• BIL6074 SOCIOLINGUISTICS IN LANGUAGE EDUCATION

Week 5

• Task

• Refer to the handout and answer the following questions:

• (1). What is standard English?

• (2). What are the similarities among all the definitions of

Standard English?

• (3). The “non-standard Englishes” are regarded as inferior.

Do you agree? Why?

• What is your understanding of the terms “pidgins” and “creoles”?

• Pidgin

 Hymes (1971)(cited in Wardhaugh, 1998) pointed out that before the 1930s, pidgins and creoles
were largely ignored by linguists, who regarded them as ‘marginal languages’

 A pidgin is a language with no native speakers: it is no one’s first language but is a contact
language (Wardhaugh, 1998).

 It is a product of a multilingual situation in which those who wish to communicate must find or
improvise a simple language system that will enable them to do so.

 A pidgin is sometimes regarded as a ‘reduced’ variety of a ‘normal’ language, i.e., one of the
dominant languages, with simplification of the grammar and vocabulary of that language,
considerable phonological variation, and an admixture of local vocabulary to meet the special
needs of the contact group (Wardhaugh, 1998).

 Exp. Tok Pisin in Papua New Guinea, Nigerian Pidgin English

• Examples

• English pidgins:

• Nigerian pidgin English, Chinese pidgin English, Hawaiian pidgin English, Queensland Kanaka
English, and Bislama (one of the official languages of the Pacific Island of Vanuatu).

• Pidginization

 Involves some kind of:

 ‘simplification’ of a language, e.g., reduction in morphology (word structure) and syntax

(grammatical structure);

 tolerance of considerable phonological variation (pronunciation);

 reduction in the number of functions for which pidgin is used (e.g. no novels in pidgin);
 Extensive borrowing of words from local mother tongues.

• Creole

 A creole is often defined as a pidgin that has become the first language of a new generation of
speakers.

 Aitchison (1994)(cited in Wardhaugh, 1998) says that “creole arises when pidgins become
mother tongues.”

 Holmes (1992)(cited in Wardhaugh, 1998) says “A creole is a pidgin which has expanded in
structure and vocabulary to express the range of meanings and serve the range of functions
required of a first language.”

 Exp. (French-based) Haitian Creole, (English-based) Jamaican Creole

• Examples

• English creoles:

• Jamaica English creole, Sierra Leone English creole, Cameroon English creole, the Gullah
language (also called Sea Island Creole English)

• Gullah – the English variety spoken by descendants of African on the coast of South Carolina,
USA.

• Creole roots of Black English in USA

• Creolization

• Involves:

• expansion of the morphology and syntax;

• regularization of the phonology;

• deliberate increase in the number of functions in which the language is used;

• Development of a rational and stable system for increasing vocabulary.

• Language Attitude and Motivation

• What is the difference between attitude and motivation?

• Language Motivation

• What is your understanding of the following terms:

• (i). Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation;

• (ii). Instrumental and integrative motivation.

• Attitude and Performance

 • What are the relationships between an individual’s attitudes/motivation, and success (academic
performance) in language learning?

• McGroarty (2002).

• Complex and reciprocal connections with each other.

• Positive attitudes about language and language learning may be as much the result of success as
the cause.

• Students with positive general attitudes may not be particularly successful if these attitudes are
not linked with effective strategies that enable them to take advantage of instructional
opportunities presented to them.

• Students are affected by the attitudes and examples of their peers, teachers, and parents, with
respect to language study,

• and by social and institutional language policies as reflected in, for example, required courses of
language study, both first and second, in schools.

• The status of a language in a society, whether native or second language, further shapes the
social climate for language study.

• Exp. English – language diffusion and the nativization of English around the world mean that
distinctions such as second language or foreign language are increasingly hard to draw, because
of varieties of English and norms for use emerge in response to local communicative needs
(Chesire, 1991; Kachru & Nelson, 1996)(cited in McGroarty, 2002

• Attitudes and motivation affect learners and teachers in ways that, though perhaps powerful,
are often unconscious, thus it is difficult to identify their influence readily or unambiguously.

Exp. Semantic differential scale (Osgood, Suci, and Tannenbaum, 1957), classic direct measures of
individual attitudes and motivation (Gardner & Lambert, 1959, 1972), matched guise technique
(Lambert, 1972), orientation index (Gardner, 1985)

• Language Attitudes, Norms And Standards

• How do language attitudes influence the creation of norms and standards as well as the
formation of language policies?

• Norms

• Descriptive versus prescriptive norms

• A descriptive norm is a statement of the form or feature of language that most speakers use
most of the time, a statement of statistical probability and one which admits variation
(McGroarty, 2002).

• A prescriptive norm, in contrast, is a formally stated rule meant to apply to all language uses in
all settings, it is the things which grammar and spelling handbooks (for example) are constituted
(McGroarty, 2002).
• The term norms includes not just the actual forms of language used but the expectations of
speakers regarding the appropriate tone and stance conveyed by language in different
situations (McGroarty, 2002).

• Native speakers of a language often have strongly felt opinions regarding where the “best”
varieties of their language are spoken, and their perceptions contribute to public attitudes
related to appropriate language use and language instruction.

• Nonnative speakers may come to share some of these perspectives as they learn the language.

• Linguists use the term norm in a neutral sense to describe the most frequently used language
forms,

• but, as used by members of the public, the term norms includes an element of positive valuation
as well,

• and the tension between linguists’ use of the term and public understanding of language norms
affects both educational discourse and pedagogical techniques (McGroarty, 2002).

• Coulmas (1989)(cited in McGroarty, 2002) notes that professional linguists have now taken a
position of “prescriptive abstinence” which requires them to remain neutral on matters related
to evaluation of good or proper language.

• This contradicts with the public who, in this age of specialization, want language specialists to
offer definitive statements regarding appropriate language.

• Standards

• Standards and Schooling

• The notion of standard strongly connotes attention to written language.

• Language codification and prescription (as parts of language standardization), which focus on
writing, determine that the norms of formal registers of standard English rather than the norms
of everyday spoken English, as the appropriate models for authoritative reference works on the
language.

• Because one of the main objectives of formal schooling is to teach reading and writing, schools
are one of the central arenas for the promotion of prescriptive norms of written language
(Wiley, 1996)(cited in McGroarty, 2002).

• Historically, school systems have played a central role in creating and standardizing a national
written language.

• The choice of norms for English language teaching is no longer simply British versus American
grammar and pronunciation.
 • Research indicates that there are multiple national standards and often a range of acceptable
local variants in phonology, lexis, grammar, and discourse patterns for English emerging in the
many places where English I used (cited in McGroarty, 2002)

• Language attitudes and Implications to Language Teaching

(1). Promote individual, classroom, and schoolwide motivation

¬ each teacher must take steps to identify the variety of goals, interests, and predispositions about
language that students bring to the language classroom and capitalize on them (Oxford & Sheerin,
1994)(cited in McGroarty, 2002).

¬ teachers identify effective ways to diversity instruction and make students more aware of their own
learning processes and the rewards of language study, both intrinsic and extrinsic.

(2). Discover the language relevant for instruction

• What forms of language and literacy are relevant in the lives of students and their parents?

• Teachers should identify what functions and forms of language and which language varieties
(and what form of knowledge) matter in the communities in which they work, in terms of both
present activities and future aspirations (McGroarty, 2002).

(3). Expand opportunities to use multiple forms of language

• Teachers need to recognize a wide variety of language behaviours and realize that their own and
their students’ pre-existing attitudes toward language skills and literacy abilities will affect
student participation, and they must find ways to recognize multiple abilities and use them as a
springboard in developing better language and literacy skills (Cohen, 1994)(cited in McGroarty,
2002).

• Teachers must create in their classroom a range of participation opportunities so that students
can experience a wide variety of language forms and functions, oral and literate, including those
that will provide for success in the public arena in their societies (McGroarty, 2002).