Language Diversity - Ethnicity Flashcards
Early research into language and ethnicity in the UK was conducted by who in 1990?
Sebba’s 1990’s study into the Catford Girls
What did Sebba find?
young girls who were born in London, but had jamaican parents, had adopted a new dialect of English, which he called London Jamaican.
What did Sebba find?
young girls who were born in London, but had jamaican parents, had adopted a new dialect of English, which he called London Jamaican.
What influenced this accent?
(what did it include?)
grammatical, phonological and lexical influences from RP, Cockney and Creole
Give an example of a word in London Jamaican:
For example, he found that the preposition ‘with’ was pronounced in a variety of different ways by these girls, such as the /th/ sound from RP, the /v/ sound from Cockney, and the /d/ sound from Creole.
What did Sebba’s Research demonstrate?
Sebba’s research demonstrated that the speakers of this dialect could code-switch appropriately and that linguistic identity is fluid rather than fixed and that different variations of language can be created.
What did Sebba’s Research demonstrate?
Sebba’s research demonstrated that the speakers of this dialect could code-switch appropriately and that linguistic identity is fluid rather than fixed and that different variations of language can be created.
who found that ethnicity had an impact on language use but suggests that this impact has influenced young people beyond their ethnicities
Sue Fox
What did Fox’s Research involve?
young people across the whole of London and therefore gathered wider information about different ethnic communities, rather than just jamaican
What did Fox term this variation of ethnic communities in London?
Multiculral London English
What did Fox say Multi Cultral London English had?
it had strong characteristics of of a variety of cultures and languages, notably West Indian, West African, and Bangladeshi
Give an example of a MLE feature:
Speakers of this dialect often use the -dem suffix as a plural marker, which is a grammatical feature that comes from Jamaican Creole.
What does recent research about MLE propose?
it suggests that the MLE dialect is the fastest growing dialect and will be the dominant dialect that Brits will all be speaking in some form within the next 50 years.
What do prescriptivists say about ethnicity and language?
suggest that the popularity of the MLE dialect renders young people unintelligible
Give an example of a prescriptivist’s viewpoingt
For example Lynsey Johns, whose Evening Standard article entitled Ghetto grammar robs the young of a proper voice, stated that “speaking streed Patois is a spectacular own goal” and “their street slang makes them sound stupid and uneducated”.