Chapter 3: Variation in Geographical Space

Question 1

Define:

bilingualism

• 3.2.3 Bilingualism and Multilingualism*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 1

the use of two languages by an individual, social group, or nation

Question 2

Define:

biliteracy

• 3.4.3. Literacy*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 2

the degree to which one can effectively read and write two languages

Question 3

Define:

borrowing

• 3.3.1. Borrowing*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 3

the process of adopting a word from another language, for general use: e.g. Italian has borrowed the word sport from English

Question 4

Define:

calque

• 3.3.1. Borrowing*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 4

a word-by-word translation of a foreign phrase or expression: e.g. the title The Brothers Karamazov is a calque of the corresponding Russian phrase (the world order in English should be The Karamazov Brothers)

Question 5

Define:

code-mixing

3.2.2. Code-Switching

Answer 5

mixing two or more languages during conversation

Question 6

Define:

code-switching

• 3.2.2. Code-Switching*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 6

alternating between two or more languages or varieties of language in conversation (including between H and L forms)

• intersentential: code-switching between sentences
• intrasentential: code-switching within sentences

Question 7

Define:

Creole

• 3.1.2. Pidgins and Creoles*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 7

a language that has developed from the mixture of two or more languages, becoming the first language of a group

• When the children of the people who made the pidgin grow up and speak it, that pidgin becomes a Creole.
• With a Creole comes a new culture and new communities.

Question 8

Define:

dialect

3.1. Dialects

Answer 8

a regional or social variant of a language

• e.g. American English and British English are two separate languages tbecause they are in different countries, but the different versions within American English (Midwestern, Southern, etc.) are dialects.

Question 9

Define:

dialect atlas

• 3.1.1. Dialect Atlases*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 9

an atlas of maps showing language forms in specific regions

• Some criticized that there was an implicit belief that real speakers of a dialect lived in rural areas.
• Additionally, there was a bias that older male speakers were the bearers of the authentic language.

Question 10

Define:

dialect continuum

• 3.1. Dialects*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 10

the range of dialects spoken over a given region

Question 11

Define:

dialectology

3. Variation in Geographical Space

Answer 11

the study of dialects

Question 12

Define:

diglossia

• 3.2. Diglossia and Related Topics*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 12

the study of prestige in language forms

Question 13

Define:

e-literacy

3.5 Online Variation

Answer 13

online literacy, which is often in conflict with offline literacy, but also a source of influence on offline literacy

Question 14

Define:

functional literacy

• 3.4.3. Literacy*
• ​July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 14

the possession of enough knowledge and skill to function intellectually in a society

Question 15

Define:

koiné

3.3. Languages in Contact

Answer 15

the term used for a mixed language

Question 16

What is:

language contact

3.3. Languages in Contact

Answer 16

In bilingual communities and in situations of diglossia the languages involved are said to be in contact.

• Contact linguistics aimed (and continues) to document the influences languages in contact have on each other and, consequently, on their speech communities.

Question 17

Define:

language loyalty

• ​3.4.1. Language Loyalty*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 17

the tendency to remain loyal to the community language

Question 18

Defne:

language maintenance

• 3.4.1. Language Loyalty*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 18

the process of preserving a language or dialect

• For a language to be maintained and spoken, you have to have a reason.
• The opposite is language attrition, and in a community of immigrants, the native language usually disappears after three generations.

Question 19

Define:

language planning

• 3.4.2. Language Planning*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 19

legislation and official policies aimed at language

There are four main varieties of planning:

1. Status planning, whereby the government takes measures (such as legislation) to guarantee that the status of a language remains stable.
2. Corpus planning, whereby official institutions (such as academies and authoritative dictionary makers) assign social prestige to a language.
3. Language-in-education planning, which is designed to privilege a certain language through education.
4. Prestige planning, which involves getting all communities to accept the standard as the prestige code through the use of a language for literacy practices and for mainstream media transmissions.

Question 20

Define:

language shift

3.4. Standard Languages

Answer 20

the movement away from one language to another

Question 21

Define:

language spread

• 3.4. Standard Languages*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 21

the diffusion of one particular variant of a language over regions

Question 22

Define:

lexifer language

3.1.2. Pidgins and Creoles

Answer 22

the parent language of a creole

Question 23

Define:

lingua franca

• 3.1.3. Lingua Francas*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 23

a language adopted as a common language among speakers of different languages

Question 24

Define:

linguistic imperialism

3.1.3. Lingua Francas

Answer 24

when people who natively speak the lingua franca automatically assume that others (mainly those who recently learned it) understand the cultural idiosyncrasies

Question 25

Define:

literacy

• 3.4.3. Literacy*
• ​July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 25

the ability to read and write a language and to use it for formal purposes

• It is a very elitist form of language that is written, and develops it’s own traditions.

Question 26

Define:

loanword

• 3.3.1. Borrowing*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 26

a word borrowed from another language: e.g. cipher was borrowed from the Arabic language

• necessary loan: a loanword made in order to fill a conceptual gap
• luxury loan: a loanword used for social reasons, such as the use of a foreign word in place of a native one; nativization does not happen in this case

Question 27

Define:

multilingualism

3.2.3 Bilingualism and Multilingualism

Answer 27

the presence of various languages in a collectivity

Question 28

Define:

mutual intelligibility

• 3.1. Dialects*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 28

the ability of speakers to understand each other—criterion used to establish dialects

• Theoretically, this is not always a good way to distinguish dialects, since there is mutual intelligibility among languages that are not related. But it works for practical use.

Question 29

Define:

nativization

• 3.3.2. Nativization*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 29

the process whereby a loanword is reshaped phonetically to become indistinguishable from a native word

Question 30

Define:

pidgin

• 3.1.2. Pidgins and Creoles*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 30

a simplified language made up of elements of two or more languages

Question 31

Define:

standard language

• 3.4. Standard Languages*
• July 19 & 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 31

a language that societies agree to use for formal purposes

• It is a language ideal, or an aspiration.
• Usually, people in places of authority or high prestige determines what the standard language is.
• Only languages with a grammar can be the standard.

Question 32

Who is:

George Wenker (1876)

3.1.1. Dialect Atlases

Answer 32

The first to construct a dialect map was German school teacher George Wenker, in 1876.

• Wenker sent out a list of sentences written in Standard German to other school teachers in northern Germany, asking them to return the list transcribed into the local dialect.
• Each questionnaire contained 40 sentences, and Wenker collected over 45,000 of them.
• He created two sets of maps highlighting the main differential features.

Question 33

Who is:

Edmond Edmont (1896)

3.1.1. Dialect Atlases

Answer 33

In 1910, Edmont published the Atlas linguistique de la France, which became the model for all subsequent dialect atlases.

• Edmont was given this task by Swiss linguist Jules Gilliéron.
• From 1896 to 1900, Edmont recorded 700 interviews at 639 sites in order to compile the data in parts of France for Gilliéron’s core dialect research.

Question 34

Who is:

Charles A. Ferguson (1959)

3.2. Diglossia and Related Topics

Answer 34

Ferguson came to the notion of diglossia by researching speech communities where two markedly divergent varieties of a language, each employed in specific social ways, were characteristic of everyday speech situations.

• He classified two variants known as High (H) and Low (L). H is usually found in lectures, news broadcasts, and taught in school. L is for conversations and informal texts.
• Children usually learn L of their first language.
• Using the inappropriate variant in the wrong context would be socially incorrect or incongruous.

Question 35

Who is:

Johannes Gutenberg

3.4.3. Literacy

Answer 35

The German printer Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press, which mobilized books and therefore knowledge. Marshall McLuhan argued that this was the beginning of the necessity of functional literacy.

• Before the 15th century, most people were illiterate since there were few schools and no need for literacy to work on farms and in trades.
• Through cheap books and other materials, the printed word became the chief means for the propagation and recording of knowledge and ideas.
• With the spread of literacy and industry, people began migrating into cities to find jobs.
• Governments began to value education more, and public schooling systems popped up. By the late 1800s, formal elementary eduction had become a virtual necessity.

Question 36

What is the relationship between the Italian words: adesso, ora, and mo?

July 19, 2016 Lecture

Answer 36

They are all ways for expressing “now” but are found in different parts of Italy. Adesso is mainly in northern Italy, ora in central, and mo in southern. Depending on the word someone uses, you can tell where they come from geographically. These different forms are also markers of social identity.

Question 37

What are H (High) and L (Low) forms of language?

July 19, 2016 Lecture

Answer 37

some languages have two different versions: one for informal talking (i.e. low) and one for writing and formal talking (i.e. high)

• A language’s prestige is measured by its ability to extend outside the community borders (e.g. into government, formal interactions, etc.).

Question 38

What are the main differences between H and L speech?

July 19, 2016 Lecture

Answer 38

High (H) Speech:

• high prestige
• formal communication
• social authority and power
• part of traditions
• usually a learned language
• passed on through schooling

Low (L) Speech:

• low prestige
• informal communication
• group solidarity
• mainly spoken
• usually a native language
• passed on in community

Question 39

What functions do code-switching and code-mixing serve?

• 3.2.2. Code-Switching*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 39

1. They allow bilinguals to fill in conceptual gaps in one language from the other one.
2. They show allegiance to the group, as, for example, when a Hispanic switches to or mixes in Spanglish when speaking to other Hispanics to English or even to monolingual English speakers.
3. They indicate that certain topics are felt to be more appropriately articulated in one or the other language.

Question 40

What are the different forms of bilingualism and multilingualism?

• 3.2.3. Bilingualism and Multilingualism*
• July 19, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 40

1. Individual and social bilingualism. The former indicates that individuals can be reared or become bilingual users; the latter indicates that a society can be bilingual (e.g. Canada).
2. Productive and receptive biligualism. The former refers to an individual who can speak and understand two languages and the latter to one who mainly understands just one of the two.
3. Primary and secondary bilingualism. The former refers to an individual who was reared functially in two languages and the latter to one who acquires a second language outside of his or her rearing.
4. Additive and subtractive bilingualism. The former refers to a society that allows the bilingual child to maintain the home language in some formal way at school; the latter refers to a social situation that doesn’t allow the use of the home language at school.

Question 41

What are the four ideologies that motivate the direction of language planning?

• 3.4.2. Language Planning*
• July 21, 2016 Lecture*

Answer 41

1. Linguistic assimilation: Belief that every member should learn the standard language and forget about their home language (e.g. USA).
2. Linguistic pluralism: The institutionalization of multiple languages in a society (e.g. Canada and Switzerland).
3. Vernacularization: The restoration of an indigenous language (e.g. Hebrew in Israel).
4. Internationalization: The adoption of a non-indigenous language in order to connect the country to the entire world (e.g. certain countries adopting English as a second language in schools).