Synchronic Language Change

Synchronic Language Change

Political Correctness

Political correctness is the avoidance of using language or forms of expression that excludes, marginalizes, or insults groups of people who are socially disadvantaged or discriminated against.


http://www.economist.com/style-guide/political-correctness: 'Coloured' is deemed as offensive in some cultures but is commonly used in South Africa for people of mixed race.


It is important in business and marketing not to insult or offend your audience or potential consumers; this can be linked to influential power and Fairclough's synthetic personalisation by using the language to address them specifically.


http://www.virginia.edu/woodson/courses/aas102%20%28spring%2001%29/articles/names/dubois.htm: Names are not merely matters of thought and reason; they are growths and habits. Some people are against the idea of political correctness as they believe that changing the word of something will not change the attitudes of it. For example in this text the writer says that if people are racist towards black people, calling them 'African' or 'coloured' instead of 'negroes' will not affect or change their attitudes towards them.


This can be linked to how words become offensive because they have 'pejorated' over time. e.g. 'gay' and 'spastic'.

Crystal Mark

Crystal Mark is a seal of approval to say a document is clearly written. Many businesses use it to ensure they are providing clear and reliable information.

Language Change Revision

Language Change Revision

Accents and Dialects

• Prejudice exists in language with accents and dialects and is seen as 'socially acceptable'.
• "Native speakers of English are generally at least bi-dialectal" - meaning they can switch between at least two dialects. This suggest they can apply these dialects in particular contexts to suit different audiences. E.g. A student wouldn't use their Essex dialect in a job interview.
• This is called code-switching according to context.
• Language changes according to societal attitudes.
• Slang lends covert prestige - tends to make you sound more 'down-to-earth' or more 'cool' and in particular occupations and situations this technique can be advantageous.
• Divergence - to speak differently to your audience by using language with either a higher social status or a lower social status than you.
• Convergence - to speak similarly to your audience by using language with either a higher social status or a lower social status than you.

Arguments For Banning Slang in Schools

• Head teacher of Ongar Academy head teacher, David Grant, says that students’ dialect "may not favourably reflect on them when they attend college and job interviews".
• Lindsay Johns: "Language is power". It affects what people think of us and accents give perceptions of us being uneducated.

Arguments Against Banning Slang in Schools

• "Because children are sensitive to how they’re perceived, stigmatising their everyday speech can be harmful" - links to Julia Snell's ideas about language.
• "Our dialect and language use are part of our identities, connecting us to time, place, community, and self-image."
• Michael Rosen: "There is no evidence that speaking using one type of slang prevents us from speaking using another."
• Michael Rosen: Banning language doesn't work. "Teachers have been trying to ban slang in schools for over 100 years."
• Stan Carey (writer for the guardian): Children should not be lead to believe that there is something inferior or shameful about their dialects.
• Julia Snell: "children may simply remain silent in order to avoid the shame of speaking ‘incorrectly’, and miss the interactions crucial to learning."

CLA Revision

CLA Revision

Noam Chomsky 

- Nativist - the capacity to acquire language is innate within humans.

- Human brain is programmed to acquire grammatical structures.

- LAD (language acquisition device)

Overextension

- Children overextend physical qualities of others and features such as shape, sound, taste, movement, size, textures.

Piaget

- Cognitive - Children develop their linguistic competence alongside their ability to understand the world around them.

-Will only acquire more complex forms if their intellectual development can cope.

- It will be unsuccessful to try and teach them things before they are ready.

Michael Halliday 

Functions of Speech: 

- Instrumental - to fulfil a need.

- Regulatory - to influence the behaviour of others. (influential power)

- Interactional - to build social relationships.

-Personal - conveying opinions, ideas and personal identity.

-Representational - facts and information.

- Imaginative - creating an imaginary world 

- Heuristic - to learn about their environment 

Jerome Bruner

- LASS (language acquisition support system) 

- The childs interaction with the adults around them helps them develop their language.

- Scaffolding - that adults gradually withdraw the support as their children's language skills develop.

Child Directed Speech 

-imperatives and interrogatives 

- higher pitch 

- repetition 

- present tense

- fewer verbs/modifiers

- concrete nouns

- yes/no questioning 

- one-word utterances 

- expansions or recasts 

Standardisation of the English Language

Standardisation of the English Language

• Dr. Samuel Jonhson published the most famous first extensive English dictionary published in 1755 and was the standardisation for spellings, definitions and meanings. The dictionary enlisted 40,000 words and took 8 years to compile.
• This dictionary made the Midlands accents the preferred way of writing and spelling and the dictionary was based on this accent.
• Now words and spellings were written and recorded so standardisation began.
• After the English dictionary was published, Lowth published grammar books in 1762 to meet the demand for 'politeness' and 'correct' English in a newly standardised society. This included standardised past participles.
• These grammar books were re-issued all the way up to 1800 so all became more aware of grammar rules and spellings.

Reasons Why Language Changes

Reasons Why Language Changes

• Neosemy is the process where we begin to use words in different ways and therefore develop new meanings.
• Meanings can also shift completely e.g. fond. - meaning now is to like something or to be affectionate but it used to mean foolish or silly. It has ameliorated.

Processes of Neosemy

• Generalisation/Broadening
• Specialising/Narrowing
• Amelioration
• Pejoration
• Weakening/Bleaching
• Metaphor
• Euphemism
• Polysemy - words that acquire many possible meanings that coexist with the original.

What Affects Language Change

External factors:

• Cultural Changes
• Technological Innovation e.g. virus, bug, crash, windows
• Social Convention e.g. LGBT
• 
  

Language Change - Periods of English

Language Change

Periods of English

• Old English - 5th Century

English developed from the Angles, Jutes and Saxons (Anglo-Saxons). Vocabulary was drawn from Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse. Latin was very influential and was highly regarded as 'upper-class'. Dialects developed from different areas of settlement. Little consistency with written language as this was before standardisation.

• Middle English - 11th Century

Norman Invasion was a significant event and French became the language of the court and administration. Latin remained in written documentation and in the church. Writers such as 'Chaucer' chose to write in English rather than French and this was where English came to prominence.

• Early Modern English - 15th Century

Caxton introduced printing press, which helped to standardise the English language. The South-East dialect was the basis for the standard form. There became a growing interest in using English. Shakespeare produced his work in English and James I commissioned the first Authorised version of the Bible in English.


In this period, Samuel Johnson's dictionary was published. It took just over 8 years to compile and
listed 40,000 words. This is what led to the standardisation of the English Language.

• Modern English - 18th Century

English language grew at an incredible rate and it had borrowed words from lots of other languages like Latin and Greek. The grammar and structure of the language began to develop in the patterns that people used language. There then became standard ways of writing and speaking.

• Present-Day English - 20th Century

English has developed through influences like technology, media and travel and English has become the international language.

CLA - Research Task

CLA Research Task

1) CLA developmental phases in correct order: Cooing, Babbling, Holophrastic, Two-word, Telegraphic, Post-Telegraphic.

2) A - Nativist -> N. Chomsky

    B - Cognitive -> J. Piaget

    C - Behaviourist -> B.F. Skinner

    D - Interactional -> J. Bruner

    E - Critical Period -> E. Lenneberg 

3) This process is 'overextension' by analogy. The child sees similar shapes to the orange and uses the term by overextension to include the orange in the term.

4) This is called 'underextension'. This is because the child does not know the word 'shoes' is a hypernym and can be applied to other shoes. Cannot relate the term to a similar item. 

5) This process is called 'overgeneralisation', when the child applies the general rule to an irregular verb. This term supports Chomsky's LAD theory.

6) Telegraphic stage - child has used subject verb but has missed out the copular verb 'is' and the preposition 'to'.

7) The child is using the first person object pronoun 'me' instead of the first person subject pronoun 'I'.

8) Substitution - child is replacing the 'ch' for a simpler sound 't'. But could also be seen as consonant cluster reduction as the child might have found it difficult to pronounce the 'ch' sound therefore it is reduced to a smaller unit.

9) Deletion - leaving out last consonant, child cannot recognise that they are not pronouncing.

10) Deletion of unstressed syllables - removal of 'ba', difficult to pronounce polysyllabic lexis.

11) Instrumental - expresses needs and wants e.g. 'want juice'.

Regulatory - to give commands 'lift me up'.

Interactional - to create interactions 'bye bye'.

Personal - to express thoughts, likes, dislikes and opinions e.g. 'I don't like fruit'

Imaginative - to create imaginary words or thoughts 

Heuristic - to seek information 'what are you doing?'

Informative - to relay information - 'we had beef for dinner'

12) Jean Berko - using a made up animal tested application of the children of the '-s' plural rule and found nearly all applied it to a noun they've never heard before.

13) nouns - most common items around a child and easily understood as they can see them

14) equal so as if the child is a full participant, and teaching a child a Q&A style conversation.

15) CDS- stress of pronunciation on particular morphemes, interrogatives, imperatives, simplified grammar, tag q's & turn taking, paralinguistic.

16) A girl named the 'wild child'. She could not speak or communicate as she was locked in a room for 12 years and wasn't interacted with. Her case proves Lenneberg's 'critical period' and Bruner's 'interaction' theory.

17) Jim was born to deaf parents and placed in front of a tv in hope that he would pick up language from there but he didn't. Supports interaction theory (Bruner).

18) David Crystal, Jean Aitchison, Noam Chomsky.

19) Language Acquisition Device. 

20) Determiners, Auxiliary Verbs.