Rosa Gomes
Apling 623
Week 5 Sharma, Devyani Critique
09-23-12
This article written by Devyani Sharma is a study of non-native varieties of
English (NNVEs) specifically amongst first generation adult Indian immigrants in
the United States. They all acquired different degrees of English in India. Like other
countries around the world English was introduced to India by their colonizer.
Sharma explains that “Colonial rule established as primary medium of higher
education, law, media, and bureaucracy in India, and while Hindi and vernacular
languages have reclaimed portions of these domains, English continues to dominate
many of them (Mehrota 1998).” (Pg. 195) Sharma doesn’t spend much time giving
the reader a description about India’s history with the colonizer (assuming the
reader already knows) and the effect of these socialhistorcal factors have had on the
development of the language. The social characteristics that she does take into
account are the participants’ first language, English education, daily use, how many
years in the U.S., age, sex, and occupation. These factors are what she bases this
linguistic analysis.
According to Yamuna Kachru finding 20 years ago, majority of English users
favored a British model of English. Although, in (1991) findings by Anju Sahgal
suggests that among Indians they use ‘Ordinary Indian English’ accents over British
or American English. The first part of her study distinguishes between second
language learning features and emergent dialect features. Sharma adds that one of
the motivations of the study concerns the social reality of the variety for its
speakers. Like creoles and non-standard native dialects of English they are subject
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to stigma and covert prestige. (Pg. 197) This plays a role in the types and the degree
of stabilization that takes place. Sharma used first generation Indian immigrants to
be able to learn about their dialect identity. She states, “ This permits a
consideration of the speakers’ linguistic self-image and their dialectal response to
recent contact with a native variety, which potentially reflects their degree of
confidence in the acceptability or value of their own variety.”(Pg. 197) According to
the interviews done in this study, the Indians seem to take pride in the variety that
they speak and not having the need to conform to U.S. standard English.
Sharma explains that NNVEs posses a sociolinguistic problem because it
cannot be looked at as second language nor native variation (dialects). Sharma
writes, “Sridhar and Sridhar (1992) point to the absence of native target,
heterogeneous modes of transmission among non-native speakers, and stable,
functional role for English in a multilingual setting.” (Pg. 196) She also mentions that
Fisherman (1967) considers English in India to be a case of diglossia without
bilingualism, arguing that access to English is reserved for urban elites; at present,
English use has spread somewhat more broadly across domains of use and one
might argue that English in some parts of India is moving towards diglossia with
bilingualism.” (Pg. 196)
Sharma uses figures and tables to show a linguistic analysis to help break
down the regularities of Indian English and its status as a non-native variety.
Sharma notes “Together, English education and English use can be said to represent
proficiency level of a speaker, as education reflects formal learning and daily
functional use reflects informal modes of acquisition.”(Pg.205) Regardless of how
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much time spent in the U.S. in contact with the native variety of English didn’t have a
big impact on levels of non-standardness. In choosing a particular variant Sharma
explains, “Proficiency could potentially govern the choice among variants: on the
one hand, we might hypothesize that lower proficiency in English leads to lower
confidence on one’s dialect, resulting in greater adoption of American English
variants by less proficient Indian English speaker,” (Pg. 208) Although proficiency
may guide the choice, but I think regardless the proficiency level, not to adopt the
U.S. English could very well be a choice because of the speakers pride or identity
with Indian English. Sharma continues to explain that beyond proficiency there is
also the social dimension of dialect stabilization. “Awareness of dialect differences
may not lead to immediate adoption of American variants simply to the degree that
proficiency permits, but may instead lead to style-shifting based on the network ties
and group affiliation or distance.” (Pg.207) Even though they are in contact with
other dialects among native speakers they adapt to new feature could depend on the
positive or negative connection they may create.
Sharma shares a recognizable pattern of stylistically governed phonological
variation and proficiency-based syntactic variation. (Pg. 219) In the study it shows
that the India English speakers use two distinct linguistic spaces at the same time in
their interviews. The American English speech community alongside a more
particularized Indian identity. Sharma notes that, “A division of labor on terms of
types of variation within the linguistic system, such that some morphosyntactic
features signal education and proficiency while certain phonological variants can
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express allegiance and identity, is one solution to resolving these competing goals.”
(Pg. 219)
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