Riassunto World Englishes, Sintesi del corso di Lingua Inglese

Scarica Riassunto World Englishes e più Sintesi del corso in PDF di Lingua Inglese solo su Docsity! The Historical, Social and Political Context. Introduction to World Englishes. Currently there are approximately 75 territories where English is spoken either as a first language (L1), or as an official second language (L2) in field such as government, law and education. Crystal lists these territories along with their approximate numbers of English speakers. Such as Australia with 14million people who use English as their first language and 3million who use English as their second language. Or Canada where 20million people have English as their first language and 7million as their second language. And Ireland where 3million people use English as their first language and 100k as their second language. The total numbers of L1 and L2 English speakers amount to 329million and 430million respectively and together these speakers constitute almost a third of the total population of the territories. The total number of L2 speakers is still more remarkable than Crystal’s figures suggest. This group of English speakers, whose proficiency levels range from reasonable to bilingual competence, was originally described as speakers of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) to distinguish them from L2 speakers for whom English serves country-internal functions, that is, speakers of English as a Second Language (ESL). Since the mid- 1990s it has become increasingly common to find alongside EFL, the use of English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) or, less often, English as an International Language (EIL). The new term, ELF, reflects the growing trend for English users from Europe, China and Brazil, to use English more frequently as a contact language among themselves rather than with native English speakers. It is impossible to capture the current number of EFL/ELF speakers precisely, because it is increasing all the time as more and more people in these countries learn English. The negative attitudes which persist today towards certain varieties of English have their roots in the past and in the two dispersals of English. The two dispersals of English. We can speak of the two dispersals, or diasporas of English. The first diaspora, initially involving the migration of around 25k people from the south and east of England primarily to America and Australia, resulted in new mother tongue varieties of English. The second diaspora, involving the colonisation of Asia and Africa led to the development of a number of second language varieties, often referred to as New Englishes. The first diaspora: English is transported to the New World. The first diaspora involved relatively large-scale migrations of mother-tongue English speakers from England, Scotland and Ireland predominantly to North America, Australia and New Zealand. The varieties of English spoken in modern North America and Australasia are not identical with the English of their early colonisers, but have altered in response to the changed and changing sociolinguistic contexts in which the migrants found themselves. During the 17th century, English spread to southern parts of America and the Caribbean as a result of the slave trade. Slaves were transported from West Africa and exchanged, on the American coast and in the Caribbean, for sugar and rum. The Englishes which developed among the slaves and between them and their captors were initially contact pidgin languages but they developed into creoles. Then, in the 18th century, there was large-scale immigration from Northern Ireland, initially to the coastal area around Philadelphia, but quickly moving south and west. Comparable events were soon to take place in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. James Cook discovered Australia in 1770. The largest proportion of settlers came from London and the south-east, although in the case of the convicts, they were not necessarily born there. Others originated in regions as widely dispersed as south west England, Lancashire, Scotland and Ireland. The result was a situation of dialect mixing which was further influenced by the indigenous aboriginal languages. New Zealand was first settled by European traders in the 1790s. Immigrants arrived in three stages: in the 1840s and 1850s from Britain, in the 1860s from Australia and Ireland, and from 1870 to 1885 from the UK, when their number included a considerable proportion of Scots. There was a mixture of dialects, this time subject to a strong Maori influence, especially in terms of vocabulary. Although South Africa was colonised by the Dutch from 1650s, the British did not arrive until 1795. The majority of Cape settlers originated in southern England, though there were also sizeable groups from Ireland and Scotland. From 1822, when English was declared the official language, it was also learnt as a second language by blacks and Afrikaans speakers. The second diaspora: English is transported to Asia and Africa. The second diaspora took place at various points during the 18th and 19th centuries in very different ways and with very different results from those of the first diaspora. The history of English in Colonial Africa has two distinct patterns depending on whether we are talking about West or East Africa. English in West Africa is linked to the slave trade and the development of pidgin and creole languages. There was no major British settlement in the area and English was employed as a lingua franca both among the indigenous population and between these people and the British traders. East Africa’s relationship with English followed a different path. The countries of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe were extensively settled by British Colonist. These six countries became British protectorates or colonies at various points between late 19th and early 20th centuries, with English playing an important role in the major institutions such as government, education and the law. English was introduced to the sub-continent of South Asia during the second half of the 18th century. English became the language of the Indian education system. Even today, when Hindi is the official language of India, English is an associate official language used alongside Hindi as a neutral lingua franca. British influence in South-East Asia, East Asia and South Pacific began in the late 18th century. The main territories involved were Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and the Philippines. Papua New Guinea was also a British protectorate and provides one of the world’s best examples of an English-based pidgin, Tok Pisin. In recent years, the use of English has increased in Singapore and a local variety has begun to emerge. On the other hand, the use of English has declined in Malaysia as a result of the adoption of the local language, Bahasa Malaysia, as the national language and medium of education when Malaysia gained independence in 1957. While still obligatory as a subject of study at school, English was regarded as useful only for international communication. Nowadays English is also learnt in other countries in neighbouring areas, most notably Taiwan, Japan and Korea, the latter two having recently begun to consider the possibility of making English and official second language. These Englishes have much in common, through their shared history and their affinity with either British or American English. But there is also much that is unique to each variety, particularly in terms of their accents, but also in their idiomatic uses of vocabulary, their grammars and their discourse strategies. Models and descriptions of the spread of English. The oldest model of the spread of English is that of Stevens. His world map of English, first published in 1980, shows a map of the world on which is super imposed an upside-down tree diagram demonstrating the way in which, since American English became a separate variety from British English, all subsequent Englishes have had affinities with either one or the other. Görlach’s circle places International English at the centre followed by regional standard Englishes, then semi-/sub-regional standard Englishes such as Indian, Irish, ext… Bisong asks and answers three questions: 1. Has English succeeded in displacing or replacing other languages in Nigeria? Although English is the official language of Nigeria, it has not succeeded in displacing or replacing any of the indigenous languages. But attitudes to the language have changed since colonial times. Reasons for learning English now are more pragmatic in nature. I would want to maintain that Nigerians are sophisticated enough to know what is in their interest, and that their interest includes the ability to operate with two or more linguistic codes in a multilingual situation. 2. Has the dominance of English caused Nigerian culture to be undervalued and marginalised? Because Nigeria is a multicultural society, the Euro-Christian culture embodied in the English language is only one of a number of cultures that function to shape the consciousness of Nigerian people. To maintain that one of the foreign cultures must play a dominant role since the language that embodies it is widely used is again to fail to come to grips with the reality of the situation. 3. Why did writers like Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka and Ngugi wa Thiongo, all of them literate and fluent in their mother tongues, write in English? Because of the peculiar history of countries in the Periphery, English has become one of the languages available for use by the creative writer. The nature of English as a Lingua Franca. Defining ELF. The term ELF has already been used several times. It is English as it is used a contact language among speakers from different first languages. Main characteristics: 1) It is used in contexts in which speakers with different L1s need it as their means to communicate with each other. Some ELF researchers used the term “English as an international language” (EIL) to refer to communication that included native speakers of English and reserved ELF exclusively for non-native communication. Researchers found the distinction unworkable in practice. The majority of ELF communication consists of Expanding Circle speakers interacting with each other, often with no native English speakers present. 2) ELF is an alternative to EFL rather than a replacement for it, and depends on the speaker’s potential need and preferences. A common myth about ELF is that it is promoted to replace EFL as a learning target. There will always be learners and users of English who need to blend in with native English speakers, or who wish to aspire to a native English accent. For such people, English as a foreign language (EFL) will be more realistic. The important point is that learners should be made aware of the differences between EFL and ELF so that they are in a position to make an informed choice. 3) Linguistically ELF involves innovations that differ from ENL and which in some cases are shared by most ELF speakers. It is clear that ELF speakers use features that are particular to their won ELF variety, and/or to the English of the broader regional area from which they come. 4) Pragmatically, it involves the use of certain communication strategies, particularly accommodation and code-switching. This is because ELF forms depend crucially on the specific communication context rather than being an “all-purpose” English. 5) Descriptions of ELF that may lead to codification are drawn from communication involving proficient ELF speakers. As far as proficiency level is concerned, while ELF communication can involve participants of any level of proficiency, this is not the same as saying that the output of lower-proficiency ELF users could become an alternative target to ENL. Only the output of proficient ELF users is being collected for the purposes of possible later codification. ELF features. Lexicogrammatical features.  “dropping” the third person present tense –s;  “confusing” the relative pronouns “who” and “which”;  “omitting” definite and indefinite articles where they are obligatory in ENL, and inserting them where they do not occur in ENL;  “failing” to use correct forms in tag questions;  inserting “redundant” prepositions;  “overusing” certain verbs of high semantic generality;  “replacing” infinitive constructions with that-clauses;  “overdoing” explicitness. Pronunciation features.  all the consonant sounds except voiceless “th” /θ/, voiced “th” /ð/, and dark “l”;  vowel length contrasts;  avoidance of consonant deletion at the beginning of words and only certain deletions intelligible in word-medial and final position, on the other hand, the avoidance of consonant clusters by means of the addition of vowels;  production and placement of nuclear stress. The following features of ENL pronunciation were not found to contribute to intelligibility in ELF, and did not lead to communication problems when they were substituted with a feature influenced by the speaker’s L1 pronunciation:  these consonant sounds: voiceless “th” /θ/, voiced “th” /ð/ and dark “l”;  vowel quality;  weak forms;  other features of connected speech such as assimilation and elision;  the direction of pitch movements;  the placement of wordstress, which varies considerably even across L1 Englishes;  stress-timed rhythm. ELF processes. English evolves over time through natural processes such as regularisation. Another reason why language evolves in particular ways is physiological. A further factor is “recoverability”. According to the notion of recoverability ambiguity is far more likely to result from the removal of phonological information than from its addition. Now there is also the vast amount of intercultural communication via ELF. What seems to be happening is that ELF speakers in many cases are simply accelerating the processes that have already been taking place more slowly in ENL. The problem for ELF speakers is that when they innovate in such ways the outcome is inevitably described as “error” until it has been sanctioned by native English speaker use. Attitudes towards ELF. While some have seen ELF as common sense, even democratic, others have been outraged by the notion that there could be any challenge to the authority of British and American English standards in the Expanding Circle.