LANGUAGE
Language Introduction
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Language is critical because it’s the
means by which other cultural values
are communicated
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United Nations 6 official languages:
 Russian
 French
 Chinese
Spanish
English
Arabic
Discussion Prompt:
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Thirty U.S. states have passed laws
mandating English as the language of all
government functions. Should the use of
English be encouraged in the United States
to foster cultural integration, or should
bilingualism be encouraged to foster cultural
diversity?
Dialects of English
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Dialects: regional variation of a
language distinguished by distinctive
vocabulary, spelling, and pronunciation
 Ex: Southerners say ya’ll, Australians say
“mate”
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American and British English = different
dialects
 Differ because of isolation – evolved
independently during 18th and 19th C
Dialects of English – cont’d
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Noah Webster created 1st American
dictionary, wanted unique American
dialect to increase national pride
Dialects of English – Con’t
Webster…….
 Ex: substituted “s” for “c” in many words
(“defence” to “defense”)
 Ex: eliminated “u” from words like “honour”
and “colour”
 Changed pronunciation
Dialects of English – cont’d
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Dialects within the US – existed
originally because of differences in
dialects among original settlers
 Dialects continue today mostly in the east
(especially in the South and New England)
 Isogloss: word usage boundary for any word
not used nationally (ex: pop, ya’ll, hoagie)
 Dialects become less prominent because of
mobility
Soda v. Pop Dialect
Examples of Regional Vocabulary
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ALLIGATOR PEAR An avocado in New Orleans.
BETTY A beauty in Los Angeles.
BUBBLER A drinking fountain in Wisconsin.
BUGGY A shopping cart in the South.
BULKIE A sandwich roll in Boston.
CABINET A milkshake in Rhode Island.
FRAPPE A milkshake in Boston.
GAPER'S BLOCK A traffic jam because of rubbernecking in Chicago.
GOOBER A peanut in the South.
HOT DISH A casserole in Wisconsin and Minnesota.
IRON DOG A snowmobile in Alaska.
JIMMIES Ice cream sprinkles in Boston.
KITTY-WAMPUS Cater-corner in Wisconsin.
NEB To nose into someone else's business in Pittsburgh.
PARTY BARN A drive-through liquor store in Texas.
POKE A bag in Pittsburgh.
ROTARY A traffic circle in New England.
SHOOTS O.K. in Hawaii.
SKROK To spit in Buffalo.
STAND ON LINE To stand in line in New York.
WALLERED Useless or wrecked in the Southwest.
WOOLIES Dustballs beneath your bed in Pennsylvania
Northern Virginia Vocabulary
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Are there any words that are used in
NOVA that may be unique?
Language Families
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All language belong to a family –
collection of many languages which
come from same original tongue, long
ago, before written history but have
since evolved with different
characteristics (i.e. have same ancestor)
Indo-European Family
I-E family = largest family…spoken by
over 50% of world
 Families divided into smaller branches
and groups
 I-E as 8 branches, 4 BIG ones
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 Germanic Branch: dominant in N and W
Europe (Swedish, Dutch, Danish, English,
Norwegian)
Indo-European Family – cont’d
 Indo-Iranian Branch: branch w/ most
speakers (over 100 lang spoken by over 1
bill people)
○ Indic (Eastern) Group: India, Pakistan,
Bangladesh (Hindi, Urdu)
○ Iranian (Western) Group: Iran, Afghanistan
(Persian, Kurdish, Pathan)
Indo-European Family – cont’d
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Balto Slavic Branch – Russian, Ukrainian,
Polish, Czech, Slovak, Bulgarian
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Romance Branch evolved from Latin
spoken by Romans 2,000 yrs ago.
Conquering Romans diffused their lang
through the empire. After fall of empire,
regions were isolated and lang developed
distinctly
Indo-Euro Lang Family Tree
Indo-Euro Family – most widely
diffused language
Pidgins and Creole Languages
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When 2 groups meet with different languages, a
new language with new characteristics of both
emerges.
 Pidgin: simplified form of lingua Franca (usually
forms as a simple trade language); no native
speakers; used for communication among
speakers of 2 diff. languages (i.e. hodge podge
combination - ex. African slaves)
 Creole: language combined between colonizers
and colonized/indigenous peoples - blended
○ Ex: French Creole in Haiti
Indo-European Ancestor?
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Called Proto-Indo-European – difficult to
prove because existed thousands of yrs
before written history. 2 theories….
 Kurgan Hearth: Russia/Kazakhstan, N. of
Black Sea, spread by nomadic herders
 Anatolian Hearth: present day Turkey –
spread by farmers
Other Lang Families
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Indo-European – 50%
Sino Tibetan – 20% (Chinese, Cantonese,
Thai)
Afro-Asiatic 5% - Middle East – Arabic,
Hebrew
Niger-Congo 5% - Africa (Africa – most
diverse languages…unknown #. Over
1,000 distinct lang and several thousand
dialects. Nigeria alone has over 200
distinct lang.
Austroneasean – 5% SE Asia
Dravidian 5% - parts of India
Global Language Families
Language Preservation
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Distribution of a language is a measure of
the fate of an ethnic group. Language
displays the 2 competing geographic
trends:
GLOBALIZATION
Versus
LOCAL DIVERSITY
Language Extinction
No longer in use by any living people
Thousands have become extinct over
history but process has accelerated in
recent past
 Colonialism in 18th and 19th C and
globalization of 20th C driven many lang to
extinction
 Ex: when Spanish arrive in Amazon found
over 500 lang. Today 57 survive, half of
which will die in next few yrs as elderly
speakers pass away
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Language Extinction – cont’d
Pressures of econ and social acculturation
responsible for today’s extinction (i.e.
adoption of cultural traits like lang by one
group under the influence of another)
 Lang extinction can lead to cultural
extinction: an entire culture obliterated by
war, disease, acculturation. When a
culture and its language disappear it takes
w/ it a tremendous amount of history
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Language Extinction
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“To lose my mother tongue would be like
being forced into language exile. I
would lose my family’s history and
culture.”
- James Jansen – director of “In Language We Live”
– documentary on extinct languages
Language Extinction
Language Revival
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Movements to revive near extinct language
 Parts of Scotland, Ireland, Wales – revive Celtic
 Hebrew revived after WW II when Israel became a
state. Hebrew made one of two official languages (with
Arabic). Due to the fact that Hebrew was used primarily
for religious services and was not commonly spoken.
 (Official language: all government business occurs in
this language – schools, documents, road signs, etc.)
Official Languages….
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Language given a unique status in the constitution
of countries
Government makes a declarative statement
Typically language used in nation’s legislative
bodies
Over half the countries in the world have official
languages
Some have one; others have more than one
USA doesn’t have an official language….should
we?
Official Languages
Multi Lingual States
Have multiple official languages – can
cause difficulty
 Belgium- Walloons in S speak French,
Flemings in N speak Flemish.
Language boundary sharply divides
country. Each region has own elected
assembly that runs their region and
often antagonism between the two.
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Multi Lingual States
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CANADA – French and English.
Quebec has had separatist movement in
past. Separation only voted down by
slim majority
Multi Lingual States
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Basques – Pyrenees mountains in N.
Spain, ETA – separatist movement –
engaged in terrorist attacks