Brainscape's Knowledge GenomeTM

Browse over 1 million classes created by top students, professors, publishers, and experts.


See full index

Human Geography > Chapter 5 > Flashcards

Chapter 5 Flashcards

1
Q

Language

A

is a system of communication through speech

is dynamic always changing with the changing world

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
2
Q

How many languages are there?

A

The world has over 7,000 current spoken languages,

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
3
Q

Institutional Language

A

used in education, work, mass media, and government. Has a literary tradition means is Written as well as spoken

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
4
Q

Developing language

A

spoken in daily use by people of all ages and has a literary tradition

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
5
Q

Vigorous language

A

spoken in daily use but lacks a literary tradition

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
6
Q

Threatened language

A

face-to-face communications- fewer people speak it

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
7
Q

Dying language

A

is still in use by older people but is not being transmitted, not being taught to kids so no longer active for the younger tradition

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
8
Q

Natural language

A

Emerged and evolved within living or historic human communities

Ex- English, Latin which we don’t speak anymore

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
9
Q

Artificial language

A

Intentionally constructed by people for communication or fictional purposes

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
10
Q

What are examples of artificial languages?

A

Elvish languages in Lord of the Rings

Dothraki language in Game of Thrones- kelisi means queens and many people name their kids that, Aria

Esperanto

2016 more than 200000 parents named their sons Kylo  
sign language (no universal sign language – varies), tactile language (Braille, computer programming languages)

Culturally variable

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
11
Q

Esperanto

A

international language that was created in 1887 and was intended to be a universal second language, idea was that it would be much easier to learn than grammar of natural languages, never took off 1 million to 15 million people might speak it

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
12
Q

Permaculture

A

permanence and agriculture are put together based around sustainable agriculture and gardening

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
13
Q

Freegan

A

only eat food they can eat for free

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
14
Q

Snowflake

A

someone who is special or unique

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
15
Q

What can world languages be organized into?

A

can be organized into families, branches, and groups

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
16
Q

language family

A

is a collection of languages related through a common ancestor that existed long before recorded history

Group of languages descended from a common, but distant, ancestor

More than 90 different language families

6 are considered major

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
17
Q

language branch

A

is a collection of languages within a family related through a common ancestral language that existing several thousand years ago

Branches derive from the same family

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
18
Q

language group

A

is a collection of languages within a branch that share a common origin in the relatively recent past

Have many similarities in Grammer and vocab

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
19
Q

Most languages

A

share a distant, historical and genetic relationship with one or more other languages

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
20
Q

What languages are not indo- european?

A

Chinese, Arabic, and Japanese are not)

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
21
Q

½ the world’s people speak languages…

A

belonging to the Indo-European language family

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
22
Q

Describe indo european languages

A

Indo-European is divided into eight branches

4 are spoken by large numbers of people: Romance, Germanic, Indo-Iranian and Balto-Slavic

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
23
Q

Romance language

A

is spoke in southwestern europe evolved from latin spoken by Romans

How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
24
Q

Germanic branch

A

Mian branch in north western Europe is Germanic branch

English is a part of the Germanic branch
northwestern europe

25
Q

Indo-Iranian

A

is mainly in western and south asia

26
Q

What is Indias official language?

A

Hindi is India’s official language, which belongs to the Indo-European language

India recognizes 22 languages called schedule languages that the government protects and encourages people to speak

27
Q

Kurgan Hypothesis

A

(nomadic warriors)

Hearth of the Indo-European languages lies north of the Caspian Sea (near the current Russia/Kazakhstan border)

Kurgan nomadic herders domesticated horses and carried the language to the east and west as they conquered new lands

28
Q

what branch is english part of?

A

English is a Germanic language but studying the origin of English words reveals a long history of invasions to the land that became England

Has a higher % of romance words

29
Q

i

A

England speaks English because of migration from Angles, Saxons, Jutes (from N. Germany)

Old English emerged out of Proto-Germanic language brought to England during the 5th and 6th centuries

Normans (from present day France) brought French to England in 1066

This stayed the language until 1362, when Parliament changed the language to English

n this 300 year period, German and French intermingled to form the new language (both sets of words exist today)

Modern English owes its simple words like sky to Germanic language and more elegant words to the French

Middle English

After 13th century

Wouldn’t be recognized as English by our standards

“Modern Day” English

15th century (from London)

Expands globally in 18th century

English is not a static language it continues to grow and change and known for its ability to incorporate other languages in and spread throughout the world

30
Q

Renfrew (Anatolian/ modern day turkey) Hypothesis

A

sedentary farmer theory)

The hypothesis suggested that peaceful indoenzation of Europe from Anatolia would occur from about 7000 BC with the advance of farming technology

Transformation of language is thought to have occurred through the absorption by intermarriage and language replacement as the language of the framing population spread

Most of the farmers would have spoken indo European languages

31
Q

Where did Proto- Indo European being

A

began in the Fertile Crescent, and then:

From Anatolia diffused Europe’s languages

From the Western Arc of Fertile Crescent diffused North Africa and Arabia’s languages

From the Eastern Arc of Fertile Crescent diffused Southwest Asia and South Asia’s languages.

Spread with Anatolian farmers/agriculture

Turkish language is not actually indo European language

32
Q

Lingua Franca

A

Global societies need global languages for communication

A language mutually understood and commonly used to communicate by people who have different first languages
A language used among speakers of different languages for the purposes of trade and commerce

Example: A Polish pilot flying over France speaks to the control tower in English

Example: a sign in Tanzania includes English and other lingua francas, including Arabic, Swahili, and Hindi (see right)

English is the global lingua franca

33
Q

Pidgin language

A

a language created when people combine parts of two or more languages into a simplified structure and vocabulary

Language used to have a basic convo

a simplified mixture, or fusion, of languages and it is not the main language of the speakers

Only adopted when theres no other choice

Oral langauge barely written down

It is used to communicate in limited circumstance, such as business or government

E.g. Democratic republic of Congo “Lingala”: mix of French and local Congolese dialects

34
Q

Creole language

A

a pidgin language that has developed a more complex structure and vocabulary and has become the native language of a group of people

A language that results from the mixing of a colonizer’s language with the indigenous language of the people being dominated

May become more complex over time as grammatical rules, larger vocabulary, are introduced

Can act as a unifying cultural force for formerly distinct groups (e.g. Haitian Creole which evolved from pidginized French and African dialects during the era of the slave trade)

35
Q

Describe the prominence of english on the internet

A

More than half of all Internet content is in English

English remains the dominant language of the Internet primarily because the people of the United States were early adopters

Today Chinese (Mandarin) language users online represent 20% of the world total

36
Q

Standard/Official Language

A

a language that a country formally designates for use in it’s political, legal and administrative affairs

Countries can designate 2 languages as official languages

They can be unilingual, bilingual, trilingual etc

Not all countries have an official language- USA

At the federal level Canada is bilingual with 2 languages- English and French

In Manitoba its only English in Quebec only French and new Brunswick is the only province that designates both

37
Q

Monolingual state

A

where citizens of the country all speak one language

Ex- Japan

38
Q

Describe the Global Distribution of English

A

nglish is an official language of 54 countries, this represents about 2 billion people who live in these countries

In the past 4 centuries, the English migrated with their language when they colonize many parts of the world- relocation diffusion

English is a DeFacto- predominant but not official language in other countries- Australia, USA and England

Did you know that English is not the official language of the United States, Australia, and England?

39
Q

dialect

A

is a regional variation of a language distinguished by distinctive vocabulary, syntax(how we put words together for pronunciation), spelling, cadence(rhythm of speech), pace of speech, and pronunciation

Example: English in the USA and English in the UK

40
Q

How do UK english and USA english differ

A

Vocabulary, spelling, and pronunciation are the most different

Vocabulary: settlers in America found new features, animals, etc to name

Spelling: The creator of Webster’s dictionary wanted American English to be different from England’s version, to promote independence and national pride

Pronunciation: colonists in N. America pronounced words differently over time

Dialects

41
Q

Isogloss

A

A geographic boundary within which a particular linguistic feature occurs (dialect boundary or word-usage boundary)

42
Q

When does a dialect turn into a distinct language?

A

Several languages in Italy were previously considered dialects, and now viewed by Ethnologue as different enough to be classified as distinct languages

a dialect can turn into another language with enough time

E.g. Venetian (3.8 million speakers)

43
Q

Catálan

A

once regarded as a dialect of Spanish, is now classified by linguists as a distinct Romance language

Catálan is the official language of Andorra, and spoken by 5 million people in Catalonia (in Spain)

44
Q

Mixing Languages

A

Many French speakers regard the invasion of English words with alarm, but Spanish speakers may find the mixing of two languages interesting

45
Q

Franglais

A

Widespread use of English in French language

Cowboy, hamburger, jeans and t-shirt diffused into French and affected the “purity” of the language

French Academy promotes the use of French terms in France (i.e. fin du semaine rather than le weekend)

46
Q

Spanglish

A

A pidgin language that has grown out of contact between English and Spanish speakers in US, Mexico and Puerto Rico

Magazine article: “When he says me voy – what does he really mean?”

Code switching: where a speaker alternates between languages during a sentence/conversation

47
Q

Loanword

A

A word that originates in one language and is incorporated into the vocabulary of another language

E.g. ukulele and luau from Hawaiian, caravan and candy from Persian, Fjord and ski from Norwegian

48
Q

Explain how different countries manage linguistic diversity

A

Countries have devised various strategies to promote peaceful coexistence among speakers of multiple languages

Switzerland has 4 official languages: German, French, Italian, and Romansh, and each is strong in different parts of the country

They function in relative harmony

Belgium has form two autonomous regions to try to keep the peace between the Walloons (who speak French) in Southern Belgium and the Flemings in Northern Belgium that speak Flemish

Economic and political differences

Walloons wealthier in the past, but not recently

49
Q

i

A

Canada: Bilingual Autonomy

57% of Canadians speak English at home, 21% speak French, and 22% speak another language

French speakers are clustered in Québec and French is the sole official language of Québec, despite the fact that Canada recognizes both English and French as official languages

Quebec avoids English words that are used in other French-speaking places

1977: government required all businesses in Quebec to show they function in French
1993: government requires French in advertising
2013: language policies made international news when an Italian restaurant was told to provide French language translations

50
Q

Extinct/lost language

A

A language that has no living speakers

360 languages have become extinct since 1950

51
Q

Endangered language

A

Risk of extinction due to few surviving speakers

52
Q

Isolated Languages

A

An isolated language is a language unrelated to any other and therefore not attached to any language family

53
Q

Language hotspots

A

(areas where risk of extinction is high) occur when the following converge:

Language endangerment

High linguistic diversity index value

Language is poorly documented

54
Q

Linguistic diversity index (LDI)

A

A measure that expresses the likelihood that 2 randomly selected individuals in a country speak different first languages

LDI does not simply reflect the number of languages

Mexico has ~300 languages but a low LDI because most people speak Spanish

55
Q

What do the values on the LDI mean?

A

Values range from 0.00 (no linguistic diversity) to 0.99 (a lot of linguistic diversity – 2 randomly selected people will probably speak different first languages)

56
Q

Explain how Irish language is preserved

A

There are efforts to revive, preserve, or invent languages

Preserving: Irish Gaelic is an official language of the Republic of Ireland

Irish was once the principal languages of Ireland before U K colonization

Now children are required to learn Irish in school and the language is used in signage, films, TV, etc.

All government employees required to pass language proficiency exams

57
Q

Explain how welsh language is preserved

A

Welsh was the dominant language of Wales until the 19th century, when many English speakers migrated there

In 2011, the UK government made Welsh the official language in Wales

All government and utility companies provide services in Welsh

58
Q

logograms

A

a symbol that represents a word rather than a sound
ex- chinese language thats written like this rather than english which is written according to sounds

most are compounds; words related to bodies of water ex- include a symbol that represents river plus additional strokes that alter the meaning

59
Q

galician

A

Whether Galician, which is spoken in northwestern Spain and northeastern Portugal, is a dialect of Portuguese or a distinct language is debated among speakers of Galician. The Academy of Galician Language considers it a separate language and a symbol of cultural independence. The Galician Association of the Language considers it a dialect, because it believes that as a dialect it can help influence one of the world’s most widely used languages, whereas classified as a separate language it would be relegated to a minor and obscure status

Human Geography (9 decks)

Brainscape helps you reach your goals faster, through stronger study habits.
© 2025 Bold Learning Solutions. Terms and Conditions