What
is more common in language uniformity or variability?
Variability is quite more common in language.
What kinds of variability exist?
The different kinds of
variability are register, geographical, social and historical.
How
do we decide if a particular group of speakers belong to a particular dialect
or language?
We can decide it,
using Shibboleth that gives you a
way to know where somebody is from, or maybe we can also decide it focusing on
historical, geographical, economical and political factors.
Saussure
emphasized the importance of synchronic descriptions of languages rather than
diachronic. He and is disciples (structuralists) focused on language at
different periods as finite entities. Is this reasonable?
No, it isn’t,
because languages are variable, that is, that they are always in change. If we
study diachronic descriptions of language, we can learn about the languages
changes between periods.
The
unattested states of language were seen as transitional stages in which the
structure of a language was, as it were, disturbed. This made linguistic change
look abnormal. Is it abnormal?
No, it isn’t. The
disturbed structured of a language can show us that all the languages make a
progress and that let us adapt them to new situations.
Milroy (1992: 3) says “the equation of uniformity with
structuredness or regularity is most evident in popular (non-professional)
attitudes to language: one variety –usually a standard language – is considered
to be correct and regular, and others –usually ‘non-standard’ dialects – are
thought to be incorrect, irregular, ungrammatical and deviant. Furthermore,
linguistic changes in progress are commonly perceived as ‘errors’. Thus
although everyone knows that language is variable, many people believe that
invariance is nonetheless to be desired, and professional scholars of language
have not been immune to the consequences of these same beliefs.”
Can you think of any example
of non-professional attitudes to your own language?
This can be applied
to my mother tongue (Valencià). Firstly, there are a problem with this that
have to be mention, that is, there are many varieties of this language (català,
valencià, mallorquí and some other varieties less common) these can be an unique
language with some varieties or maybe a different language each one. For
example, Valencià can be considered a “non-standard” language because the
speakers of that language maybe use a lot of “barbarismes”, that is words of
other language like Castellano, or maybe it can be considered like a dialect.
Nevertheless, we can also see degradation in our language (Spanish). We can see some
examples: “mercao”, “me se
ha caído”, “digistes”, “asin”,
“ayer ha muerto”…
Why does Milroy use “scare
quotes” around non-standard and errors?
Because he does not agree with these ideas.
Are non-standard dialects “incorrect, irregular, ungrammatical and
deviant.”?
It depends. I think
that non-standard dialects have to be used in a non-academic way, because as
they are non-standard, they are less acceptable to this ambit. So, from this
point of view, there are incorrect, but it depends on the concrete dialect,
because for example, I speak a dialect in my common life, but this is not
acceptable to use in a class or in a essay or exam. (Academic
way)
Which of these
systems is more irregular? Why?
|
Myself Yourself Himself Herself Ourselves Themselves |
Myself Yourself Hisself Herself Ourselves Theirselves |
I think that the second one. Because the first is the standard system,
and in the second there are items like “hisself” and “theirselves” that are
quite weird.
“…
much of the change generally accepted body of knowledge on which theories of
change are based depends on quite narrow interpretations of written data and
econtexutalized citation forms (whether written or spoken), rather than on
observation of spoken language in context (situated speech). (Milroy 1992: 5) Why do you think this is so?
I think that this is because
the spoken language has a wide variability, and it also depends on the
register, the geographical situation and the social factor, these are some
kinds of variability that can influence us in a bad way, if we want to acquire
more knowledge of a certain language. However, if we follow the interpretations
of written data, possibly we acquire a more normative knowledge of the language
that we study.
Any
description of a language involves norms? Think of the descriptions of your own
language. Why is this so? For example: He ate the pie already is considered to
be non-standard in which variety of English and perfectly acceptable in which
other?
Every language involves norms,
although these norms do not appear in the description. Maybe this sentence “He
ate the pie already” is acceptable in a colloquial register, but not in a
formal or academic way, because this sentence does not follow the rule
established in the standard English.
What
is the difference between descriptive and prescriptive grammars?
Descriptive
Grammars: Describe how the words of a language are actually used, rather than
saying how they ought to be used
Prescriptive
Grammars: Describe how a language should be used, rather than describing how it
is used.
Weinreich,
Labov and Herzog’s (1968) empirical
foundations of language change:
Constraints: what changes are
possible and what are not
Embedding: how change
spreads from a central point through a speech community
Evaluation: social responses
to language change (prestige overt and covert attitudes to language, linguistic
stereotyping and notions on correctness).
Transition: “the intervening
stages which can be observed, or which must be posited, between any two forms of a language defined
for a language community at different times” Weinreich, Labov and Herzog 1968:
101)
Actuation: Why particular
changes take place at a particular time.
What
do you think the “prestige motivation
for change” and the “solidarity constraint” mean? How are they opposed?
The prestige motivation for change is when
we want to speak in a “better way” to show a certain level or status.
On the other hand,
the solidarity constraint is when we
use the language to identify us with the society around our quotidian
environment, that is, to integrate ourselves.
We can say that
these two concepts are opposed because one refers to try to reach a good status
or level in a social way, and the second refers to a collective movement in
order to show that we belong to a certain community (although it is also
related to the social way).
Sound
change: post-vocalic /r/ in
Actuation:
Why did /k/ palatalize before certain front vowels? PrsE: cheese, German käse
English/Norse doublets shirt/skirt?
In order to
differentiate the meaning between two words in doublets.
What
is the biological metaphor in language change?
This maybe means
that languages are transmitted from one generation to another, and they also
vary or is developed through these periods
What
is the difference between internal and external histories of a language?
External
history: The history of a language as the
means of communication in a community, as opposed to the internal history of a
language system.
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1O36-externalhistory.html
Internal
history: The history of changes in the
structure of a language, as opposed to its external history .
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1O36-internalhistory.html
Look
up Neogrammarians and lexical diffusion. Why are they often
found in the same paragraph or chapter?
Because lexical
diffusion is opposed to the thought of Neogrammarians.
In historical linguistics, lexical diffusion is both a phenomenon and a theory. The
phenomenon is that by which a phoneme is modified in a subset of the lexicon,
and spreads gradually to other lexical items. The related theory, proposed by
William Wang in 1969 is that all sound changes originate in a single word or a
small group of words and then spread to other words with a similar phonological
make-up, but may not spread to all words in which they potentially could apply.
The theory of lexical
diffusion stands in contrast to the Neogrammarian hypothesis that a given sound change applies
simultaneously to all words in which its context is found.
http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Lexical-diffusion
Look
up social norm-enforcement, childish
errors and slips of the tongue. What
have they to do with language change?
The function of a social norm is to coordinate people’s
expectations in interactions that possess multiple equilibria.
Norms govern a wide range of phenomena, including property rights, contracts,
bargains, forms of communication, and concepts of justice.
Social norms consist of rules
of conduct and models of behaviour prescribed by a
society. They are rooted in the customs, traditions and value systems that
gradually develop in this society. Performance is an example of a value
assimilated within the prevailing social norm. Resisting it can lead to
exclusion.
Humans are
creatures that use language, and once they get the idea, there is no stopping
them. In fact, many 'childish' errors
in language occur because children instinctively understand the rules too well,
and have to be taught the irregularities. EX:(Mummy, I
eated my dinner.)
http://www.english-online.org.uk/englishblog/profblog.php?st=20
Children make
these errors because they do not know their language in its totality, due to
this fact, they are still learning.
A slip of the tongue is an
error in speaking in which a word is pronounced incorrectly, or in which the
speaker says something unintentionally.
http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/slip+of+the+tongue