Some accents just Palin comparison to others

Tee hee hee, see what I did there? A headline truly worthy of the hallowed pages of the "Sun Writer's Pun-Writer" handbook. For this post is indeed all about accents (accents such as that of Sarah Palin, candidate for the US Vice-Presidency) and how some accents (Sarah Palin's, for example) are seen to be less prestigious and/or desirable than others - in fact, some accents pale in comparison to others (Palin comparison... geddit?). Ahh-herrmmm... anyway...*

One article from the American press chooses to headline specific negative perceptions of Sarah Palin's accent ("What an accent! Mush!") as a summary of the writer's generally less than positive views about her as a politician. This highlights the fact that people tend to see accent and dialect as an important characteristic when it comes to making judgements about other people, and another article from the American press picks up on this. Like the first article, this one starts by focusing on Sarah Palin's accent ("Really? That's an Alaskan accent?") but moves on to a more detailed discussion of the significance of attitudes towards language varieties, drawing on the views and observations of a number of expert linguists. Whilst this article focuses exclusively on American accents (and is therefore technically outside of our remit for Unit 5 'Contemporary Language Variation in the British Isles'), many of the issues that are raised about accents of American English are of equal significance for British English varieties. Among the points raised is the observation that, contrary to earlier predictions that regional accents would 'die out', people are actually holding on to their distinctive linguistic varieties as a means of marking their identity.

On the other hand, the article reports, there are some people who see a distinctive regional accent as an obstacle to progression in socio-economic terms, and it is perhaps these people that are adopting a more standard language variety that is not marked for any particular region. The writer picks on "rural Maine" as the undesirable antithesis to the "city", and there's an important point to bear in mind here: attitudes towards regional accents and dialects are not always based on their linguistic characteristics, but often on society's percpetions of the region with which the variety is associated.

Nowhere is this more true than in Britain, where you can pretty much guarantee that any opinion poll asking which is Britain's coolest/most prestigious/sexiest accent will show one variety coming bottom of the heap: the Birmingham accent and dialect. The results of a recent CoolBrands survey identified 'Brummie' as the least cool accent of British English, with Received Pronunciation seen as the coolest (don't ask me why, I don't make up the rules!), closely followed by Scotts and Geordie. You can read the full story here and here. Like users of any regional variety, though, many Brummies are proud of their accent and dialect, even if they are aware of the negative light in which it casts them in many people's eyes.

The road sign pictured left actually appeared at roadworks in Dudley in the West Midlands a few years ago (I'm offering a prize for the first correct translation posted in the 'comments' section of this post), and gives a clear indication of the sense of solidarity that can come with the use of a regional variety. As a proud ex-pat Brummie myself, I'm always pleased to see this kind of thing. Imagine my delight last year, then, when I found out about national Talk Like a Brummie day. And how much more delighted do you think I was when I found out that said event is to be repeated on 19th July 2009?!! Yowm gunna loov it, aah kid.


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*I'll get my coat...

Room for a small one?

Sticking with what seems to have become a bit of a theme in recent postings, this article on language innovation asks us to consider whether the English language is 'full'? The writer of the article, Alex Beam, claims to "love neologisms, coinages, new words, whatever you want to call them", citing staycation, manecdote and brocabulary as personal favourites. In the interest of presenting a balanced argument, however, Beam raises the following question:

Are new words as great as we think they are? Paul MacInnes, writing for The
Guardian newspaper, says no. "The common line is that any new word is a good
word," he says. "It shows a vibrant, playful language shaped by those who
practice it." He continues: "Not often, however, does anyone stop to ask whether
this is a good thing, whether... the English language is full."

It's an interesting point, whether or not you agree with it - and this kind of debate is right up our street as far as the A2 English Language course content is concerned.

txt speak - luv it or h8 it?

There's been a lot of media interest in the language of text messaging recently, not least because of the latest book to be published by David Crystal, one of the UK's leading linguists. In Txting: the gr8 db8 Crystal explores the impact that the language of texting has had on the spelling system of English. This article features a detailed account of some of Crystal's thoughts on the subject. Whether you're an AS student thinking about the language of so-called 'blended', mixed mode electronic texts, or an A2 student focusing on language change and attitudes towards it, this article is a very useful one to read.

Lend us a word, mate

With the history of the English language at the forefront of our minds on the A2 course at the moment, this article was a timely find. The article reviews a new book, The Secret Life of Words: How English Became English by Henry Hitchings, and focuses in particular on the wide variety of foreign loanwards that have worked their way into the English language for one reason or another over the centuries. As well as citing some of the usual suspects (Latin, Old Norse, French), the reviewer highlights some of the other languages that have so generously donated their lexemes to our beloved tongue - among them Turkish, Arabic and Dutch. As the reviewer points out, this rich linguistic history reflects and indeed emphasises the multifaceted nature of Britain's social, political and economic history.

Having worked through some examples of words that have come into English from other languages, the reviewer touches on some of the attitudes that are often expressed about the proliferation of foreign loanwords in English. He comments that English has never been short of its "furious defenders against foreign corruption", an observation about 'linguistic gatekeeping' that links very nicely with a couple of other articles that I found recently - this time not about words but about spelling.

This one talks about "the utter irrationality of British spelling", commenting on the somewhat controversial views of John Wells, a professor of phonetics and president of the Spelling Society, before going on to discuss in detail the arguments for and against spelling reform. Professor Wells argues:

"Let's allow people greater freedom to spell logically," adding, "Have we really
nothing better to do with our lives than fret about the apostrophe?"

You can read more about Professor Wells' (Wells's?) views in another recent article, which focuses on - among other issues - the use, misuse and abuse of the apostrophe. This third article adds further detail to the same story.

To round off this posting on language change and people's attitudes towards it, you might like to have a look at this article, which reports on some of the new slang words that have earnt their place in the pages of the latest Oxford English Dictionary of Modern Slang. The only thing I'll say is that I cannot be held responsible for the image that they've chosen to accompany their story, nor for the feelings of revulsion that are certain to ensue. Enjoy.

Advertising dinosaurs of the pre-PC age

Blog entries, eh? Nothing for nearly two weeks and then three come along all at once. Please forgive the dearth of postings of late - I've been a very busy chap.

Anyway, hot on the heels of our recent (AS level) class discussions of the representations of subjects and audiences in adverts, I happened upon this article while scouring the net for tasty morsels. I offer no comments (I wouldn't dare), but I think you'll find them particularly interesting as a window on the way we used to be when it came to gender politics. Prepare to be amazed/infuriated/amused* (*delete as applicable).

Rents think Teenglish website is bare nang, blats

...or something. If you thought that 'malt' was something used in making beer, 'rare' was a way of cooking steak and 'flossing' was that thing the dentist is always nagging you to do, then you need the Teenglish Jargon Buster. Okay, maybe you don't actually need it, but your parents might, as this story in the Daily Mail tells us.

The jargon buster is a feature of the gotateenager website hosted by Parentlineplus, the purpose of which is to "help break down the language barrier" between parents and teenagers. What is interesting about this website is that it aims to keep on updating the dictionary of 'Teenglish', inviting contributions from parents in order to do so. This is particularly important given the extreme transience of this particular type of slang - it changes more rapidly, probably, than any other type of non-standard or colloquial usage, so websites like this are useful for linguists like us if we want to keep track of this high-speed language change as it occurs. After all, some of the words that appear in slang dictionaries like this one are out of date almost as soon as they are published ("phat", anyone...?).

War of the words

As the campaign for the American Presidency gathers pace, the candidates and their 'people' are keener than ever to find something - anything - to use as a weapon against their opponents. In the wake of yesterday's outcry about Barack Obama's 'lipstick on a pig' comment comes a fresh accusation of racism against supporters of John McCain.

The argument revolves around the use of the word 'uppity' by two separate Republican politicians in reference to Obama and his wife and to a black news reporter, as reported here. A spokesman for the two Republican politicians argued that they had "simply evoked a word that by definition described [their] demeanor as being superior, arrogant and presumptuous". However, supporters of Obama have been quick to point out that the word has a racially-loaded history and that its use by the Republicans is far from innocuous. This article explains the background to the use of the word:

The phrase “uppity (N-word)” was used to let a black person know he was out
of his “place.” It was used on black people during the civil rights movement, who refused to give up seats on buses and who moved into segregated neighborhoods, as well as black people who used proper English. It was likely the last phrase heard by freedom riders in Mississippi before they were killed and buried in an earthen dam.

Whether or not the Republicans were conscious of this history is unclear. What is clear, though, is that language really is a 'loaded weapon' and should be handled with extreme caution!

it wz me wot dn it lol

Linguists have played an important role in the science of forensics for many years, using their knowledge of the structures and patterns of language use to identify the origins of 'mystery voices', construct pictures of the social background of suspects and even expose falsified written statements. Until recently the forensic linguist's evidence has been mainly in the form of tape recordings and written documents, but this news report explains how linguists are now beginning to focus on the language of electronic media such as text messaging.

The article comments that people "choose their own text language "rules" - which they tend to use throughout all their messages", and explains that it is therefore possible to spot a 'fake' message sent by someone masquerading as someone else (as was proven to have happened in the murder case on which the article focuses). The article goes on to say that "forensic linguists can also build a "sociolinguistic" profile of the author: they can give an idea of a texter's gender or age... women tend to be inter-personal while men make arrangements".

So it would seem that the language of electronic communication varies in the same ways and according to the same factors as spoken language does.

More grammar gripes

Following their report on Tesco's decision to re-label their "10 items or less" checkouts (as discussed in my recent Less is more blog posting), BBC News on-line magazine has published a 'rogues gallery' of the 20 most hated grammar crimes, as identified by its readers. Have a look at the list and see whether you feel as strongly about these misuses of language as some people apparently do. Perhaps you have some additional gripes of your own that don't get a mention here...

CONGRATULATIONS...

...on choosing to take the most exciting*, useful** and just plain excellent*** A level course known to human beings. We'd just like to take this opportunity to say "welcome" to all our new AS English Language students, and "welcome back" to those of you starting your second year of English Language at Strode's.

The purpose of this blog is to help you to keep up to date with current news articles, websites and other resources that focus on aspects of English Language and that will support your learning. The blog is updated by members of the English Language team on a regular basis, so please do log in as frequently as possible. If you've got something to say about the issues raised in one of the blog entries, please do feel free to post a comment. Similarly, if you happen to come across an interesting language-related resource/website/news item somewhere and you think other students would benefit from accessing it, then please email the details to your teacher at jjones@strodes.ac.uk, nwhillans@strodes.ac.uk or telliott@strodes.ac.uk and we'll post it up.

*probably
**no doubt about this one
***well, we like to think so

Less is more

The language police are on patrol again - and this time they've got Tesco under surveillance. As this BBC News article explains, there are those who object to the grammatical inaccuracy of the "10 items or less" sign that appears on some checkouts, arging that 'fewer' is the correct term to use in this context:

Both words are used as comparatives - fewer meaning "a smaller number of", less
meaning "a smaller amount or quantity of"... Fewer should be used when you are
talking about items that can be counted individually, for example, "fewer than
10 apples". Less is correct when quantities cannot be individually counted in
that case, e.g. "I would like less water".

So we return once again to the presecriptivist debate. Grammatical pedants (and I hold my hands up to being one of them on this particular occasion, the confusion between 'less' and 'fewer' being one of my own language 'niggles') strive for technical accuracy, while their more linguistically liberal counterparts might argue that nobody is confused by the supposedly inaccurate "10 items or less" so why bother about it? All good fuel for the language debates furnace.