LANE 422 SOCIOLINGUISTICS

1
LANE 422 SOCIOLINGUISTICS

• Summarized from
• SOCIOLINGUISTICS
• An Introduction to Language and Society
• Peter Trudgill
• 4th edition. 2000,
• Prepared by
• Dr. Abdullah S. Al-Shehri

2
Chapter 7

• Language and Nation

3
The Problem of Multilingualism

• In many speech communities around the world, many
  people are either bilingual or multilingual (i.e.
  they could speak two or more languages with a
  fair degree of fluency).
• This of course is a consequence of the fact that
  the society in which they live is a multilingual
  society.
• Societal multilingualism is a very widespread
  phenomenon.
• On a world scale, multilingualism is the rule
  rather than the exception.
• The vast majority of the nations of the world
  have more than one language spoken indigenously
  within their frontiers.
• In some cases, the number of languages spoken in
  one country may rise into the hundreds.

4
Multilingual Nations

• Multilingual nations exist in all parts of the
  world, and very many examples could be cited.
• Difficulties only arise when one attempts to
  locate a country that is genuinely monolingual.
• Most people would accept as true statements to
  the effect that Germans speak German, and French
  speak French, and so on.
• There are good reasons for this, but the reality
  of the matter is somewhat different.
• Nearly all European countries contain indigenous
  linguistic minorities. Iceland is the only
  exception.
• In some cases, where the minority is large, the
  nation-state usually has more than one official
  language. Examples are Belgium (Dutch/Flemish and
  French), Switzerland (German, French, Italian and
  Romansch), and Finland (Finnish and Swedish).
• In other cases, where the minority is smaller or
  less influential, the minority language or
  languages are unlikely to have official status,
  and their speakers, out of necessity, will tend
  to be bilingual. This is what helps to give
  Europe its outwardly monolingual appearance.

5
Language Minorities and the Problem of
Multilingualism

• Nearly all European nations are multilingual to a
  certain extent.
• Perhaps the most multilingual of all the
  countries in Europe is Romania, where in addition
  to the majority Rumanian language at least
  fourteen other languages are spoken natively in
  the country.
• Multilingualism on this scale clearly brings
  problems for governments and others concerned
  with national organizations of various kinds.
• Multilingualism on any scale brings with it
  problems for individuals and groups alike,
  especially those who are members of linguistic
  minorities.
• Unlike members of the majority-language groups,
  minority group members have to acquire
  proficiency in at least two languages before they
  can function as full members of the national
  community in which they live education being
  the biggest problem they have to face.

6
The problem of Language Minority and How it has
been Treated in Some Parts of the World

• Members of a language minority, especially
  children, may be faced with very considerable
  difficulties.
• This may occur where the two languages involved
  are not closely related and also, more
  importantly, where the educational policy of a
  particular nation is to discourage, or simply
  ignore, minority languages.
• In extreme cases the minority language may be
  forbidden or disapproved of in school, and
  children punished or actively discouraged from
  using it there.
• This was formerly true both of Welsh in Wales and
  Gaelic in Scotland, and was for many years the
  policy of the Turkish government concerning
  Kurdish.
• One language which has received particularly bad
  treatment and no attention in Europe is Romany,
  the originally north-Indian language of the
  Gypsies.

7
Language is a Symbol of Group Identity

• Perhaps the biggest threat for a multilingual
  nations national unity comes from the fact that
  language acts as a symbol of group identity.
• Where language is a defining characteristic of a
  minority ethnic group wanting independence,
  particularly where other characteristics are not
  significant, linguistic factors are likely to
  play an important role in any separatist
  movement.
• This is a result of the fact that language acts
  as an important symbol of group consciousness and
  solidarity.
• To preserve national unity of multilingual
  nations, where minority language may be used for
  political reasons, the state can overcome or
  minimized this problem either through granting
  some political independence to linguistic
  minorities or, less drastically, through adequate
  and fair educational programs and policies.

8
More on multilingualism as a Problem for National
Governments

• Many governments regrettably regard as a problem
  the fact that language can act as a focus of
  discontent for minorities wanting more power,
  independence, or annexation by a neighboring
  state.
• Where governments do not regard this as
  threatening or undesirable, they may well regard
  linguistic minorities benevolently, or simply
  ignore them.
• In cases where governments regard linguistic
  minorities as potentially subversive, they may
  react very differently and foolishly fail to
  perceive that if minority language communities
  are well treated, especially in education, they
  will be less likely to become dissatisfied.
• Nevertheless, these governments fears, from
  their own illiberal and centralist point of view,
  may often be justified language loyalty can be a
  powerful weapon, and has often been manipulated
  to political advantage.

9
Examples from Europe

• Sometimes, a repressed or discouraged minority
  language is also the language of a possibly
  antagonistic state.
• This has been true of Macedonian in Greece,
  Slovenian in Italy, and German in France and
  Italy.
• The fear is that language loyalty may prove to be
  stronger than national loyalty.
• One particular European language which has had a
  history of oppression for reasons of this kind is
  Catalan.
• Catalan is a Romance language which is about as
  closely related to French as it is to Spanish. It
  has approximately seven million speakers in Spain
  in Catalonia, Valencia and the Balearic Islands
  as well as about 250,000 in Roussillon in
  France, and a very small group in Sardinia.

10
More on the Catalan Problem

• Catalonian was the official, administrative
  written language in Catalonia until that area was
  annexed by Castile at the beginning of the
  eighteenth century.
• Subsequently, Spanish was introduced by
  government decree in former Catalan schools.
• In 1856, a law was passed which stated that all
  political documents and legal contract were to be
  in Spanish.
• Liberalization of this policy took place under
  the Spanish Republic, from 1931 to 1939, and
  children were being taught again in Catalan to
  begin their education in Spanish later at the age
  of ten.
• However, under the Franco dictatorship Catalan
  was once again banned completely from schools,
  and Chairs of Catalan language and literature at
  the University of Barcelona were abolished.
• Franco government was clearly concerned about
  what it regarded as separatist tendencies.
• In the later years of the Franco regime the
  situation of Catalan was somewhat relaxed.
• In the democratization of Spain in the 1970s, the
  situation has changed very significantly. Catalan
  has returned to the domains, in the media and in
  education, from which it had been banished.

11
Language and National Unity

• As we saw earlier, language can be a strong
  signal of group identity, and anybody attempting
  to create a unified nation-state will find any
  signaling of a different identity undesirable or
  dangerous.
• Linguistic subjugation (or unification) is
  therefore an important strategy in implementing
  political subjugation (or unification).
• The activities of governments, having to do with
  language, can be described as instances of
  language planning.
• In very many cases activities of this kind can be
  regarded as both necessary and commendable for
  example in countries which are faced with the
  problem of having to select a national language
  or languages and, subsequently, of developing and
  standardizing it/them.
• This type of language planning, which decides
  which role is to be played by which language, is
  known as status planning.

12
Lingua franca as a Solution to Multilingualism

• Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, is a very
  multilingual area where language problems have
  been exacerbated because colonial powers drew
  national frontiers without regard for the
  geographical distribution of ethnic or linguistic
  groups.
• Communication problems in areas like these are
  not necessarily so serious as one might think.
• In many areas of Sub-Saharan Africa people who
  belong to different ethnic or linguistic groups
  are able to communicate with each other quite
  easily.
• This is because they are also usually familiar
  with other more widely spoken languages such as
  Swahili in East Africa, Hausa in West Africa,
  English or French.
• Such languages function in such multilingual
  communities as lingua francas.

13
A Lingua Franca is..

• A language which is used as a means of
  communication among people who have no native
  language in common.
• Some of the languages which are used in this way
  in Africa, like English and French, are not
  indigenous to the area in question and are often
  learned through formal education.
• Many African lingua francas, though, are
  indigenous, and many have come to be used as such
  because of the political dominance of their
  native speakers, or because they were the
  language of prominent traders in the area, like
  Swahili in East Africa.

14
In West Africa..

• One of the most important lingua francas which is
  still used for trading purposes is Hausa.
• Hausa is an Afro-Asiatic language spoken
  originally in the region of Lake Chad in
  north-central Africa, but it has become so widely
  known that it is used for trading and other
  purposes by many millions of speakers in areas
  such as Ghana, Nigeria and Dahomey.

15
Historically..

• Many languages have spread as lingua francas in
  the past, only to contract again for reasons of
  economics or politics.
• Greek, for example, became a lingua franca in the
  ancient world as a result, initially, of
  Alexanders military conquests, and was one time
  used widely from Turkey to Portugal.
• Latin was later used as a lingua franca in the
  western world, mainly as a result of the
  expansion of the Roman Empire, and later survive
  as such, in spite of the fact that it had no
  native speakers, for many centuries.
• The original lingua franca, from which the term
  is derived, was a form of the Provençal language
  that was used as a lingua franca by the
  multilingual crusaders.

16
Deciding on a National and/or an Official
language for Multilingual Nations

• When governments are presented with the problem
  of selecting a national or an official language
  or languages, as many new nations have been,
  lingua francas are very useful.
• There are clear advantages to be gained from the
  selection of a language which many people already
  understand.
• In some cases, though, complications may arise
  because competing or alternative lingua francas
  are available.

17
In India..

• There are over 300 native languages.
• Hindi, for example, is used as a lingua franca in
  much of the northern part of the country.
• Hindi has an advantage, being an indigenous
  language, but it also has a disadvantage of
  benefiting its native speakers while other
  indigenous groups still have to learn it as a
  second language.
• English, on the other hand, operates as a lingua
  franca throughout the country, though tends to be
  used only by relatively educated speakers.
• As a solution, English has been selected to be
  the official language of the nation while Hindi
  and other native languages are regarded as
  national languages of India.

18
In Malaysia..

• A federation was formed in 1963 with a population
  of only ten million, but with a linguistic
  situation that was very complex.
• Malay is the native language of perhaps 30 per
  cent of the population.
• Another 30 per cent speak one of twelve different
  Chinese languages.
• Roughly 10 per cent speak various Indian
  languages.
• The rest speak varieties of Portuguese, Thai and
  several aboriginal languages.
• English is a lingua franca for many of the
  educated.
• The sociolinguistic problem is further
  complicated by the languages which are used as
  the medium of instruction in schools Malay,
  Tamil, Mandarin, Arabic and English are all used
  as languages of instruction in Malaysia.
• There is therefore clearly a problem in Malaysia
  as to which language should be selected to act as
  the national language.

19
More on the Malaysian Situation

• Malay is the most widely understood lingua franca
  and therefore would be suitable as a national
  language.
• But, Malays are politically dominant in the
  country and attempts to make Malay the sole
  official language might cause resentment among
  the Chinese and Indians.
• English on the other hand cannot be claimed to be
  in any sense a national language, but it is the
  most popular educational medium, for what are
  largely economic reasons.
• This problem has as yet not really been solved,
  but while group identity plays an important part
  in maintaining language loyalty towards languages
  like Tamil, these community languages appear to
  be gradually ceding in importance to Malay (for
  reasons of national loyalty) and to English (for
  reasons of international economics) in more
  official functions and circumstances.
• Government policy appears to be in the direction
  of strengthening both Malay and English as
  official languages of Malaysia.

20
Further Solution to Global Multilingualism

• A further solution has sometimes been advocated
  for solving the world communication problems.
• This solution is that an artificial language such
  as Esperanto should be adopted as a lingua
  franca.
• Supporters of Esperanto would like to see it used
  as a world-wide lingua franca in order to solve
  the problem of international multilingualism.
• However, it is very unlikely that any nation
  would want to adopt Esperanto because of the
  practical problems involved.

21
Why Esperanto is Unfitas an International
Language

• Although it is easier to learn than natural
  languages, Esperanto may not be suitable as an
  International language.
• Esperanto is clearly based on European-type
  languages, and would therefore benefit native
  speakers of European languages only.
• There are as yet no real signs of Esperanto
  making very great headway as a solution to
  international communication problem.
• For now, English seems to serve that purpose
  extremely well.

22
The Suggestion to make Esperanto an official
Lingua franca of the EU

• In the European Union, disputes can often arise
  as to which language is to be used officially.
• Advocates of Esperanto would suggest that, if it
  were made the official language of the EU,
  disputes of this kind would not arise.
• It is believed that unlike English or French,
  Esperanto is nobodys native language, and
  therefore gives no one an unfair advantage, just
  as English in India is in many ways a fairer
  choice as a lingua franca than Hindi.

23
Language Planning The Selection of a National
Standard Language

• In language planning, often the role of a
  national government does not stop at selecting a
  national language.
• Once selected, the language may have to be
  established, developed and standardized (status
  panning).
• The government, for example may play a part in
  developing a suitable orthography, or in deciding
  whether a particular dialect of the language
  should be selected.
• It may also want to help with vocabulary
  development and to decide exactly which
  grammatical and phonological forms should be
  represented in the standard.
• This type of language planning, which focuses on
  the linguistic characteristics of varieties
  undergoing planning, is known as corpus planning.
  
• English, of course, developed a standard variety
  by relatively natural means, over the
  centuries, out of a kind of consensus, due to
  various social factors.
• For many newer countries, though, the development
  of a standard language has had to take place
  fairly rapidly, and government intervention has
  therefore been necessary.