LANGUAGE

WHERE ARE ENGLISH LANGUAGE SPEAKERS DISTRIBUTED?

VOCABULARY

Language: a system of communication through speech & is a collection of sounds that a group of people understands to have the same meaning

Official Language: used by the government for laws, reports, & public objects understood by most or all citizens

Dialect: a regional variation of a language distinguished by distinctive vocabulary, , spelling, and pronunciation

Isogloss: a boundary that separates regions in which different languages predominate

ORIGIN & DIFFUSION OF ENGLISH

FORMATION

• 3 groups of people came together; form theEnglish people & English language
• Angles in the North
• Jules in the Southeast
• Saxons in the South & in the West
• Migrated to England 1500 years ago

THE DIFFUSION OF ENGLISH

• The people of England migrated with the language
• When they went to establish colonies
• Jamestwon in 1607 and Plymouth in 1620
• Over past 4 centuries

ORIGIN OF THEM

• They were Germanic tribes
• Angles from Southern Denmark
• Jules from Northern Denmark

TWO INVASIONS

• Added additional words to the evolving English Launguage
• The German invasion
• The Norman invasion
• Norman-come from normandy in present day France
• England conquered by the Normans in 1066, French official language 300 years

Figure 5-1
Although English may be the official language of 42 countries, it is not the most common & widely used language in 26 of these countries. In countries that were once British colonies, a significant number of people understand English as well.

Figure 5-2
Depicts invasions in England. The tribes were known as the Jutes occupying Southern England, Saxons to South & West, & Angles to the North. At the time, they inhabited present day Germany & Denmark. The spatial separation of them began the first major regional differences in dialect.

DIALECTS OF ENGLISH

Dialects!
a regional variation of a language distinguished by distinctive vocabulary, , spelling, and pronunciation;
different dialects can understand one another

Standard language!
the dialect chosen to be established & well recognized when many dialects are spoken
-government, business, education, & mass comunication

Figure 5-3
After the Norman invasion, you can see that there are two more dialects present. You can see that the Middle English & Old English correspond a bit. Mercian became West & East Midland. West Saxon became known as Southwestern, and Kentish as Southeastern. Northumbrian became Lowland Scottish and Northern.

AMERICAN ENGLISH VS BRITISH ENGLISH

Britain's Standard Language is BRP, British Received Pronunciation
-politicians, broadcasters, & actors
-London, Cambridge, & Oxford
-introduction of printing press to England in 1476

American English is so different from British English because of isolation
-developing apart from one another & evolving independently

Pronunciation differences are almost immediately recognizable between American English & British English

Language differences, as exhibited in dialects tend to be greater in rural areas than in cities because farmers are relatively isolated from interactions with people from other dialect regions
-no outside influences, developing on their own again

There is a relatively uniform form of the English dialect spoken across the Midwest, Great Plains, & Western U.S. due to the mobility of Americans

Figure 5-4
Displays dialects of the Eastern U.S. The Eastern U.S. can be divided into 3 regions, Northern, Midlands, & Southern, each having more subregions within them. People from these regions migrating West not only brought along distinctive house styles, but distinctive dialects too.