Take A Peep Through The Pidgin Hole - Looking into Pidgin and Creole Languages in the Carribean

Have you ever approached someone from the Caribbean and asked him, her or them what language they were speaking? Well, many persons have asked me this very question on various occasions and so many times have I had to give the same answer: It's just English!

 

But what makes it so different that it sounds like another language? I've decided to investigate this.

 

According to an online case study on Caribbean English, the varieties of English spoken in the West Indies are due to the way languages emerge and evolve when people from different cultures come into contact. From the early 1700s, thousands of people were transported as slaves to the Caribbean, particularly from West Africa. As a result a number of pidgin languages developed. A pidgin language is a linguistically simplified means of communication that emerges naturally when speakers of two or more languages need to understand each other. Initially workers on the colonial plantations in the Caribbean would have spoken a variety of ethnic languages, but the language imposed on them by slave owners was English. Among the workers themselves, however, a pidgin language would have been used, based on the sounds, vocabulary and grammatical structures of all the contributing languages.

 

It also states that a pidgin language is not a mother tongue. This means it has no native speakers. But if the pidgin remains the main means of communication within a community for a significant length of time — as, for example, on the plantations of the Caribbean - then it becomes the first language of children within the community.

At this point it begins to increase in complexity as it is spoken in a wider range of contexts and adapts to serve the purposes of a fully-fledged language. This process produces what linguists call a creole. A creole is a pidgin that has expanded in structure and vocabulary and has all the characteristics of other languages.

 

Cool nuh?

 Many Creole/Pidgin/Caribbean English also has some differences grammatically where:

 

·      Many speakers drop the verb 'to be', which is required in Standard English, for example, one might say 'Why she so happy?' where as in Standard English it would be 'Why is she so happy?' In Jamaican Creole or Guyanese Creole, persons often use a + verb and/or a + verb + ing to indicate the present progressive aspect. (Me a cook/ing something sweet)

·      On occasion, syntax may be different here as well. One might say 'Why she happy so?' however, this varies with region.

·      Creole speakers often use me, him or her as subject pronouns e.g. 'James and me went to the movies'

·      Some use double negatives, which is actually very common in other languages (such as French) e.g. 'She didn't give me none' and 'I ain't seen nobody'

·      Many use them as a demonstrative pronoun e.g. 'give me them books'

·      Most speakers use don't and was with all persons e.g. 'She don't like it' and 'We was there'

 

 

Here we see that that the differences lie not only the way we pronounce words like 'have' as /æv/ rather than /hæv/ but the way we speak due to the merging and evolution of languages.

 

Now, the real question: should these dialects be recognised as an actual language? Join the debate at

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/caribbean/news/story/2009/10/091002_forumdialects.shtml

 

 

Victoria Williams

 

Sources:

 

Adding English: A Guide to Teaching in Multilingual Classrooms

 By Elizabeth Coelho, Dyanne Rivers

 

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=_RDWv9QBJc0C&pg=PA116&lpg=PA116&dq=sentence+structure+caribbean+english&source=bl&ots=WxiBcoqsST&sig=h7OsmkNkooARJjYxSqQd9xqi3gc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=YEKJVcWvFebg7QajhbeABA&ved=0CCEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=sentence%20structure%20caribbean%20english&f=false

 

Language & Literature Case Study: Sounds Familiar?

 

http://www.bl.uk/learning/langlit/sounds/case-studies/minority-ethnic/caribbean/

 

Caribbean Creole in Class

Rebecca Karli and Brynna Larsen

Structure of English

Prof. Baron

 

https://www.american.edu/cas/tesol/resources/upload/Larsen_Brynna_and_Karli_Rebecca.pdf

"Bye Felicia!" - How the Language of the Internet is Waving Goodbye to Traditional English

"Bye Felicia." By definition, this supposedly useful phrase that suggests a farewell to a person named Felicia is actually an expression used to dismiss a person who is irrelevant and annoying, regardless of gender, name or age. You're probably wondering why this has anything to do with a blog post about the language of the internet, however, had I not been logged on to a particular Facebook on a wintry Sunday morning, I would never have come across this now much used phrase. It's not just quirky phrases that young people and teenagers appear to be picking up from the web; it's the whole smorgasbord of non-standard English.

Paul Kerswill, professor of linguistics at Lancaster University, studies street language in London. He has found that young people aren't just using non-standard English to just sound cool or fit in with peers; they're using it when they speak to everyone. He blames this epidemic on the language of the internet and its lack of any grammar and language police, like teachers and parents in the real world, to halt the use of initialisms and abbreviations that are plaguing the English language.

The biggest culprits that instigate the use of non-standard English are social networking sites. Twitter in particular has a strict 140 character per tweet rule which, in order to get one's opinion across, one has to ignore grammar rules in order to fit the message in the allocated space. For example, the hashtag "WhatsInMyBrowserHistory" should have an apostrophe in "What's" but it doesn't. This is also due to another of Twitter's workings; in order for hashtags to work, the block of characters can't have any spaces in them therefore young people are throwing all they knew or didn't know about grammar straight out the window and opting to use this non-standard form.

Granted, some social networkers suffer from recognised disorders hindering their ability to use Standard English. For example, an individual from my Facebook page is a dyslexic and the following comment shows this: "Of to adventure wonderland tmw." However, a person who doesn't know this individual could easily assume that they are being ignorant of any standard grammar that should be used in this instance thus influencing others, especially younger people still in school, to write in this way. On the other hand, internet users may use non-standard English on purpose, as comedian Ellen DeGeneres often does in her tweets – "Check it out-now you can tweet and shop at the same time! I call it twopping. I hope you twop 'till you drop." She's used these neologisms for comedic effect however, as is frequently seen, neologisms that originate on the internet can be easily transferred to day-to-day English, as "Bye Felicia" was.  Linguist David Crystal argues in his book, "Language and the Internet" that "In everyday conversation, terms from the underlying computer technology are given a new application among people who want their talk to have a cool-cutting edge."

Personally, I despise internet language and the use of non-standard English on the web and in everyday conversation so, in conclusion, to that I say, "Bye Felicia."

Sophie Stevens

'hiya ickle pickle bubba!'

'Hiya ickle pickle bubba!'

'Well who is a beautiful bubba wubba', makes you feel a bit sick doesn't it? But in fact Child Directed speech has been shown to help child language development from the Stanford University; they say children need 'linguistic nutrition' for their development of language in the feature to 

support their needs. 

'New research from Stanford psychologists shows that by talking more to their toddler, parents help the child learn to process language more quickly, which accelerates vocabulary growth.'

Children need this silly talk from their mothers and other guardians to progress their language through their life and to grow up and understand the difference between 'doggy' and 'dog'.

Child directed speech aims to attract and hold the Childs attention, help break down the process of language into understandable chunks to the child and also make the conversation more predictable by referring to here-and-now.  

'The researchers also assessed children's efficiency in language processing, using a procedure designed by Fernald. Toddlers were shown two images – for example, a dog and a book – as they listened to a voice asking them to look at one of the pictures, while a video camera recorded the child's reaction.'

But not everybody agrees on this, it has been said that researchers ague the child directed speech doesn't directly help babies learn their language instead it helps parents to communicate with their children for example its rather social than educational. Also a child's language improves when in contact with an adult who speaks to them directly.

The features of child directed speech are that using phonology by separating phrases more distinctively, leaving long pauses between words, this is so the child can understand what is being said. Also a lot of repetition is used for example 'who is that?'

Baby talk also shows lots of warm gestures to build a relationship with your child and to communicate with them in a way for their understanding. A use of commands, tag questions and inflections are also used to communicate. The use of personal names such as 'mummy' is used so the child can associate to them on a personal level. The uses of repetitive sentences are used such as 'this is a...' so they learn new objects and animals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSCXMfeo74Q

The video above shows some of the examples mentioned.

So maybe all that baby talk is for some reason or maybe it's not everybody has their own opinion. But talking to your child in this way may have an impact on how they grow up and understand things when they are older.

Beth Carling.

Language of Politicians- American vs British

 

Politicians through the ages have always been known to give a heartfelt speech or a heated rant to gain popularity or influence. In todays globalised world this is even more so, in particular with countries such as Britain and the U.S.A who share a language in common.

The following article demonstrates how politicians when it comes to their public speaking tend to all use the same techniques whether it alliteration, making witty rhetorical questions or repetition. http://www.teachit.co.uk/armoore/lang/power.htm#politics

This being true it is also noticeable the difference in Lexis that politicians from different countries choose to use. Examples of this can be drawn from the following sources: http://usa.usembassy.de/etexts/speeches/rhetoric/rmnresig.htm

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33221966

What you may have picked up from that first source, President Nixon’s resignation speech, is that in American politics there is a greater use of Abstract nouns such as “faithfulness” and “Friendship.” On the other hand the second source, a speech from David Cameron, is quite the opposite and has more frequent use of concrete nous such as “taxes” and “wages.” It can be suggested to be so due to a cultural difference, the U.S.A has a society which heavily depends on religion which is also an abstract noun so they try to assimilate their speeches to this by using other abstract nouns which represent similar values; whereas in the U.K there isn’t as much emphasis on religion within society. The U.Ks society can be said to be more based on factual objectives so therefore Politicians adapt their speeches with concrete nouns which is more addressed at what the public want to know about.

Another difference is name dropping of which there seems to be much in British politician’s language and very little in American political language.

http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/102777

This speech of Margaret Thatcher illustrates this with, “Oxford University,” “Winston Churchill” and “Harold Macmillan.”

This is a major difference between American and British political speeches. In America Politicians want to project themselves as average, working class people so that they gain support and the population can feel represented by them. In the U.K however the existence of a predominantly elitist society results in quite the opposite, many politicians attempt to diverge their way of speaking from their audiences as they want to show their superiority and so their aptness to lead. This is a result of Britain’s longevity as a nation and so its hierarchical social structure.

In addition language is also shaped by the political system in both the countries. In America there is a system of personality politics therefore the politicians need to have popular support to win an election regardless of what their policies state. In the U.K there is much less of this and more of manifesto politics which means a politicians popularity is important only to a limited extent what really matters is what policies they choose to implement.

N.Serafino

Power and Language Use: The Discourse Elite

By Jordan Watts

Every day billions of language users utter, write and type to and at each other; we're fully aware of that, and most of us are so comfortable that we never question our language. What those people often aren't aware of is that language in general is dangerous; it's an instrument of power to those who control it, and an oppressive fist to those who don't.  

But what is 'power' anyway? 

The given definition on Google is "the capacity or ability to direct or influence the behaviour of others or the course of events." Power is therefore a relationship between two or more persons or parties. Manuel Castells said in his 1996 book, 'The Rise Of The Network Society', that "power relations are the foundations of society." In other words, power is cohesive. It can bind everyone and anyone together, creating anything from a maternal bond to an entire society.                                             

So lets say I'm a powerful figure and I wanted to rule a country, how would I go about it? Well I'd only really have two viable options: the one that immediately springs to mind is coercion, whereby force, or merely the threat of force, creates a sweeping wave of fear and consequently conformity. But force leads to resistance, so I wouldn't be ruling for very long. This means it would be best if I used the least obvious, far more common and far more enslaving second option. Hegemony. 

Hegemony is about the transmission of ideology to narrow the thought train and create social cohesion. It requires the supposed consent of its intended target in order to appear as being 'democratic' (a term that falls under a topic I'll shortly discuss,) and one of the main weapons in its arsenal is language.  

So how would I use language to control thought?  

One method is the controlling of discourse. George Lakoff describes the 'framing' of language, a creation of a conceptual framework with semantic purposes. Framing anyone who criticizes the actions of the Government as 'conspiracy theorists', for example, immediately triggers a semantic reaction of hate and despair in people. This is normally preceded or succeeded by a phrase from a political figure like 'we are serving the nation', done to name themselves as helpers of the people, and thus justify their actions. The political structure itself is justified often by the shouting of 'DEMOCRACY!', almost always followed by 'FREEDOM!'. This is another classic example of framing as 'freedom' is understood to be a good thing, and because 'democracy' is the current political paradigm, it must be defended whatever the cost.                                                                                            

Other linguistic tools used very effectively include the very popular euphemism, where certain words and phrases are used in a synonymic way due to the denotation being considered too blunt (the CIA doesn't torture people, they use 'enhanced interrogation techniques.') The use of complex jargon, or subject specific lexis, to confuse and steer away anyone who tries to take an interest (i.e 'budget deficit.') And of course there's the simple assertion of power, usually an exclamative and relatively self explanatory (such as David Cameron's personal favourite 'let me be absolutely clear about this.')            

Overshadowing these accessories of control is agenda setting. This is really where the power in language really exists. If you can control what is and isn't to be discussed, then you have dominance over the entire public discourse. The Conservative Party are very quick to discuss welfare and the need to cut £12billion of its funding from the budget, and yet they almost completely ignore talking about the estimated £25billion in tax revenue lost every year due to wealthy tax dodgers. The agenda being to protect the rich by imposing austerity and justifying it by claiming "we are all in this together." Oh the irony.                                                                                                                                                                              It's almost as if a sub-language, similar to Newspeak in George Orwell's 1984, has been and can be created using relatively simple methods; given the incredible power of the media, a 'discourse elite' of language controllers would find it surprisingly easy using their power to generate a desired effect (the labeling of welfare receivers as 'lazy' and 'benefit scroungers' to rationalise welfare cuts seems to be working quite well.) Applying other ideas, including linguistic relativity from Chomsky and Sapir-Whorf and the humorous take from George Carlin, only furthers the view that the language we hear, see and use affects the way we think and subsequently act. Perhaps this means there should be a warning notice on the front page of The Sun...

Miss-interpretation – The Language of Women’s Adverts

By Martha Williamson.

 

All adverts have similar purposes – to persuade and inform. These adverts have specific target audiences which influence the language used in them. One main audience is women.

One thing you might expect in an advert directed at women is the lexical field of beauty as there is a higher pressure for women than men to be beautiful above all other things. Another device incorporated into these adverts is sexual implications which fit into the idea that women have to be attractive and sexually desirable. Furthermore, these adverts use lots of adjectives to add detail into them and to entice the female viewer into buying their product.

Gile's accommodation theory suggests that we converge our way of speaking to fit in with whoever we are talking to. That can be applied to these adverts as the language used in them uses gender specific lexis and topics.

I took a look at the language of three adverts aimed at women. The first was Garnier BB Cream.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAoRivMDdfM

This advert definitely tries to converge its way of speaking with the audience as the speaker says "getting the kids dressed" and "if only everything in the morning was as easy!" which is aimed at the most popular female archetype – the mother. A mother will have no trouble relating to trying to organise their children, get them to school on time, etc. The more the audience can relate to the advert, the more credible it is to them.

It also uses contractions and abbreviations such as "what's" and "wanna" to converge the way of speaking to that of a working class woman or to sound friendly and build a relationship with the viewer.

 

The second advert I looked at was Venus Razors.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmQzkNoJt2Q

This uses basic advertising methods such as repetition. The speaker repeats the phrases "perfect match" and "For (adjective) you there's Venus…" which helps these ideas resonate with the consumer and stay in their heads. There's lots of adjectives used with feminine connotations such as "glam", "delicate" and "gorgeous". These also are a part of the lexical field of beauty. This lexical field is a main factor in women's adverts because they want to make their viewers doubt themselves and believe that their product can fix their problems.

 

The third advert I looked at was Herbal Essences.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUtS5QKfpRk

This advert shamelessly uses sex to sell their product. Half the advert is filled with moaning from the female lead as she washes her hair. At the end they say "share your first time using herbal essences" which is a very transparent euphemism for sex. Sex sells – especially when it's a beautiful woman selling it. This leads the consumers to associate the shampoo with being sexually desirable and conventionally attractive.

The advert also uses imperatives such as "say yes", "share your first time" and rhetorical questions such as "have you heard?". These are classic persuasive features used to encourage the reader that their product is worth buying.

It also uses adjectives with positive connotations such as "smooth" and "irresistible" to sell you the product and the idea of beauty that comes with it.

 

In conclusion, many adverts aimed at women focus on beauty and covering imperfections. They include lots of details and adjectives that are perceived to be feminine and they're not afraid to use sex to sell their products. 

The complex language of medicine:

How many times have you been sat in the hospital or doctors surgery with numerous health related questions, only to leave none the wiser? ­Don't worry you're not alone!

Your lack of understanding and confusion with technical terms is nothing to be ashamed of. The healthcare profession has it's own specialised vocabulary, a 'field specific lexis', which unless you're in that profession you're not expected to know.

Originally medical terms are derived from Greek and Latin roots and terms have been combined to make New Latin words, which have led to an international scientific vocabulary. Greek prefixes go with Greek suffixes, and vice versa with Latin. Medical terms are often created by combining a prefix and a suffix with an 'o'­ as a connector but this can be dropped in some cases when connecting vowels-stems. The prefixes and suffixes have different combinations to create different medical terms, though these terms will be within the same category, for example the prefix 'aden(o/i)' means gland or relating to the glandular system, however can be combined with a different suffix to have a different meaning relating to the same area.

This field specific lexis consists of hundreds of abbreviated terms and acronyms, these are used constantly in both speech and written language. Everything is shortened down to save time when writing down patient's medical details and also to improve the general consistency of fast paced conversations. Another benefit of acronyms in this profession is the time saving element. For example it's much quicker to say "the patient in ward 3 has COPD and requires urgent treatment" rather than saying "the patient has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease", which let's be honest is a bit of a mouthful!

Of course healthcare experts don't set out to intentionally confuse you, sometimes they're just so used to their specific way of speaking that they forget to switch to a less technical lexical style that is understandable to people outside of their profession.

Often healthcare professionals will use specific lexical choices when speaking to you about your health or medicine in order to ensure your full understanding. Healthcare professionals often use declarative forms with imperative functions, this is in order to tell you as a patient the information that you need to know whilst commanding you to follow their instructions in a polite and professional way, without seeming demanding. Interrogatives are also regularly used in order to obtain a patients information and also to ensure that the patient has fully understood the information that has been passed on to them.

Ellie Boelema

If all the World were Paper...

By Emily Willmoth (23rd June 2015)

            Nursery rhymes use old words because they are old. Their archaic lexis is widespread. 'The moon doth shine as bright as day'; 'Goosey goosey gander'. Their subject matter is odd ('Can you make me a cambric shirt?') and stuffed with traditions that don't make sense ('Jack be nimble / Jack be quick / Jack jump over the candlestick'). Sometimes they can be very violent, and euphemistic for things no mother wants to relay.

            'Hickety, pickety, my black hen,

            She lays eggs for gentlemen…'

            (Slang, of course, for 'the woman prostitutes herself'.)

            '…Sometimes nine and sometimes ten,

            Hickety, pickety, my black hen.'

            But of course, children knew these things in those days. If Dicky Dilver beat his wife, it was no less horrifying than the man next door doing exactly the same.

            Taboo evolves: it does not start out as taboo. There is a children's song from the 1860s called 'Ten little n** boys', which was very popular in its day and is still known. Its entire chorus is built on the adjective we see today as a racial slur.

            Language we might today see as emotive and unsuitable, such as 'death', 'coffin', 'blind', etc. is widely written in to nursery rhymes. Who killed Cock Robin? A nonchalant sparrow pipes up, "I did!" The thing is, children were exposed to this.

            Many nursery rhymes did not originate from the nursery at all. According to the OED of Nursery Rhymes, 'the overwhelming majority of nursery rhymes were not in the first place composed for children'. Examples being, 'Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home'; an old custom or ritual which was most likely a form of lucky charm, or 'This is the house that Jack built,' which has been attributed to the Jewish chant, 'Had Gadya', and is most certainly of ancient origin.

            They have evolved. They have been given a new coat of paint. They have been done up and acquired new purpose. Many poems had songs added to them and were adapted to fit a tune. When people did this, they often added nonsense words to make the lyrics 'fit' correctly to the notes. The riddle 'I had four sisters beyond the sea', had a whole chorus added, which made no sense, but enhanced the tune.

            Which brings me to the point that nursery rhymes are not said primarily for their meaning.

            'Eeny meeny miny moe' say the children; not because they like what it means (what does it mean?) but because they like the assonance of it: the sounds of the vowels. You say 'Arthur O'Bower has broken his band', but you don't care about the band: you like listening to the /b/s. Onomatopoeia is so lovely, it can paint a picture in your head: 'itsy bitsy spider', with all its skittering legs; 'Pat-a-cake', when you form pastry; 'Four dilly danders' mean nothing, except that, for the riddle, they sound like the udders they are describing.

            Before children learn words, rhymes help them to differentiate sounds, which helps them to recognise words, which helps them to learn to read.

            There once was a man called S. G. Goodrich, who nearly succeeded in banishing nursery rhymes from the nursery altogether. He said they were nonsense.

            Well, yes. Of course they are. But, to quote, 'This poor old man is dead and gone'… even though 'Higglety, pigglety, pop'…the nursery rhyme he wrote to prove nursery rhymes are useless… that's still here!

AS to A2 Language Blog Posts 2015

Hi All --


Here is where you should post your blog entries ready to transition to A2. Starting the A2 year is conditional on completing and posting an interesting and well-researched article here.


You can browse through previous entries for examples of ideas and style.


When you send your post, make sure to include your name, so that I can be sure who's posted what.


It's as easy as sending an email, but if you have any problems, contact me at my college address or the English@Park Facebook Page.


Paul