Ethnicity Flashcards
Ethnicity
A shared social identity consisting of cultural practices, language, beliefs and history. You have some control over your ethnic affiliation.
The relationship between ethnicity and language
- Ethnicity and language have a complex relationship
- Things get more complicated when there are multiple linguistic influences at work, as urban centres become more culturally diverse and young people grow up exposed to many language varieties
Where does diversity in Britain come from?
Romans
Vikings
French
Slave trade
Indians and Chinese due to the growth of the British Empire
Refugees from Eastern Europe after WW2
Reasons for diversity in Britain
Invasion
Expansion
Empire
Commonwealth
2021 Census in terms of Ethnicity
Across the 19 ethnic groups the largest percentage point increase was seen in the number of people identifying through the ‘white other white’ category where people were allowed to specify their ethnicity in writing.
Shows the true diversity of Britain
Ethnicity is…
Dynamic
Pidgin
A language that is invented by adults who speak different languages in order to communicate between themselves. It has historically happened most in colonial situations.
Features of pidgins
- Have a short life
- Are a blend between the two languages
- Likely to follow the grammar of the dominant language
- Have a clear and definite use (e.g. to sell trade)
- Simple sentence structures
- Reduction or elimination of some syllables
- Uncomplicated clausal structure
Creoles
A stable natural language developed from the mixing of parent languages; creoles differ from pidgins in that they have been nativized by children as their primary language, with the result that they have features of natural languages that are normally missing from pidgins
Do creoles still exist?
Many of the most known European-based creole languages are extinct however some still survive e.g. in the Caribbean
An example of how a creole may start
Slaves from different parts of the world (put together as a tactic to prevent rebellion) used pidgins to communicate with one another and form an identity. This language would then be passed onto the new generation of children
Creolisation
The process whereby a pidgin becomes a creole. This happens once children grow up using the pidgin as their first language
How many languages are there in Papua New Guinea?
839 known languages. The most linguistically diverse country in the world.
Heritage language
A language that is not the dominant language in the society in which somebody lives, yet is the one which is spoken at home
Perhaps heritage languages are used as a desire to assimilate, to maintain cultural roots or to communicate with older relatives
Ethnolect
A variety of language that is associated with a particular social group. They are not fixed or restrictive, instead they are fluid.
Ethnolinguistic repertoire
A set of linguistic resources that are available to be used by individual speakers in order to signal their ethnic identity
Viv Edwards (1986): Jamaican English in West Midlands
The West Indian language issue in British schools, language - the creole spoken by the students - was singled out as an important factor disadvantaging Caribbean children in British schools. The study cites negative attitudes of teachers towards any non-standard variety.
Mark Sebba (1993): London Jamaican
Second generation speakers of creole in London in the 1980s were conscious that they could not pass for natives when in the Caribbean, but could nevertheless claim to be authentic ‘Black British’ by virtue of commanding both the local British vernacular and a local version of Jamaican cerole
Janet Holmes (2013)
When people routinely use more than one language in daily life, they generally code-switch
Speakers don’t need to be proficient speakers of the second language to make use of specific words and phrases that signal their ethnic identity to others
Multi-ethnolect
A collection of linguistic resources combining features from a variety of languages within a multi-ethnic, multicultural context
Does a multi-ethnolect belong to a particular ethnic group?
No, it is available to be used by everyone
BBE
British Black English which is a form of many members of Britain’s Caribbean heritage community. This combines elements of standard British English with creole forms. This varies between regions within the UK
MLE
Multicultural London English. This has been identified more recently by Cheshire et al (2008) predominantly among young people in London’s inner city. Now this appears to have spread further around the UK
Does MLE have a uniform set of features?
No
Vocabulary - MLE
‘Bare’ (a lot/very)
‘Beef’ (disagreement/conflict)
Phonology - MLE
- The diphthong vowel sounds of words such as ‘face’ and ‘like’ pronounced as /fes/ and /la:k/
- Don’t drop the h’s (unlike Cockney) e.g. ‘I’m Heading to the House’
- TH stopping - ‘TH’ sound replaced with a /t/ or /d/ e.g. ‘Thing’ becomes ‘ting’ or ‘brother’ becomes ‘brudder’
What is a phonological feature of MLE that is also apparent in the Cockney accent?
Th fronting
Grammatical feature of MLE
‘Dem’ as a plural marker (as in ‘man dem’ for ‘men’ and ‘boy dem’ for ‘the police’)
Discourse features of MLE
‘Innit’ as a tag question
‘You get me’ as a confirmation
Gary Ives Bradford Study - 2014
- Bradford Asian English
- 95% Pakistani backgrounds
- Majority from Mirpuri - large city surrounded by villages and farmland
- A more specific ethnic community
Quotes from the teenage boys in the Bradford study
‘We use language so people don’t know what we’re saying’
‘We are different to ‘freshies’ they’re born in Pakistan’
‘We mix punjabi and English’
Teenage girl contrast to Bradford boys
A teenage girl of Indian origin in a contrasting study claimed to never mix English with her second language (Gujarati)
She felt this was because at school she is in the minority
Teachers - Bradford study
Two teachers of Pakistani heritage confirmed that code-switching takes place and that Punjabi is included in their everyday talk. This is important due to the many students of Pakistani heritage in the school
Gary Ives - London 2014
- Differed from Bradford
- A wide range of ethnic, religious and cultural backgrounds
- % of EAL students is significantly above national average
- Highest proportion are from an Afro-Caribbean background
Code mixing
The inclusion of words and phrases from one language in another
Linguistic appropriacy
The way in which language choices reflect ideas about what is appropriate for any given context
How have creoles historically been perceived?
‘Broken’ or ‘incorrect’ English
What are ‘Jafaican’ (fake Jamaican) and ‘ghetto grammar’ said to be associated with?
Gangs, violence and poor education
