Attitudes to Language Change: Prescriptivists and Descriptivists Flashcards
What are the 2 types of language change?
Diachronic change Synchronic change
What is Diachronic change?
Historical development of a language
What is Synchronic change?
Language change at a particular moment in time
What are the 2 main attitude classes to feelings on language change?
Prescriptivism Descriptivism
What do Prescriptivists believe?
English Language is getting worse
What is a class of attitude under prescriptivism?
Declining Attitude
How do Prescriptivists believe language should be?
Follow a set of rules and be static
What is a descriptivist attitude? Why?
They see language change as important as it reflects societal changes
Which researcher described Prescriptivists attitudes to be wrong?
Jean Aitchison
What are the 3 types of prescriptivism created by Aitchison?
Damp Spoon Syndrome Crumbling Castle View Infectious Disease Assumption
What is a common perspectivist view under DSS?
Sloppiness in language change results in laziness
What is Aitchisons critique of the prescriptivist DSS perspective?
Only truly lazy speech is drunken speech
What does Aitchison say about why making words shorter is essential and not lazy?
It makes us say more words in a minute
What is the common prescriptivist view in CCV?
English is like an old Castle that should be preserved
What is Aitchisons critique of the CCV prescriptivist view?
This view implies English was lovingly crafted and had a peak, when this isn’t the case
