LANGUAGE CHANGE AND VARIATION IN ENGLISH (Chapter

1, pp. 21-62)

MAIN TOPICS

Concepts of change and variation: how and why

Attitudes to language: standard and non-standard varieties

The main phases in the history of English Causes of the spread of English in the

world Present-day English: from English to

“Englishes” English as a global language: advantages

and disadvantages and future predictions

BRAINSTORMING ON LANGUAGE CHANGE AND VARIATION ( Chapters 1,

§ 1 and 2)

1. Do languages change in time? 2. Why do languages change? 3. How do languages change? 4. Why, and how, do languages

vary at a given time in history? 5. What is “the best form” of a

language?

In pronunciation : the Great Vowel Shift from the 15th to the 17° century (“push chain process”) explains the present discrepancy between spelling and pronunciation

In morphology the gradual reduction of case endings (inflection) in nouns, verbs and adjectives from Old to Modern English

In syntax the gradual fixing of the SVO (Subject+Veb+ Object) word order and the development of modal verbs from main verbs to auxiliaries in Modern English

Examples of slow and systematic change in English

Examples of ‘sudden’ change in English

NEW WORDS YUPPIE, DINKY, NIMBYSince the 1980s YUPPIE( Young Upwardly Mobile Professional

People), DINKY (Double Income No Kids), NIMBY ( Not In My Backyard) to refer to different groups of people and their life styles

MsSince the 1970s Ms was suggested to neutralise the distinction

between Mrs and Miss in order to avoid “linguistic sexism”BORROWING from other languages, e.g. Words from Italian in

classical music ( e.g allegretto, pizzicato) and to refer to typical Italian food (spaghetti, pizza)

SEMANTIC CHANGE GAY, MEAT, SUBPRIMEFrom gay (merry/ cheerful) to gay (male homosexual) From meat ( meaning food ) to the present more restricted meaning In 2008 subprime, from adjective into noun to refer to “a subprime

loan”

Coexisting variants1 Personal pronouns Thou / you e.g Thou shalt not kill (The Bible) You must not killA search based on The British National Corpus

(BNC) says that thou is used 748 times in religious or literary texts and you 668,260 in a variety of contexts

2) The relative pronouns Who/whom e.g. To whom should I complain? Who/whom should I complain to?According to the BNC who is used 200,998 times and

whom is used 12,596

Causes for language change

“external”, e.g. historical events, inventions, new ideas, contact with other languages and cultures

“internal” e.g. analogy, regularity, reorganisation, hypercorrection

Causes for language variation

1. SOCIAL FACTORS LINKED TO LANGUAGE USERS, such as region, social class or group , education, gender , ethnicity, age

e.g. Labov’s analysis of the pronunciation of [r] in New York city after 1945 according to social class and style (pp. 22/23)

2. SOCIAL FACTORS LINKED TO THE CONTEXT OF

SITUATION , i.e. topic, relationships between participants and the medium chosen

e.g. AVIAN INFLUENZA versus BIRD FLU influenza aviaria versus l’influenza dei polli e.g. SWINE INFLUENZA versus SWINE FLU versus inflenza A [H1N1] influenza suina versus influenza dei maiali

e.g. GREETING DIFFERENT TYPES OF PEOPLEHI LOVEHELLO TOMGOOD MORNING TOMGOOD MORNING, MR JOHNSONGOOD MORNING, PROFESSOR PRATGOOD MORNING , JOHNSONGOOD MORNING, SIR/ MADAMGOOD MORNING, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN

DIFFERENT WAYS OF SAYING THE SAME

THING…The lesson is beginning! Can you listen to me, please?Would you mind keeping silent?Listen, please!Be quiet over there Shut up, will you?Attendance is not compulsory!!!(Shut your big mouth)

What is “the best English”?

All the varieties of a language are equally acceptable and interesting for a linguist and for its users

but in each epoch there is a more socially

accepted variety, which is considered the standard variety. A standard is associated to the elites of the time ( monarchy, the parliament, upper classes, intellectuals, educated people, the media or literature writers), and will be gradually elaborated and codified in grammars, dictionaries and style books

From general to expert knowledge

SOME CONCEPTS AND TERMS: Synchrony/diachrony,

sociolinguistics, social variables (related to users and to the context of situation), historical linguistics, history of the language, comparative linguistics, language family, Indo-European, Germanic family, Romance or Neolatin family

A very important question

IS THE STUDY OF THE HISTORY AND VARIETIES OF ENGLISH RELEVANT TO UNIVERSITY STUDENTS OF ENGLISH?

YES !!!

1. FOR CULTURAL REASONS2. TO UNDERSTAND MORE ABOUT

PRESENT-DAY ENGLISH (e.g. the gap between spelling and pronunciation; e.g. the mixed nature of its lexis e.g. “liberty” versus “freedom”; the existence of regular and irregular verbs; the linguistic situation of present-day UK; the varieties of English in the world)

3. TO REINFORCE PRACTICAL COMPETENCE (e.g. to improve pronunciation and grammatical correctness in a given variety and to expand lexical competence; to be prepared to understand different varieties of English)

HISTORICAL PERIODS AND LINGUISTIC PHASES

1. The Anglo-Saxon period

2. The Norman period

3. Modern period Great Britain and Northern Ireland united under the

British crown. New territories explored and stable colonies established in America, Asia and Africa

4. 20th Century : From English to “Englishes” English as a global language

1. OLD ENGLISH, OE (700-1150)2. MIDDLE ENGLISH , ME ( 1150-1500)

3. MODERN ENGLISH, ModEngl. (1500-1900)

4. PRESENT-DAY ENGLISH (PDE) (to the present)

OLD ENGLISH

OE (700-1150)

(Chapter 1, § 3.1, 3.2)

THE STORY OF ENGLISH STARTED IN A SMALL

ISLAND…WAYS OF REFERRING TO IT TODAY:

1. UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAND AND NORTHERN IRELAND (UK) composed of ENGLANDSCOTLANDWALESNORTHERN IRELAND

2.GREAT BRITAIN (GB) / BRITAIN composed of ENGLANDSCOTLANDWALES

3. THE REPUBLIC OF IRELAND

WHO LIVED IN ENGLAND BEFORE 700

A.D? SOME MYSTERIOUS POPULATIONS

(see Stonehenge , 3000 B.C) THE CELTIC AND GAELIC

INHABITANTS ( today many areas are bilingual and some geographic names are of Celtic origin , e.g. London, Leeds, Kent, Cornwall, Thames )

THE ROMANS INVADED THE ISLAND AT THE TIME OF CAESAR ( 50 B.C. ) AND ABANDONED IT IN THE 5th CENTURY A.D.)

STONEHENGE, 3000 B.C.

The Roman baths of Bath

Major historical events and monuments before and during the

OE period 5th century A.D: some Germanic tribes

(Anglo-Saxons and Jutes) arrived in England and forced the Celts to move west and north

• Since the 6th century: the Christianisation of Britain took place ( e.g. substitution of the Runic alphabet with the Latin alphabet) see. P.29

• In the 8th century: the Scandinavian Vikings tried to invade part of Britain and in the 9th century King Alfred, king of the West-Saxon reign, defeated them. West-Saxon was considered the first written English standard

• 1066 The Anglo- Normans invaded Britain

THE CELTIC/GAELIC COUNTRIES IN THE BRITISH

ISLES

AN EXAMPLE FROM OE(Ælfric’s Colloquy, c.

998)

OE: We cildra biddaþ þe , eala lareow, þæt þu tæce us [...].

We cildra þe biddaþ, eala lareow, þæt þu tæce us [...].

We cildra þe biddaþ, eala lareow, þæt tæce þu us [...]

PDE: We children bid you, master, that you teach us [...].

FEATURES OF OLD ENGLISH

LATIN ALPHABET, WITH SOME DIFFERENCES FROM PDE (e.g. the consonant Thorn, or þorn, Þ, þ)

NOUNS, ADJECTIVES AND PRONOUNS WERE INFLECTED FOR CASE ( nominative, genitive, dative, accusative) ,NUMBER ( singular and plural) AND GENDER ( masculine, feminine, neuter). Personal pronouns have retained case, number and gender also in Present-day English

THE DEMONSTRATIVES WERE USED BOTH FOR THE DEFINITE ARTICLES AND FOR DEMONSTRATIVES

TWO TYPES OF VERBS (STRONG AND WEAK) = IRREGULAR AND REGULAR VERBS IN PDE. “To be” is the most irregular verb

WORD ORDER WAS FREE LEXIS WAS MAINLY GERMANIC BUT INCLUDED

WORDS OF CELTIC (names of places, e.g. London) , LATIN (e.g. schol from schola) AND SCANDINAVIAN ORIGIN (e.g. landes mann = native in PDE)

SYNTHETIC VERSUS ANALYTHIC LANGUAGE: English from synthetic to analytic

language Synthetic languages express

grammatical and syntactic categories (mainly) through CASES ( OR INFLECTION)

Analytic languages express grammatical and syntactic relations (mainly) through WORD ORDER and GRAMMATICAL WORDS such as prepositions and auxiliaries.

MIDDLE ENGLISH, ME

(1066 or 1150-1500)

(Chapter 1, § 3.2)

MAJOR EVENTS IN THE MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD

1066 The Normans invaded England and went into power. They spoke French (or Anglo-Norman) while Latin was the language of the Church and education, and Anglo-Saxon English was still the language of the majority of the population. Gaelic was spoken in Scotland

1204 The Normans lost their power in favour of English kings

1215 The Magna Charta Libertatum (in Latin)

The most authoritative example of written literary English: The Canterbury Tales by G. Chaucer (14th century)

1476 Introduction of the printing press in England by William Caxton

A Norman Castle

Geoffrey Chaucer (1340-1400)

The Canterbury Tales

From Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales

1 Thanne were ther yonge povre scolers two,

PDE: Then there were two young poor scholars,

2 That dwelten in this halle, of which I seye.

PDE: Who dwelt (lived) in this hall, of which I say.

FEATURES OF MIDDLE ENGLISH

Reduction of the case system in particular in nouns and adjectives because of the disappearance of vowels in unstressed final syllables

Development of the future with shall/will, the present progressive and the passive

Increasingly fixed word order, with some variation

French (e.g. “marry”, “government”) and Latin (e.g. “psalm” “inferior”) influence on vocabulary

Development of a standard form of English around the city of London

MODERN ENGLISH (c. 1500-c.1900)

Chapter 1, § 3.3.

Major historical/cultural events in the Modern

English period1. BRITAIN BECAME A UNITED AND POWERFUL

COUNTRY ( but with only 7 million inhabitants!)• Separation of the Church of England from the

Roman Catholic Church• Queen Elisabeth I established the power of Britain

on the seas• Great flourishing of the theatre and literature

(Shakespeare, The Authorized Translation of the Bible)

• The English Civil War over the power of the Parliament versus the power of the Monarchy

• In 1702 England and Scotland were united under the British Crown

2. BRITAIN BECAME A COLONIAL WORLD POWER • Since the I7th century English trading companies

in India and slave trade in Africa • Since the 17th century stable colonies were

established in America, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, The Caribbean and South Africa

• 19th century colonial empire in Asia and Africa

William SHAKESPEARE (1564-1616)

A quotation from Love’s Labour Lost by

Shakespeare I praise God for you sir, your

reasons at dinner haue beene sharpe and sententious: pleasant without scurrillity, witty without affection, audacious without impudency, learned without opinion, and strange without heresie…

From HAMLET by Shakespeare

To be, or not to be: that is the

question:Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to sufferThe slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;No more; and by a sleep to say we endThe heart-ache and the thousand natural shocksThat flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummationDevoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;For in that sleep of death what dreams may come…

TRANSLATION BY A. LOMBARDO

Essere o non essere – questa è la domanda. Se è più nobile per la mente sopportare Le sassate e le frecce dell’oltraggiosa

fortuna O prendere le armi contro un mare di guai E, combattendo, finirli. Morire, dormire – Nient’altro – e con un sonno dire che

poniamo Fine al male del cuore e ai mille Travagli maturali di cui la carne è erede. Questa è consumazione da desiderare

devotamente. Morire, dormire – dormire, forse sognare. Ah, qui è l’intoppo. Perché in quel sonno Di morte quali sogni possono venire

1611 King James’ Authorized Version of the

Bible in English

From the Genesis

15: And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. 16: And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 17: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. 18: And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. … 21: And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; 22: And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. 23: And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. 24: Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. 25: And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.

(Late) Modern English (1500-1900)

• Simplification of inflection (only ‘s genitive and –s plural in nouns, the comparative and superlative endings in adjectives) with the exception of pronouns, which have retained inflection

• Tendency to fixed word order

• Debate between Neologisers (in favour of words of foreign origin) and Purists (in favour of native word formation processes)

• Development of a standard form of English through long processes of selection (London English) and codification through grammars and dictionaries

• Development of a standard accent in Britain: The Received Pronunciation (RP)

• Development of the so-called colonial standard varieties of English, e.g. American English, Australian English, New Zealand English

• Development of Pidgins and Creoles, which were the result of the contact between English and local languages and functioned as the lingua franca for trade and commerce, e.g. in West Africa

The four main periods of English:

a summary Old English (700-1100 c.)● fully inflected● free word order● mainly Germanic vocabulary

Middle English (1100-1500)● reduced inflection● increasingly fixed word order● French and Latin influence on vocabulary

Modern English (1500-1900)● very reduced inflection● greater use of fixed word order● codification of language

Present-day English (1900-nowdays)● very reduced inflection and fixed word order● formation of new native and non-native varieties

worldwide● English as a global lingua franca

THE ENGLISH “DIASPORA”

1ST STAGE: The expansion of English within the British Isles with the reduction of Gaelic languages to minority languages in Scotland, Wales and Ireland

2ND STAGE: The colonial empire and the birth of colonial varieties of English and Pidgin and Creoles

3RD STAGE: the spread of English as a global lingua franca

Present-day English

(1900-nowdays)

Chapter 1, §4.1-4.10

RED = where English is the first and often only language of most people DARK PINK = where English as a native language but there is at least one

other significant native tonguePINK = countries where English is not the native, but only the official

language

MAIN POLITICAL AND CULTURAL EVENTS

1. English is the official – or main- language of many important countries in the world (e.g. UK, USA, Australia, Canada, New Zealand).

2. English has been retained as the official language (along with other native languages) in more than 70 former British colonies after their political independence (e.g. in India, and several African countries).

3. English has acquired growing importance worldwide in science, technology, international organisations and business.

The reasons for the present predominance of English in the

world: a summaryExternal reasons: the colonial and

industrial power of Great Britain in the 18th and 19h centuries; the political, economic and technological power of the USA in the 20th century; the number of speakers; the geographical spread; the cultural heritage

and/or Internal reasons: morphological

simplicity, structural clarity, size and mixed nature of its vocabulary, flexibility in creating new words, adaptability to distant contexts.

The present situation of English

in the world1. Native varieties of English (ENL or L1),

such as American English, British English, Australian English, Canadian English, New Zealand English, but also regional varieties such Northern English, Southern American

2 Varieties of English as a Second Language (ESL or L2), used intranationally in former British colonies in the institutional, media and educational fields ( e.g. Indian English, Nigerian English, South-African English, Singapore English, Hong Hong English)

3. English as a Foreign language (EFL), English as a lingua franca (ELF), English for Special Purposes (ESP), Business English, English for Academic Purposes (EAP), Airspeak, Policespeak…

4. Within each variety there is a continuum from an educated standard (acrolect) to a very limited form of communication (basilect)

The world Englishes paradigm

by B. Katchru

Katchru’s Three Circle Model: Non-native speakers

of English have outnumbered native

speakers

Who owns English today?

“…the English language ceased to be the sole possession of the English some time ago”

(Salman Rushdie, 1991)

Native varieties are…

…a set of different but related varieties which share a common core of grammar and vocabulary. They differ mainly in pronunciation and lexis, with limited differences in spelling and in grammar.

The two main ones are British English (BrE ) and American English (AmE). They provide the norms for EFL learners.

Second language varieties, or New Englishes …

… have gone through a process of language contact (i.e. imposition of native norms followed by nativisation/ hybridisation/acculturation

e.g. “As honest as an elephant, been-to, township, apartheid, co-wife, younger husband”)

…. have been progressively acknowledged as local standards (e.g. Indian English, East-African English), described in dictionaries and grammars and used by writers

… share common features that are different from native standard varieties

Are these mistakes or the result of linguistic creativity?

(see. pp. 49-53)1. I was feeling thirsty, so I

bought one soda2. Last time she come on

Thursday3. We are having something to

do4. Whenever we go there they

be playing5. She came yesterday, isn’t

it?

Quotations by Mahatma Gandhi (1869 - 1948) Indian political and

spiritual leaderYou must be the change you want to see in the world.

Victory attained by violence is tantamount to a defeat, for it is momentary.

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong

.

Nelson Mandela - South African statesman. Born 1918. Nobel

Peace Prize 1993. No one is born hating another person

because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.

True reconciliation does not consist in merely forgetting the past.

There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires.

The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

Lintonm Kwesi Johnson, A Jamaican poet born in

1952 Inglan is a

bitchDere’s no

escaping it Ingland is a

bitch Dere’s no

runnin’ fram it

OPTIONS FOR EFL LEARNERS

For production : - follow one of the native standards chosen

on the basis of proximity, tradition, personal needs or taste (e.g. British Standard English or American Standard English).

or- follow a non-native model, English as a

Lingua Franca based on a core of norms drawing on British and American English and intended to guarantee mutual international intelligibility in scientific and professional fields

For comprehension:- be prepared to understand different

varieties

Pros and consof English as the lingua franca of

today’s world World languages have always existed (e.g.

Latin and French) A world language is necessary for mutual

intelligibility in a globalized world A post-national language may be useful to

world democracy and citizenshipEnglish is the vehicle of different cultures

Non-native writers reach a world audience

English is killing other languages and culturesPeople are becoming lazy in learning other languagesEnglish expresses a particular world view and favours

its native speakers (cultural imperialism)

English has become uncontrollableWill interpreters and translators become useless? Non-native writers sacrifice their own identities

WHAT WILL BE THE FUTURE OF ENGLISH?

FROM

ENGLISH

TO

ENGLISHES

Will English …?1. … go on being a polycentric language

comprising several mutually intelligible varieties?

2. …achieve a balance between national identity and international intelligibility?

3. … remain strong until English-speaking countries are powerful ?

4. … fragment into mutually unintelligible languages as was the case with Latin giving birth to romance languages?

5. …be rejected as a symbol of colonialism (e.g. Malaysia) or cultural imperialism?

6. … be spoken as a simplified lingua franca by non-native speakers?

7. …influence other languages so as to create mixed varieties such as Spanglish, Franglais, Itangliano or Italiese

The BBC Story of English

9 tapes on the English language and its development (available at CLIFU)

In particular: Tape 1: An English-speaking

World Tape 2: The Mother Tongue

Take some Picts, Celts and SiluresAnd let them settle,Then overrun them with Roman conquerors.

Remove the Romans after approximately 400 yearsAdd lots of Norman French to someAngles, Saxons, Jutes and Vikings, then stir vigorously.

Mix some hot Chileans, cool Jamaicans, Dominicans,Trinidadians and Bajans with some Ethiopians, Chinese,Vietnamese and Sudanese.

Then take a blend of Somalians, Sri Lankans, NigeriansAnd Pakistanis, Combine with some GuyaneseAnd turn up the heat.

 

BENJAMIN ZEPHANIAH, a British writer, poet and singer of Jamaican

origin

(FOLLOWS) Sprinkle some fresh Indians, Malaysians, Bosnians Iraqis and Bangladeshis together with some

Afghans, Spanish, Turkish, Kurdish, JapaneseAnd Palestinians Then add to the melting pot.

Leave the ingredients to simmer.

As they mix and blend allow their languages to flourishBinding them together with English.

Allow time to be cool.

Add some unity, understanding, and respect for the future,Serve with justiceAnd enjoy.

Note: All the ingredients are equally important. Treating one ingredient better than another will leave a bitter unpleasant taste.

Some issues to discuss…

1) Should English become the only official language of international organizations?

2) Should English become compulsory in education? Or is it already?

3) Do you approve of the multilingual policy of the European Community (two foreign languages beyond the mother tongue for the European citizen even though this choice is very expensive)?

Examples of review questions

(see set book, p. 60) Why is Old English (OE) a

synthetic language?

OE is a synthetic language because most grammatical categories in nouns, adjectives and verbs are expressed through a system of case markers, or inflections.

Why is Present-Day English described as an analytic

language?

PdE is an analytic language because grammatical and syntactic relations are expressed by fixed word order and grammatical words like prepositions rather than through inflection

What are the most important consequences of the British

colonisation on the English language?

English was brought by colonisers to different parts of the world during the 17th, 18th and 19th century, first to America and then to Asia and Africa. Different native and non-native varieties have gradually developed thus creating a vast multicultural speech community.

Who speaks English in the world today?

Three categories have been identified by the linguist Katchu:

1. People for whom English is the mother tongue (ENL). There are several native varieties that partly differ in pronunciation, lexis, grammar and spelling. The two most important native standards are British English (BE) and American English (AmE).

2. people for whom English is the second language (ESL) in former English colonies, such as India and Kenya. These Englishes partially differ from native norms and are gradually recognized as independent standards.

3. people for whom English is a foreign language (EFL) who usually take a native variety as their model

Why do languages change? Give some examples for

English Languages change for EXTERNAL

and INTERNAL reasons. The former are major historical, political and cultural events like the Norman invasion in 1066, the Industrial Revolution or the colonial expansion since the 18th century. The latter refer to changes in the language system such as the Great Vowel Shift from the 15th to the17th century, and the gradual loss of inflection in nouns and verbs from Old English to Present-Day English

Change in language can be both sudden and slow. Give one example

for each in English

Lexical change is usually sudden as new words may be required to refer to new ideas, objects and discoveries. For instance, “hippy, yuppy, dinky, nimby” were created to describe different life styles in the 20th century

Grammatical change is usually slower. For instance, the loss of inflection in nouns, adjectives and verbs took many centuries from 500 to 1900