AP Human Geography
Language lecture notes
Language: The What, the Where, the Why
What is a language?
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Definition (De Blij, 2009): A set of ________________ and __________________ that is used for communication.
When do you know you have a language?
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___________________ (people who study languages) debate this a lot, but a good rule is that if people
can understand each other when speaking (____________________ ___________________), we have
a language.
Standard and Dialects
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Languages are ______________________ (they can and do _________________________)
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New words are added all the time.
▪
What would we call new inventions if we couldn’t add new words?

People ___________________________ words differently in different places.
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____________________ words are used to describe the ___________________ idea/item.
Standard Language

Because of the fact languages are dynamic and word choices vary from place to place, some societies have a
standard language, the version that is _______________ ________________ and used for publishing.
Who actually uses a standard language?

Probably no one. We all have our own variants of the language, called _______________________.

Different dialects use different ______________________, ___________________________, and pace, but are still
part of the same language.
Dialect chains
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The closer two dialects are in space, the more _____________________ they are.

The farther away, the more the users of the dialects struggle to understand each other.
An __________________________ is a boundary of a dialect feature. They aren’t perfect, but they might help us
figure out where language culture changes.
Why are languages spoken where they are?

Just like you, languages have a “_________________________ _______________________.”
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The largest “limb” of the tree is called the language _______________________________.

Major languages we are familiar with (English/Spanish) come from the “______________________________________” language family.
If we’re part of the same family, why do we speak different languages? 2 theories
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______________________ THEORY
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Speakers of one language/language family overpowered other languages and POOF, a language spread
(diffused)

________________________ THEORY

As __________________ spread out, non-farming societies did not change their language, but were gradually
taken over by those farmers.
What causes one language to become another?
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Language divergence (language separation)

When people are far apart and don’t __________________________ (as was the case in most of human
history), a language suffers.

It becomes __________________________, and then the _____________________ become so separate
they become different languages.
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Language convergence (language combination)

As groups of people who didn’t interact start to interact, the separate languages may become ______________.
Lingua franca, pidgin, and Creole

Lingua franca: a language used by people who speak different languages for _________________________,
_____________________, and __________________________.
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Pidgin language: Two or more languages in close contact _______________________ parts of each and
_________________________ the rules and vocabulary
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Creole language: A _______________________________ ________________________ that has developed a
more complex structure and vocabulary AND has become the _____________________ language of a group of
people.