Chaps 4&5
Chapter 4
Standard language---idealised language
Standard American English
Like a unicorn: imagined, but described in detail by everyone
Definitons
Marriam-Webster Dictionary
Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary
Modern English Usage
"Usage dictates acceptability" (pronunciation)
In TV, radio, newspaper....
Education!
Specialists
Theres is no need for them-they make themselves important
Work without source
Dennis Preston's Study
Best to Worst Englishes by college students
South-North-West-Coast
Characterised by
No accent
Conscious-pronunciatio-grammar
Educated/educator-broadcaster
Understood generally
Not in the South
Accents
Dominant-Subordinate
Normal? Definiton is not clear
Power based
Results in Standardisation
AAVE-African American-not just bad slang
Various definitions are around
We should consider it a variety, accepted, educated, but not superior
diffrences mainly in grammar and pronunciation
Chapter 5
Language subordination
Ideology
Homeland Community
other mother tongue
first language acquisition ethnicity-race-religion-gender-region-economics
US English
L1 Accent
L2 Accent
LANGUAGE IDEOLOGY FILTERS
Subjective evaluation
The Communicative Burden
Rejects
Neutral
positive
Negative
"Promotion of the needs and interests of a dominant group or class a the expense of marginalized groups, by means of disinformation and misrepresentation of those non-dominant groups"
STANDARD LANGUAGE IDEOLOGY (SLI)
Primary function of a myth
Discrimination by accent
People are not asked to change their skin color, ethnicity, religion, gender or sexual indetity, why should they change their accent?
Still can be found in (via devaluation)
everyday interaction
the courts
the media
education
housing
employment
Looking at the US - things are better than they were 100+ years ago, still room for improvement
Recognition/Misrecognition
Our identity is partly shaped by recognition
Misrecognition of a people or group can make them suffer real damage
Bias toward an abstracted, idealized, homogenous spoken language which is imposed and maintained by dominant bloc institutions and which names as its model the written language, but whih is drawn primarily from the spoken language of the upper middle class
Ideology as a bridge/filter
Social structures
Language variation and change
Idealized nation has one perfect and homogenous language
Language is institutionalized, students differing in language from the standard are penalized
Standardization process (assimilation)
Ongoing resistance against the institutionalizations
Vernacular speech is subjugated to the Standard Language
Accepts
second language acquistion ethnicity-race-religion-gender-region-economics
Speaker's
Listener's