world english Flashcards
Three Circles Model (Kachru)
describes the spread of English in terms of three concentric circles:
- the Inner Circle: where English is used as a first language, acquired from birth by most
- the Outer Circle: includes countries colonised by Britain and the USA where English is spoken as a second language and plays an important historical and governmental role
- the Expanding Circle: where English is not an official language, but is recognised as important as a foreign language, perhaps for trade
the model has been criticised for being oversimplistic and too geographically bound. In a globalised world, it is becoming increasingly challenging to define people and the languages they speak in this way.
ENL ESL EFL
ENL: English as a Native Language eg. most speakers in the UK, USA, Australia
ESL: English as a Second Language eg. many speakers in Nigeria, India, Singapore
EFL: English as a Foreign Language eg. some speakers in Japan, China, Spain
Lingua Franca:
a common language used for communication between groups of people who speak different first (native) languages; often used in the ‘Expanding Circle’
Key characteristics of a lingua franca (Jenkins):
allows for non ENL/ESL communication;
alternative to EFL as a functional tool;
includes local innovations;
depends on specific context;
used for description for the purpose of codification
Globish (Nerriere):
a highly simplified and unidiomatic variety of English employed as a lingua franca, using a subset of Standard English grammar, and a list of 1500 English words
Critics of Globish either feel that its codifications are not sufficiently clearly rendered, or that an artificial language is preferable to any natural one.
Norm-providing:
Inner Circle variety already codified; often looked to for guidance
such as Standard English
Lowth Grammar - multiple negation, difference between pronouns
But not even English follow- many regional dialects use non standard form + teens
Norm-developing:
very established Outer Circle English, diverging from that originally distributed
eg Indian English just developed a dictionary
Norm-dependent:
Expanding Circle variety, looking to Inner (or even Outer) Circle for guidance
Distribution vs. spread (Widdowson):
English was ‘distributed’ around the world (mostly to colonies of the British Empire) in a controlled manner, with Standard forms preserved. English today ‘spreads’ naturally around the globe, uncontrolled and mixing with local languages
Linguistic Imperialism (Phillipson):
the dominance asserted and retained by the establishment of structural and cultural inequalities between English and other languages; language transfer as a demonstration of power
Exonormativity:
: upholding British Standard English and RP accent as standards in postcolonial nations
Endonormativity:
the acceptance of educated local forms of English as a standard, especially for teaching
Gatekeeping:
A ‘gatekeeper’ decides which information will go forward and enter the system. In language distribution, this is selection of (standard) variety, usually for use in a colony
Dynamic Model of the Evolution of Postcolonial Englishes (Schneider):
1 Foundation: English is newly distributed
2 Exonormative Stabilisation: close modelling on British standard forms - Australian English
3 Nativisation: coupling of standard and indigenous varieties - Indian English
4 Endonormative Stabilisation: local variety of English becomes accepted as the norm
5 Differentiation: new variety reflects local identity and culture - American English
However, stops too early - one may say American English has passed stage 5 and has overt prestige due to influence over the media and its large population
such as the colloquial slang “rizz”, a non-standard abbreviation of the abstract noun “charisma” which originated in America but through social media has seen popularity across the world and has been codified by its inclusion in the Oxford Dictionary, even being their 2023 word of the year.
Indigenisation
When English becomes localised to suit the particular needs of indigenous people, fulfilling important local functions, developing local forms and characteristics
Glocalisation:
transformations and localisations of English; dialectal variation brought about by language globalisation
Pidgin:
auxiliary language that has come into existence through attempts by speakers of two different languages to communicate; primarily a simplified form of one of the languages, with reduced vocabulary and grammar
Creole:
a complete language with wide vocabulary and developed grammar, evolved from a pidgin; used in a community and acquired by children as their native language. Creoles may have several levels: - Acrolect: closest to the standard form of a language
- Mesolect: significant differences between creole variety and the standard form - Basilect: creole variety furthest from the standard language
Creolisation:
Decreolisation:
the process of a pidgin developing into a creole
the process of a creole developing into the standard version of the primary source
Language ecology:
the study of languages in relation to one another and to various social factors
Language preservation:
efforts to prevent language death
‘Right place, right time’ (Crystal):
English has not become the world’s leading language for ‘beauty or simplicity’, but for three contextual reasons:
- English was distributed around the world as the language of the British Empire
- It was the language of the industrial revolution , technological innovation and western science
- It is the language of the USA, the world’s remaining superpower
Ethnic neutrality:
English adopted for official/political functions in (often young) nations as it is not associated with one particular ethnic group, treating the population equally
Functional nativeness:
when speakers use mostly or only English in their daily lives, rather than the indigenous language acquired from birth
Language mixing:
English may not replace an indigenous variety, instead fusing with local language habits, contributing to the growth of cultural hybridity
American English
The first settlers in America in the 1600’s brought their language with them. Changes that took place in British English did not occur in America.
Eg abstract noun “fall” for Autumn, “fall was used in Britain up to the 17th century
similarly common noun “trash” was used by shakespeare
After the Civil war, many Americans wanted to seperate themselves from British in language. One of these individuals - Webster beleived Americans should learn from American books thus wrote “The American Dictionary of the English Language”.
Webster believed that British spelling rules were too complex and thus worked to establish a more phonetic American version of the English Lang
Eg “centre” spelt “center”, “honour” spelt “honor”
Webster claimed such changes would make it easier for immigrants to learn
George Bernard Shaw
“Britain and America and two countries separated by the same language”
Indian English
Largest amount of L2 speakers in the world
The use of English is increasingly associated with social mobility - used for work or education
At the highest social level, British Standard English forms are found, however younger population are less inclined to speak British English due to its colonial ties.
Increasingly, Indian English is becoming indigenised/ nativised. Indian English has adopted some local language patterns, such as its intonation and some words/expressions.
British English is stress timed whilst Indian English is syllable timed
Indian English grammar examples
Addition of the inflectional bound morpheme -s plural onto non-countable nouns thus regularising non-countable nouns so that they are more straight forward - economy of progress
“He gathered woods for the fire” “Litters should not be thrown in the street”
Adding progressive aspect by the inflectional bound morpheme -ing on stative verbs (regularisation)
“I am understanding it”
“She is knowing the answer”
Preposition variation -
“discuss about” “pay attention on”
Prepositions not really codified
Singlish
Singapore became colonies by Britain in 1819
By 1980s all education was English, Singlish probably grew for the playground.
For many Singaporeans, singlish is a badge of identity as it includes the presence of many other languages in Asia and many people can code-switch between Standard English and Singlish
Singapore English Lexis
“bodoh” (from Malay) - meaning the dysphemistic noun “idiot”
“kaypoh” (from Cantonese) - meaning the colloquial noun “ busybody”
Examples of lexical borrowing from horizontal integration form a language in the covert prestige
Features of English and a Lingua Franca
Omission of third person agreement morphemes such as the verb phrases “he jump” “she walk”
Impersonal relative pronoun “which” used to post modify a personal head noun - The boy, which was seven, went home.
Omission of definite and indefinite article determiners - “The” “an”
