’ me the ball?”
S-Curve
Convergent findings from the study of linguistic change indicate that the temporal diffusion of new linguistic forms follow an S-curve pattern. S-curve refers to the shape of the line when such findings are plotted on a graph. The horizontal axis indicates the time dimension, and the vertical axis the number of speakers who use the new linguistic form. The vertical axis could also indicate the number of texts or genre in which the new firm occurs, or by the number of lexical words which have been affected by a sound change.
Made up of 3 stages:
1. Innovation stage (someone (early adopter) heard something they liked, and then they used it in language)
2. Growth stage (word spreads to a lot of people)
3. Maturity stage (everyone uses your new word, however ad there are few people left that have yet to use your word, the spread of 5 he word slows down).
For example, if I had to go overseas to America and hear the word napkin being used, and then come back to South Africa and refer to a serviette as a “napkin”, this word (if approved by people in my community) will start to spread and follow the growth pattern of the S-curve.
