CHAPTER 1 THE CONCEPT SOCIOLINGUISTICS, LANGUAGE,
E. What is Sociolinguistics?
2. Language, Dialect, and Varieties
Edward Sapir once stated that ‘language is a purely human and noninstinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions, and desires by means of a system of voluntarily produced symbols’ (1921: 7). A little later, Morris (1946) described it as an arrangement of arbitrary symbols possessing an agreed-upon significance within a community;
furthermore, these symbols can be used and understood independent of immediate contexts, and they are connected in regular ways. First, then, language is a system, which implies regularity and rules of order.
Second, this system is an arbitrary one inasmuch as its particular units or elements have meaning only because of users’ agreement and convention. And third, language is used for communicative purposes by a group of people who constitute the speech or language community. So, a language might be considered as a communication system composed of arbitrary elements which possess an agreed-upon significance within
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a community. These elements are connected in rule-governed ways. The existence of rules (that is to say, grammar) is necessary for comprehension, of course, but it is also essential for the virtually infinite creativity (or productivity) of a system that rests upon a finite number of linguistic gears and axles [My paraphrase, J.E.].
Implicit here is the idea that languages differ from one another in the ways in which they assign meaning to sounds and symbols.
Prescinding entirely from questions about the origins of language itself, and about the evolution of different language communities, I note only that there are numerous language groups in the world, societies whose patterns of communication are not mutually intelligible (although many, of course, are related in language ‘families’: the Indo-European, the Semitic, the Finno-Ugric, and many others).
There is more to language than communication, however, which means that the description given above is not complete – and which demonstrates the basis of the language–identity linkage. One way to approach the other great attribute of languages is to consider, first of all, the pragmatic advantages that might ensue if there were not so many distinct languages in the world. While there are many ‘small’ languages hovering on the brink of extinction, thousands of other varieties continue to exist, and this might be seen by some galactic visitor as a bizarre impediment to communication and understanding, particularly in a world that technology has made smaller and smaller. Some have seen the continuation of language diversity as evidence of a wide-spread human desire to stake particular linguistic claims to the world, to create unique perspectives on reality and to protect group distinctiveness: in a word, to protect an important vehicle of culture and tradition. It is with a view to this desire that Steiner (1992: 243) speaks of separate languages enabling groups to keep to themselves the ‘inherited, singular springs of their identity’. The vehicle of continuity can also, then, be a vehicle for concealment, secrecy and fiction. This idea is not Steiner’s alone.
Popper suggested that what is most characteristic of human language is the possibility of storytelling, and Wittgenstein referred to language disguising thought (see Edwards, 1979b). Earlier, Jespersen (1946) had reminded us of Talleyrand’s famous observation that
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language exists to hide one’s thoughts, and Kierkegaard’s suggestion that language is often used to cover up a complete lack of thought! The idea of language as concealment may seem contrary to the more obvious communicative function, but it should be remembered that communication is a within group phenomenon, while the ‘concealment’
is a linguistic attempt to maintain inviolate a particular grasp of the world. The assumption here, of course, is that those who know your language are also members of your group, and this is clearly an assumption that is often incorrect; ‘outsiders’ can learn your language, or they may gain access to what it contains through translation. But this perhaps only reinforces the urge to conceal and protect, and the historical equation, traduttore-traditore (‘translation is treason’), quite bluntly suggests an unwillingness to see ‘hoarded dreams, patents of life . . . taken across the frontier’ (Steiner, 1992: 244).
There may be some overstatement here, but it seems clear enough that there has always been resistance to the abandoning of a particular language, something that can easily coincide with a desire for a purely
‘instrumental’ bilingualism in which the original variety is retained. If this pragmatically driven bilingualism involves a language stronger or more dominant than the maternal variety, then the latter may find its own domains of use steadily shrinking. The retreat here may involve an increasing emphasis on the non-instrumental functions of the home language, a heightening of the distinction between the communicative and symbolic functions.
2) Dialect
Strictly speaking, a dialect is a variety of a language that differs from others along three dimensions: vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation (accent). Because they are forms of the same language, however, dialects are mutually intelligible. So, while French speakers cannot understand Fulfulde speakers, Texans can understand Cockneys.
If you brew your tea, pronounce it tay and say Come here ’til I pour you a cup, your friend should know what is happening, even if she mashes her tea and would invite you to the table so that she can pour you a cup.
However, we have all heard some dialects that are almost impossible to understand because of the degree of variation from our own; thus,
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mutual intelligibility is frequently difficult and sometimes merely theoretical.
Mutual intelligibility as a criterion of dialects (as opposed to languages) falters at another level. For instance, the existence of dialect continua may mean that only ‘adjacent’ forms are mutually understood.
Consider four dialects, A, B, C and D. If a speaker of A can easily understand B, ‘can just understand C, but cannot really be said to understand D, does a language division come between C and D? But C and D may understand each other quite well’ (Petyt, 1980: 14). Such continua are in fact quite common, especially where one language community borders another. There is, for example, the long Spanish–
Portuguese frontier in South America, as well as the European chain formed by dialects
of German and Dutch. Similar situations exist for varieties of Slovak, Czech, Ukrainian, Polish and Russian, and for western dialects of Italian, French, Catalan, Spanish and Portuguese.
Discussion of dialects soon gives rise to other problems too. If they are different forms that exist under the umbrella of the same language, how finely are we to sieve these differences? Bearing in mind that the logically final distinction here would bring us to the level of the idiolect, convention and convenience generally determine that the analysis stops at some group level, according to need. Petyt (1980: 12) observed that
‘sometimes we speak of “Yorkshire dialect”, thus implying that the features shared by all Yorkshire speakers in contrast to outsiders are important . . . at other times we speak of “Dent dale dialect” with the
“essential” features being much more detailed’.
Criteria supplementary to the intelligibility notion must be provided, and Petyt and others have focused upon two. The first has to do with the existence of a written language: if groups who differ in speech patterns share a common written form, they maybe said to speak different dialects. The second involves matters of political allegiance and national identity (and power: ‘A language’, as Max Weinreich reported [1945], ‘is a dialect that has an army and navy’2). Both are involved where Cantonese and Mandarin speakers are concerned.
Speakers of these varieties may have considerable difficulty understanding one another but they are nonetheless considered to speak
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dialects of Chinese, not only because they use the same written form, but also because of the overarching state of which they are members. On the other hand, while Norwegian and Danish speakers can understand each other well, the demands of national and political identity require that they have different languages. On the basis of intelligibility alone, there are really two Scandinavian languages: a continental variety comprising Norwegian, Danish and Swedish, and an insular language (Icelandic and Faroese). There are other examples, too, of the dominance of political concerns over purely linguistic ones, concerns that dictate that Serbian and Croatian, Hindi and Urdu, Flemish and Dutch, and so on, are to be seen as separate languages.
A particularly interesting example was provided by Wolff (1959), who showed how the concept of intelligibility itself may be subject to social pressure. Among the Urhobo dialects of south-western Nigeria, mutual intelligibility was evident and acknowledged, until speakers of Isoko began to claim that their ‘language’ was different from the rest, a claim coinciding with their demands for increased political autonomy.
Another group, speakers of the Okpe dialect that is almost identical to Isoko, were not making such nationalistic claims and, for them, mutual intelligibility remained unaffected (see also Heine, 1979; Maurud, 1976).
It is not difficult to see that, given sufficient time, a political desire for linguistic distinctiveness could actually lead to the real loss of mutual intelligibility. This process could be strengthened if, as well, growing feelings of difference led to decreasing group contact. Elements could then be in place like those that contributed to the transition from dialect to language status for French, Italian, Romanian, Portuguese and Spanish – the Romance languages that began life as dialects of the Latin of the Roman empire. (The word ‘romance’ comes from the vulgar Latin romanice – meaning ‘in the local variety, descended from Latin’, and contrasted with latine, or ‘in Latin itself ’.)
As with languages, dialects cannot be seen, linguistically, in terms of better or worse. However, while there may be (relatively) few people who would want to argue that French is better than English, the idea that Oxford English is better than Cockney remains a prejudice of broader appeal. ‘Dialect’ has long been used, of course, to denote a substandard
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deviation from some prestigious variety or more ‘standard’ form.
Dictionary definitions have supported this view, with even the Oxford English Dictionary noting that a dialect is ‘one of the subordinate forms or varieties of a language arising from local peculiarities’. In a sense this is correct, but it is incorrect to assume – as the definition would imply to many – that this ‘subordinate’ status has any inherent linguistic basis.
Neither should it be thought, as some have traditionally done (see Wyld, 1934, below), that some varieties simply sound better than others or are more aesthetically pleasing. Clearly, we must attend a little more closely to these matters.
If, as we have seen, popular attitudes about the superiority/inferiority of languages are resistant to change despite the weight of linguistic evidence, then those concerning styles, accents and dialects are even more deeply ingrained. ‘Ain’t’, we are instructed, is always wrong; two negatives (in English) make a positive; saying dese, dat and dose is uneducated (at best); Cockney and Joual depart from both accuracy and propriety; and so on. Vocabulary, pronunciation and grammar that are at variance with a received ‘standard’ are regularly dismissed, and a great divide is thus perceived between such a standard and all other ‘substandard’ forms. In fact, however: Just as there is no linguistic reason for arguing that Gaelic is superior to Chinese, so no English dialect can be claimed to be linguistically superior or inferior to any other . . . There is no linguistic evidence whatsoever for suggesting that one dialect is more ‘expressive’ or ‘logical’ than any other, or for postulating that there are any ‘primitive’, ‘inadequate’ or ‘debased’
English dialects. (Trudgill, 1975: 26). By logical extension, Trudgill’s point applies to all dialects of all languages.