LING 275 NOTES[Week 1] [Week 2] [Week 3] [Week 4] [Week 5] [Week 6] [Week 7] [Week 8] [Week 9] [Week 10]
Updated on Sunday, Janaury 30th, 2005.
LING 275 NOTES[Week 1] [Week 2] [Week 3] [Week 4] [Week 5] [Week 6] [Week 7] [Week 8] [Week 9] [Week 10]
Updated on Sunday, Janaury 30th, 2005.
| Modern Caucasians | 87 |
| Native Americans | 86 |
| Malays |
85 |
| Africans |
83 |
Cultural models and cultural meanings form a unique worldview, providing an understanding of the world as it is thought to be, and moral lessons for individual bahavior. Reality is no absolute or abstract, it is lived in within familiar contexts of social behavior and cultural meanings
Week 4 - Notes 3: Updated on Sunday, Janaury 30th, 2005.
The Ethnography of Speaking
Dell Hymes
Main Points
Like Boas, Sapir, Whorf, and other before him, Hymes was interested in the connection between language and culture.
To truly understand language and culture, scholars would have to go beyond the mechanical study of language itself.
Hymes believed that Linguistics provided a link between biological and social levels of social behavior. But, to access deeper connections between language and culture, thought that scholars (social scientists in general) would have to improve their methods.
Hymes was interested in the connection between linguistics and psychology:
Paralinguistics: The features of vocal communication considered marginal or optional and therefore excludable from the customary linguistic analysis – vocal pitch, pacing of speech, intonation, and even emotions such as laughing, crying, etc.
Pragmatics: The system of rules for how words, phrases, clauses, and sentences are used in meaningful and intentional communication in context.
But to access connections between language and culture beyond what had already been accomplished, an extreme kind of research would have to be developed.
Hymes believed that Anthropology could contribute further to the development of linguistics in the following areas theoretically, methodologically, with its emphasis on cross-cultural comparison to access even deeper connections between language and culture.
This is how Hymes arrived at his approach to the study of language he called, the Ethnography of Speaking.
The ethnography of speaking is concerned with the embedded meaning, situation, uses, patterns, and functions of speaking as an activity.
The ethnography of speaking uses fieldwork, analytical perspectives, and the descriptive techniques of anthropology to describe language in context. According to Hymes’ Ethnography of Speaking Approach:
- There is no one method of conducting ethnography of speaking fieldwork.
- Fieldwork methods must come out of the fieldwork itself.
Hymes’ Advice
Studies of language often end up focusing too much on the mechanics of language an not on the system (pattern, framework) in which it is embedded.
Speech is more than language; it symbolizes its underlying culture. The description of speech in context is crucial to this approach.
Addressing this dimension (the description of speech) is the way to get at the deeper connection between language and culture. Speaking, like language, is patterned.
Too often, scholars assume that a language patterns cultural expression, but this isn’t necessarily true.
Hymes believed that in approaching the ethnography of speaking (in order to address the question of the connection between language and culture) scholars should proceed with the following assumptions:
1. The speech of a group constitutes a system.
2. Speech and language vary cross culturally in function.
3. a. The speech activity of a community should be the primary focus. b. An
ethnography of speaking must include a description of speech acts c. Speech
acts must be examined empirically.
Week 5 - Notes 1: Updated on Sunday, Janaury 30th, 2005.
Greatest contribution that Linguistic Anthropologists have made to the study of language:
* Culture is contstructed.
* Culture is not static but dynamic (always changing).
* Culture is constructed by words that represent the meanings to which we subscribe.
Meaning manifests themselves within words i many ways within society as morals, values, ideas, and in other forms.
To fully understand speech, we must understand meaning(s) at the level of deep structure.
To understand deep structure, we must:
1. Go into the field.
2. Study the way in which language is situated in context using qualitative and quantitative methods.
3. Describe and interpret our findings using postmodern persspectives.
Susan Philips’ definition of sociolinguistics: The ways
in which a person’s speech conveys social information.
* Salzmann gives us examples of how words convey social information through:
Taboo Words
Politeness
Forms of Address
How do these examples show how culture is constructed through words and structures invisible social rules such as:
Linguistic Etiquette
Speech and Gender
Sexual Bias in Language
* Salzmann claims that linguistic variation in a pluralistic society complicate matters.
Bilingualism: Knowledge and use of two language.
Diglossia: A pattern of language use within a bilingual community
in which two languages (or dialects of the same language) are systematically
employed in different social contexts.
Multilingualism: The use of three or more languages within
a speech community.
Sociolinguistic Change
Labov’s pioneering study concerning the social status of speakers from
New York City showed:
Labov’s linguistic insights such as the following:
* This has led sociolinguists since the mid 1960s to focus more on qualitative
methods in order to contextualize linguistic varieties.
Summary and Conclusions:
Thus, sociolinguistics today is characterized by an emphasis on the following
themes:
Language are what their users have made them, not just what human nature has
given their users.
Week 5 - Notes 2: Updated on Sunday, Janaury 30th, 2005.
Different Games, Different Rules
Yamada Haru
This chapter out of Yamada’s book provides examples of Susan Philips’
definition of sociolinguistics: The ways in which a person’s speech conveys
social information.
* A sentence in Japanese is only part of the larger interaction.
* Sasshi plays a major role in Japanese communication.
Sasshi: anticipatory guess work in a dialogue required to fill out each speaker’s
unspoken words.
* Sasshi is honed in the context of people who have known each other for a long
time.
Example of Yamada and long time friend communicating through sasshi on the phone:
Yamada: Hello?
Friend: Yeah, they were OK.
Yamada: Thanks (for worrying).
Sasshi and this kind of “anticipatory guess work” in conversation
if far from unique to Japanese culture.
* Similar to the assumption that goes into the English question, “Guess
what?”
* Some medical doctors use “perspective display” to hone the delivery
of their diagnosis.
Yamada goes on in the chapter to:
* Contrast the Japanese communication style she calls Listener Talk with the
American communication she calls Speaker Talk.
* Analyzes how a conversation between a Japanese and American business people
can be deconstructed using this model.
* Point out how cultural conflicts as well as humorous situations can arise
when people using different modes of communication try to talk to one another.
(Conversation between Chie and Fiona.)
Cultural Values Ascribed to Speaker Talk and Listener Talk
* Americans tend to evaluate Listener Talk negatively.
* Japanese tend to think of those who use Speaker talk as inattentive and selfish.
* Thus, speaking styles are constructed not just by the words that make up the
conversation, but by the underlying cultural values of those who use the language.
* This is why fieldwork and the ethnoliguistic method a large component of which
is qualitative analysis is so crucial in understanding the meaning behind words
or the cultural model of native speakers.
In the rest of the article, Yamada articulates the rules of both Speaker Talk
and Listener talk through humorous incidents in the office and her ethnolinguistic
analysis.
Yamada’s overarching point is the title of her book, Different
Game, Different Rules.
Labov’s Study of Language Use In Three New York Department Store
Higher class people tend to pronounce (r)s more regularly than lower class people.
Hypothesis: If any two subgroups of New York City speakers are ranked in a scale of social stratification, then they will be ranked in the same order by their different use of (r).
High Class Saks Fifth Avenue (at 50th Street)
30 percent always pronounced both (r)s. – fourth floor
32 percent pronounced both (r)s sometimes – fawth floah
Middle Class Macy’s (at Herald Square)
20
30
Low Class S. Klein at Union Square (14th & Broadway)
4
17
Significance:
* Sociolinguistic change is contextual.
* Qualitative methods are crucial for contextualizing language.
Language Variation
* Salzmann deals with variation of English – dialects, pidgins, and creoles.
- These are surface structures of the language.What do these surface structures
represent?
* Noam Chomski’s Model of Tranformational Generative Grammar
* Deep Structure/ the level of the unconscious mind.
Week 8 - Notes 2. Monday
lingua franca: a language agreed upon as a medium of communication by people who speak different first languages.
pidgin: a language that develops when speakers of two or more
mutually unintelligible languages develop a need to communicate characterized
by…
- a much narrower range of meaning than the languages for which they substitute
- limited in vocabulary
creole: a pidgin language that has become the first language of a speech community.
Bickerson’s work on creole, published in 1983, was the first to connect patterns apparent in creole to possible universal characteristics of language acquisition - evidence for a universal grammar.
Bickerson’s Bioprogram Hypothesis: the assumption that the human species must have a biologically innate capacity for language.
ARGUMENT:
* Scholars have noted a remarkable similarity of structure among all Creole languages.
* There is an impressive body of evidence to support the hypothesis that what is common to Creole languages may indeed form the basis of the acquisition of language by children everywhere.
* Evidence suggests that children between two and four years of age speak a variety of language structures that bear a striking resemblance to the structure of Creole languages.
* Historical evidence suggests that the structure of Creole arouse without significant borrowing from other languages, indicating that its structure is autonomous. The strongest evidence for this is its uniformity across the world.
* Worldwide, Creole languages are more similar to one another than they are to any other language.
* If these discoveries remain true, they has significant implications for language acquisition theorists.
SIGNIFICANCE:
* Bikerson’s findings suggest that like Noam Chomski’s Innatist Theory (of language acquisition), language use in humans might be predetermined biologically.
* However, unlike Chomski’s theory that assumes children choose from one of many models of grammar that is available to them in their LAD, the structure of Creole may be the fundamental grammatical model in humans.
* It may be the Creole structure that represents the manifestation of a neurologically determined program of child development.
Notes 3 Tuesday
Peter Farb – Chapter 11: Man the Talker
Pg. 224-225
Chomski’s Theory of Language Acquisition
* All human beings possess at birth an innate capacity to acquire language.
* This capacity is biologically determined – often considered to be human nature.
* Transformational Generative Grammar – a person acquires a grammar that can generate an infinite number of new sentences in the language he/she speaks.
* A child learns the grammar of the language through the practice of it and the social implications of its use.
* The ability to learn a language naturally is easiest during a window of time that begins with the birth of the child and lasts to the time when he or she is 8-12 years of age.
* The function in the brain that enables a child to learn a language naturally is called the Language Acquisition Device.
Peter Farb – Chapter 12: The Language of Children
Pg. 238-239
Wild Boy of Aveyron (Wolf Boy): Captured in 1797 in France.
* This 12 year-old boy couldn’t speak and walked on all four limbs.
* French Physician J. M. G. Itard set out to try to teach the boy (later named Victor) to speak. After 5 years of language learning, Victor showed he could learn many things, but not language.
In Contrast:
Ohio Girl, discovered in the wilds in 1930s, also had no language skills. Because she was only 6 years old, she was able to learn speech. learnable.
Normal Children:
* Learn language over a 8-10 year period.
* In most societies, children transition from “baby talk” to adult language. Various theories exist as to the function of “baby talk.” Most ethnolinguists generally agree that “baby talk” somehow makes a child’s native language(s) easier to speak.
Notes 3 Thursday
In Ads taken from U. S. publications, Words = Surface Structure.
In addition, the visual images portray Articulated Culture such
as American cultural norms, values, and symbols as well as
gender, class, race, and ethnicity judgements.
But Ads also incorporate Unarticulated Culture - the nonvisible meanings associated with Articulated Culture that make up The American Worldview
English or any language is like Ads.
While there are many distinct dialects of English spoken in the United States, two historically marked varieties are:
African American English (AAE)
One of many dialects of AAE is know as:
African American Vernacular English (AAVE): a variety of English spoken by lower income African Americans in urban ghettos of the northern United States.
Origins of AAE
The Dialect Theory: some scholars argue that AAE is a dialect of American English because none of its features departs significantly from those found in other dialects of American English.
The Creole Theory: other scholars contend that AAE is sufficiently distinct from and independent of Standard English to merit assignment to English-based Creoles like Jamaican Creole and Gullah, the Creole surviving in the Sea Islands off the coast of South Carolina and Georgia.
The Video Black On White deals with Pidgin English and Creole English used by African American Speakers in the south.
pidgin: a language that develops when speakers of two or more
mutually unintelligible languages develop a need to communicate.
creole: a pidgin language that has become the first language
of a speech community.
What Linguists know about the nature of pidgins and creoles today demonstrate that AAE and AAVE should be considered a language, not a dialect or variant of Standard American English.
English is particularly diversified dialectiacally.
Even when a person speaks only one language, several dialects and speech styles of that language.
idiolect: an individual’s speech variety (voice quality,
choice of words, grammar, and pronunciation).
dialect: the form of speech used by members of a regional or
ethnic, or social group.
style: the way people express themselves in a particular situation.
accent: a distinguishing manner of pronunciation.
Socially and culturally, language variants have important meanings to their
users and reflect the worldview of that speech community.
Dialect, idiolect, style, and accent can reveal a speaker’s:
* social and ethnic background
* class and economic status
* even what is more desirable and less desirable within a speech community.
For example, Americans tend to think that:
* urban is better than rural
* middle class is better than working class
* white is better than black
Anthropologically speaking, language stigmas tend to follow social
or cultural stigmas.
* What is considered most linguistically “appropriate” is often
the speaking characteristics of the economically and politically powerful.
* The way a language is spoken can: unify, divide, endear and intimidate.
* The way a language is spoken embodies the unarticulated culture of both the
speaker and listener.
Notes 1. Tuesday: The Origin of Language
Language could have been the decisive event that made human culture possible.
The study of the origin of language is often associated closely with hominid evolution. This is because linguists have had to rely closely on association with biological evidence for clues to the history of the development of language.
Polygenism: Hominids evolved not from a single source, but from many “Adams.”
Polygenesis Theory: The idea that language evolved not from a single source,
but from several unrelated sources that ultimately came together.
Monogenism: The idea that the human race originated from a single source.
Monogenesis Theory: The idea that human language originated from a single origin
of traits. Radical and Fuzzy forms. Fuzzy Monogenesis seems most likely.
Protolanguage Theory: The original language that produced offspring languages.
* Historically, the search for a protolanguage has been driven by advances
in anthropology – the understanding of how humans evolved.
* Need to remember that in certain circles, evolution is still highly controversial.
But there are still too many unanswered questions.
* We still don’t understand how Neanderthals evolved into Homo Sapiens. (In other words, how primate type language became the language of modern Homo Sapiens today.
Three leading theories of how humans evolved:
1. Wolpoff Theory:( modified theory of polygenesis) argues
that human populations in different world areas evolved from archaic times in
parallel fashion.
2. Stringer Theory: transition to biologically modern humans
first occurred in a single area – either the sub Sahara area or Northern
Africa and spread by merging with local populations of often inferior species.
3. Leaky Theory: The dispersal of the upper Paleolithic Homo
Sapiens from the African continent created a worldwide network of small speech
communities.
The current understanding of human language from a social science perspective is that:
1. it is a form of communication exclusive to Homo Sapiens that developed arbitrarily
with no direct connection to primates.
2. it is culturally patterned.
3. it evolved from a primitive form to an advanced form.
So what are we saying?
* Biologically, humans evolved polygenetically.
* Linguistically, human language probably developed the same way, changing over time.
But “change” along can’t explain the connection between modern languages and ancient languages because…
a. We don’t know how change took place (or takes place now).
b. What we know about change in science is associated closely with evolution, the theory that all species developed from earlier forms through a process of maturation over time.
c. It is because of the theory of evolution that early in the development of the study of languages, social scientists and linguists move from Monogenesis to Polygenesis as the prevailing theory.
The Fuzzy Monogenesis Theory: Human language somehow evolved
from a single (general source) in language communities among Homo Sapiens in
some kind of discontinuous manor.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Continuity Theory: speech must have ultimately developed from
primitive forms of communication used by lower animals; language evolved from
its primitive forms to its modern, advanced forms in a straight line over time.
Discontinuity Theory: human language must be recognized as
unique, without evolutionary antecedents. Otherwise, non-human primates such
as gibbons, chimpan-zees, orangutans, and gorillas wouldn’t be as speechless
as they are.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Protolanguage Theory is an elegant theory, but is still not an absolute certainty by a long shot. There is just not enough concrete evidence.
Notes 2. - Thursday
Because the theory of evolution is such a centerpiece of biological inquiry……
The Study of the Biological Origin of Humans
and
The Study of the Linguistic Origin of Language
Focus on……
The “Protolanguage Possibility” – the idea that there was a single mother language out of which all others developed. This is an elegant theory, but is still not an absolute certainty by a long shot. There is just not enough concrete evidence.
Various Theories of Language Origins from the 18th Century to the present:
Bow Wow Theory: first words were uttered in order to imitate natural sounds.
Pooh Pooh Theory: first words were uttered as spontaneous sounds emitted to register pain and react to the natural environment.
Dingdong (Sing Song) Theory: the peculiar ring each substance in nature possesses came to be vocally represented in human words.
Ha Ha Theory: first human words resulted from laughter.
Evidence about language goes back only about five thousand years. By this time, languages were already fully developed. No hope exists for discovering the earliest stages of development. Current methods are based on the study how living human beings acquire language.Due to recent developments in anthropology and alternative perspectives in linguistics, the polygenesis theory is getting a new look.
Polygenesis Theory: The idea that language evolved not from a single source, but from several unrelated sources that ultimately came together.
How is language studied Today?
Language is typically catalogued and described using two kinds of methods.
1. Synchronic Linguistics: The study of language structure as it exists at one given point in time.
2. Diachronic Linguistics: Also called Historical linguistics, this is the study of the historical development of language, giving attention to the changes that occurred in it over time.
Living Languages Change Through Time: Two Rules:
1. Change (adaptation to an environment).
2. Conformity (among it’s users).
Two Kinds of Language Change:
1. External
2. Internal
Within Diachronic Linguistics, Salzmann writes as if the Protolanguage Theory
is a given fact. This is not necessarily so.
Most widely accepted theory for the Origin of Language:
The Fuzzy Monogenesis Theory: Human language somehow evolved from a single (general source) in language communities among Homo Sapiens in some kind of discontinuous manor.
This isn’t to say that Protolanguage Theory isn’t useful when considered appropriately as in the case of Leonard Bloomfield and Frank Siebert.
Notes 1. Monday
The Roots of Language: How modern speech evolved from a single ancient source
The Berkeley “Eve” Hypothesis: Researchers traced genetic material from women around the world and concluded that all humans alive today are descendents of a tiny population of Homo Sapiens that lived in Africa.
If the human race did arise from this small group of people, it is likely that they all spoke the same language.
UPDATE: August 22nd, 2004
A team of German and British scientists think they have found the first of many
genes that gave humans speech.
The human gene, FOXP2, is the first definitively linked with human language.
Key changes to this gene and others like it in the last 200,000 years of human
evolution appear to have made human speech possible.
"This is hopefully the first of many language genes to be discovered,"
says Wolfgang Enard of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
in Leipzig, Germany.
This discovery lends credence to the protolanguage theory, but most linguistics still think the Fuzzy Monogenesis Theory is the most plausible.
Week 10 Notes 2.
Oral Folklore and Spoken Art
The term folklore has a range of meanings that stretch from oral tradition to traditional practices including customs, beliefs, and mature culture. In the past, the term oral folklore evoked images of traditional practices and beliefs. The more recent emphasis is on the communicative process. The beauty and complexity of oral narratives produced by non-literate peoples have often been underestimated. The oral narratives of non-Western communities have often suffered the same fate.
Oral Folklore and Performance: Contemporary Approaches
* Stress on identification of the language-culture-society linkage.
* Focus is not on the genre, text, structure, comparison, and reconstruction of lyrics, but on the performance, style, event, description, and verbal art tied to the society.
Robert A. George: Story Telling Postulates
* Helps to contextualize performance
1. Each Storytelling event is a communicative event that includes both performer(s)
and the audience.
2. Every storytelling event is a social experience that has meaning for both
the performer(s) and the audience.
3. Every storytelling event is unique.
4. Every storytelling event can be classified according to style.
The teller (performer[s]) enhances the message through the use of music, costumes, and other tools.
Hymes’ acronym for contextual considerations in linguistic ethnography
designed for speaking can also be utilized to study oral Folklore and Performance.
S – Setting and scene: Ochai Hamlet, Towa-cho, Iwate, Japan
P – Participants: Residents of Ochiai Hamlet and observers at performance
events.
E – Ends: Hope to preserve local tradition and values through dance performance.
A – Act sequence: Form and content reflect local history and tradition.
K – Key: Relatively serious, educational – at times religious.
I – Instrumentalities: Performance used language no longer comprehensible
to locals.
N – Norms: Performance is hoped to inspire locals to live by age old values.
G – Genres: Types of speaking performances (monologues, dialogue, chants).
Audience response required.
Week 10 Notes 3. Tuesday
Oral Folklore
The Collection of Traditional Narratives in the United States
Henry R. Schoolcraft (1793-1864): Published extensively on
the folklore of the Ojibwa.
John Wesley Powell (1834-1903): Was know as a collector of
traditional narratives of the Native American.
Franz Boas (1858-1902): Was the most distinguished scholar
in the study of traditional narratives of native North Americans.
Judy A. Teaford (contemporary) Mountain State University, Beckley,
WV. Folktales of the Appalachians
The Classification of Traditional Narratives
The Taxonomic Approach: An examination of the text in order to identify motif and story types – reoccurring elements.
The Functional Approach: Emphasis on what the story means for the people who tell it.
Structural Analysis: The use of taxonomic analysis, structural analysis, and other techniques to account for the order and content of the story.
Interpretation of Myths and Folklore:
Claude Levi-Strauss theorized that, “… the substance of myth doesn’t lie in its style, it’s original music, or its syntax, but in the story which it tells.
* Believed that stories reflect universals contained in the unconscious mind.
* One Universal Characteristic of the unconscious mind was thought to be the tendency of humans to organize the world in binary contrasts.
* The task of the interpretation involved identifying these opposites in a myth or folktale and then to show how they are resolved or mediated.
Week 10 Notes 4. Tuesday
An example of studying Oral Folklore As Performance:
The Ochiai Deer Dancers of Northeast Japan
Hymes’ acronym for contextual considerations in linguistic ethnography
designed for speaking can also be utilized to study oral Folklore and Performance.
S – Setting and scene: Ochai Hamlet, Towa-cho, Iwate, Japan
P – Participants: Residents of Ochiai Hamlet and observers at performance
events.
E – Ends: Hope to preserve local tradition and values through dance performance.
A – Act sequence: Form and content reflect local history and tradition.
K – Key: Relatively serious, educational – at times religious.
I – Instrumentalities: Performance used language no longer comprehensible
to locals.
N – Norms: Performance is hoped to inspire locals to live by age old values.
G – Genres: Types of speaking performances (monologues, dialogue, chants).
Audience response required.
Taxonomic Analysis: Original written text tells the story of a divine deer heard in the area. Eleven morality tales are told. Stories translate into eleven “acts” in a play. Villagers developed choreography and lyrics to accompany song 300 years ago.
Story Type: Japanese Folklore (a Divine Intervention story) from Notheast Japan
Motief: Kami (god[s]) speak to humans through a species of animal marked as divine (also has the characteristics of a wild boar).
Functional Analysis: Deer dance enacts the moral values inherent in the tale such as group unity, loyalty, the importance of recognizing the divine in everyday life, and being willing to die for a fellow member.
Structural Analysis: Contemporary local expression that maintains cultural traditions and lifestyles as the society around them changes.
Levi-Straussian Analysis of Binary Contrasts of the story “Tsunawatari.”
1. What are the Opposing Fields of Meaning in the story? This World and the Other World, Humans and Kami (God), Society and Nature, etc.
2. What is it that mediates these two opposing fields in the story? The Deer.
Emic Interpretation: Traditional culture gives group members the strength to solve life problems.
Week 10 Notes 5.
Ranking of the Most Widely Spoken Languages in the World
Language
1. Chinese (Mandarin)
2. English
3. Hindustani
4. Spanish
5. Russian
6. Arabic
7. Bengali
8. Portuguese
9. Malay-Indonesian
10. French
Source: Ethnologue, 13th Edition, 2005.
Rank of the Most Studied Foreign Languages in the U.S.
Language
1. Spanish
2. French
3. German
4. Italian
5. Am.Sign
6. Japanese
7. Chinese
8. Latin
9. Russian
10. Greek
Week 10 Notes 6. - Friday
A theme that runs through Salzmann Chapater 13 is the application of an ethnolinguistic point of view to everyday life.
* The way we talk and the way we use language reveals a tremendous amount about who we are in various ways.
What is the difference between making sociological inferences based
on the sound of a person’s voice, and linguistic profiling?