1.-What is more common in language uniformity or variability?
One of the most
important facts about human language is that it is continuously changing.
Everyone knows that languages have changed in the course of the history.
At this very moment
changes are being implemented and diffused: old varieties are dying out and new
varieties are springing up; pronunciations are changing, new words and
constructions are being adopted and old ones adapted to new uses. Sometimes
change is rapid, and sometimes is slow, and at any given time some linguistic
structures are changing while others remain stable. Indeed, change seems to be
inherent in the nature of language: there is no such thing as a perfectly
stable human language.
2.-What kinds of variability exist?
Languages are never
uniform entities; they can be observed to vary geographically and socially, and
according to the situational contexts in which they are used.
3.-How do we decide if a particular group of speakers belong to a
particular dialect or language?
We care to look at a
language, or dialect, it is variable and in a state of change. We may ignore
this and treat language for descriptive purposes as if it were a uniform and
unchanging phenomenon, and there are often good practical reasons for adopting this
convenient idealization. For instance, we may want to write a grammar of
English for the use of foreign learners, and it will be more helpful to our
readers if we focus on what is constant rather than what is changing.
4.-Saussure emphasized the importance of synchronic descriptions of
languages rather than diachronic. He and his disciples (structuralists) focused
on language at different periods as finite entities. Is this reasonable?
5.-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?
If linguistic change were
an abnormal state of affairs, this would not be an unreasonable way to look at
language: change could then be seen as something that strikes a language from
time to time like a disease. We could talk of healthy languages (where
everything holds together) and sick languages (where it does not). But this is
not how things are: no real language state is a perfectly balanced and stable
structure, linguistic change is always in progress, and all dialects are
transitional dialects.
6.-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?
In Spanish we can
find examples like:
“me se cayó”, “me dijo de que…”, “he
decidio…”
7.-Why does Milroy use “scare quotes” around non-standard and errors?
Because he is writing
what he wants to explain but it isn’t his real opinion.
8.-Are non-standard dialects
“incorrect, irregular, ungrammatical and deviant.”?
Uniform states of
language are idealizations and that variable states are normal; furthermore, variation
in language may itself be structured and regular. Languages are not in reality
completely stable or uniform, and there is absolutely no reason why they should
be.
9.-Which of these systems is more irregular? Why?
|
Myself Yourself Himself Herself Ourselves Themselves |
Myself Yourself Hisself Herself Ourselves Theirselves |
The second column is
more irregular and we use more the first one. When I say “we” I mean not
English speakers. But for them, the second column it can be also used.
10.-“… 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 contextualized 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?
“The drama of the
linguistic change”, according to Wyld, “is enacted neither in manuscripts nor
inscriptions, but in the mouths and minds of men”, and historical linguists
have generally insisted that the history of language is primarily the history
of spoken language. Traditionally, however, it was not possible to follow this
out very thoroughly because investigators did not have the technology to study
spoken discourse in extenso, and
could hardly have imagined how complex the patterning of spoken interaction in
situational contexts would would actually turn out to be when it did become
possible to analyse it.
11.-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?
Most language
description involves norms.
In my own language
there are norms like in grammar, pronunciation, orthographic…
The example given in
the question below is correct in southern English variety but it is barely
acceptable in British English in
12.-What is the difference between descriptive and prescriptive grammars?
Prescriptive appeal
to some idealized superordinate norm which is part of the “standard” or
literary language, rather than a consensus community norm, but although they
are not enunciated as social, they are social judgements.
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.
13.-What do you think the “prestige
motivation for change” and the “solidarity constraint” mean? How are they
opposed?
14.-Sound change: post-vocalic /r/ in
15.-Actuation: Why did /k/ palatalize before certain front vowels? PrsE:
cheese, German käse English/Norse doublets shirt/skirt?
16.-What is the biological metaphor in language change?
17.-What is the difference between internal and external histories of a
language?
18.-Look up Neogrammarians and
lexical diffusion. Why are they often
found in the same paragraph or chapter?
19.-Look up social
norm-enforcement, childish errors and
slips of the tongue. What have they to do with language change?