LANGUAGE

Chapter 6 Lecture Continued

What Are Languages, and What Role Do Languages Play

in Culture?

• Language: A set of sounds, combinations of sounds, and symbols used for communication

• Standard language: A language that is published, widely distributed, and purposefully taught

• Role of government in standardizing a language

Example: Gov’t-forced assimilation

Example of Dialect

Example: Dialect

• African American Vernacular English (AAVE)– Aka “Ebonics”

• Standard American English

Non-English Speakers in the US

Language and Politics

The Internet: Globalization of Language

Language Formation

• Sound shifts, slight changes in a word across languages over time

Milk = lacte in Latin leche in Spanish lait in French latta in Italian

• Language divergence: Breakup of a language into dialects and then new languages from lack of interaction among speakers

• Language convergence: When peoples with different languages have consistent interaction and their languages blend into one

Historical Linkages among Languages

• Proto-Indo-European

• (proto = first; original)

The Languages of Europe

• Romance languages– French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese

• Germanic languages– English, German, Danish, Swedish

• Slavic languages– Russian, Polish, Czech

The Case of Euskera

Spoken by the Basque and in no way related to any other language family in Europe

Languages of Subsaharan Africa• Dominant language family: Niger-

Congo

Nigeria

How Do Languages Diffuse?

• Human interaction• Print distribution• Migration • Trade• Rise of nation-states• Colonialism

Elizabeth J. Leppman

Effects of Spatial Interaction

• Lingua franca: A language used among speakers of different languages for trade and commerce

• Pidgin language: A language created when people combine parts of two or more languages into a simplified structure and vocabulary

• Creole language: A pidgin language that has developed a more complex structure and vocabulary and has become the native language of a group of people– Haitian creole, Jamaican patois

What Role Does Language Play in Making Places?

• Place: The uniqueness of a location, what people do in a location, what they create, how they impart a certain character, a certain imprint on the location

• Toponym: A place name– Imparts a certain character on a place– Reflects the social processes in a place– Can give a glimpse of the history of a

place

EXAMPLE

• Town with the longest name in the world is in Wales (UK)

• Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwlllla-ntysiliogogogoch

• Translation:"Saint Mary's Church in the hollow of white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the Church of Saint Tysilio near the red cave."