CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought

(Sem I, 2017/18)

THE UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG Warm-up activity

COMMON CORE CURRICULUM ~ GLOBAL ISSUES
SEMESTER I, 2017/18

Turn to your neighbour, introduce yourselves, and discuss:
CCGL9038:
English as a global language in What is a standard language?
Asian contexts What is standard English?
Do you speak standard English?
DR. LISA LIM etc

Lecture 3
Standards a nd n ativeness
rethought

Standard languages: Four stages (Haugen 1966)

1. Selection
What is a standard language? One variety is chosen as the one to be developed as the standard language
Often an existing variety that already has political and/or economic currency,
Standard language: e.g. Modern Std Eng from Mercian, the East Midlands dialect after the Royal
Court was established there after the Norman Conquest
Variety of language considered to be the accepted norm,
Could involve selection from several varieties, e.g. Modern/ Std Hebrew
optimum for educational purposes, used as yardstick against Michnaic spelling, Sephardic pronunciation, Yiddish idioms and calques
which other varieties are measured, prestige variety.

2. Codication
Language standards:
Selected variety is xed in grammar books and dictionaries so that people
Prescriptive language rules which constitute the standard, and have access to its standard forms
to which all members of language community are exposed and

urged to conform during education, regardless of local variety.
3. Elaboration of function
Note: Such standards (rules) are subject to change over time,
To full a wide range of functions (government, law, education, science,
since a living language is by denition dynamic.
literature, etc), new lexical items and conventions are developed to ll gaps
Complaint tradition


4. Acceptance

Dr Lisa Lim, 20 Sept 2017 1

CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

Varieties of English activity What is a standard English?

Listen to the recordings; respond on the handout The dialect of educated people (throughout the British Isles),
normally used in writing, for teaching (in schools, universities, in
ESL/EFL), and heard on radio and TV (Hughes & Trudgill 1979;
Trudgill & Hannah 1994)

The set of grammar and core vocabulary of educated usage in

English, in speech and writing, including colloquial and slang
vocabulary, swear words and taboo expressions; note: not
pronunciation (Trudgill 1984; Strevens 1985)

Actually: A minority variety, identied chiey by grammar,

vocabulary and orthography, which carries most prestige and is
most widely understood (Crystal 1995)

A social (i.e. not regional) dialect (Trudgill 1999)

Standard English: what it isnt

Not a language, but just one variety of English
New Englishes (Platt, Weber & Ho 1984)

1. Developed through the education system, i.e. taught as a

Not an accent in Britain 12-15% speak StdE, of which 9-12% use a subject, usually used as medium of education
regional accent
2. Developed in area where native variety of English was not the
language spoken by most of the population
Not a style can be spoken in formal, neutral and informal styles 3. Used for a range of functions among those who speak/write it
in the region where it is used
Not a register register is largely a matter of vocabulary in 4. Has become localised or nativised by adopting/ developing
some linguistic features of its own
relation to subject matter (e.g. register of medicine, of cricket,
of knitting)
E.g. There was two eskers what we saw in them U-shaped Also note:
valleys (non-standard English in register of physical geography) * Multilingual ecology
* Nativisation as a result of inuence from dominant local
languages
Not a set of prescriptive rules
(Trudgill 1999)

Dr Lisa Lim, 20 Sept 2017 2

CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

The ecology of SIngapore

1819: Sir Stamford Raes

acquires island for British East
India Company
Prior to this, from at least early
14C, Temasek was a node in the
trading networks along with
Riau and other islands; already a
heterogeneous population of
Malays, Bugis, southern
Chinese, Indians, Peranakans,
Eurasians.
After 1819, a massive inux of
settlers

Linguistic historiography of Singapore: Eras (Lim 2007, 2010)

80
Malays: Malay peninsula, Sumatra,
Riau archipelago, Java, Sulawesi 70 Consider both external ecology (immigration patterns, language policies, etc)
(Bugis), Bawean Island (Boyanese), and internal ecology (typology of languages, linguistic features, etc)
etc. 60

Chinese: Hokkien, Teochew, 50 I. The age of the original immigrant languages:
Cantonese, Hainanese, Hakka, etc. Malays Pre-colony through post-independence
40
Chinese - Bazaar Malay, Hokkien (English, Indian lgs)
Indians: South India - Tamil, Indians II. The age of the ocial languages:
30
Malayalam, Telugu; North India - Mid-1970s to present
Punjabi, Bengali; Sri Lanka - 20 - English, Mandarin (Malay, Tamil, Hokkien, Cantonese)
Ceylonese III. The age of the global-media languages:
10 Late 1980s to present
Others: Eurasian, English, Scots, - English, Mandarin, Cantonese (other Chinese varieties)
Welsh, Irish, American 0
1824 1836 1901 2000

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CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

socio-politics language policies

1834: rst English-medium school Singapore/ Singapore English:

1819: Sir Stamford Raes
acquires island for British East 1920s: non-English medium schools also teaching
India Company English Categorised as:
1942-45: WWII - non-native/ ESL [older]
1956: All-Party Committee Report: English, - Outer Circle (Kachru 1992)
Mandarin, Malay & Tamil declared 4 ocial - New English (Kandiah 1998)
languages
1959: self government
End of 1950s: enrolment in English-medium
1963-65: part of Federation of Variation in SgE:
schools more than in other language schools
Malaysia - lectal continuum: acrolect - mesolect - basilect
1965: English is compulsory language in
1965: independence - diglossia: Standard Singapore English (SSE) - Colloquial Singapore
education (as L1 or L2)
English (CSE)
1979: annual Speak Mandarin Campaign

1987: all schools English-medium; bilingual
system, mother tongue taught as L2 Matrix for SE structure:
- Lexier (superstrate): English
English literacy: 47% (1970) to 71% (2000) - Adstrates/ substrates: restructured Malay + Southern Chinese varieties:
English as dominant language at home: 12% (1980) to 23% (2000) Hokkien, Cantonese + Mandarin
Primary 1 Chinese students dominant home language: English > Mandarin (2004)

Aspectual categories in SE (Bao 2005)

SE ever [Perfective: Experiential] Chinese experiential guo
SE already [Perfective; Inchoative; Inceptive] Chinese le
(2d) I ever try this type of fruit (before) (3d) wo3 chi1 guo Ri4ben3 fan4
(2a) I see the movie already. [Perfective: Completive] (3a) wo3men2 chi1 le liu2lian2 I eat GUO Japan food
I have tried this type of fruit before
I saw the movie/ I have already seen the movie. we eat LE durian [Completive] Ive eaten Japanese food (before)

We ate durian
(2e) John ever love Mary
(2b) Her tongue red already. [Inchoative] (3b) qiang2 bai2 le (3e) ta1 ai4 guo Huang2 Xiao3jie3
John has loved/loved Mary
wall white LE [Inchoative] he love GUO Huang Miss
Her tongue has turned red. (It is now red, but was
not red prior to time of ref) The wall is whitened He once loved Miss Huang

(3c) wo3men2 chi1 liu2lian2 le
- Not derived from English, which does
we eat durian LE [Inceptive] not have the experiential in its
(2c) It rain already. [Inceptive]
We started/ are about to eat aspectual system;
It has started to rain durian - Derived from Chinese guo which marks
indenite past aspect with the meaning
These 3 meanings of already are not derived from happened at least once in the past
English, which relies on:
- verbal morphology (V-ed, have V-en) for Completive
- explicit lexical items for Inchoative and Inceptive

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CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

Passives in SE (Ansaldo 2004)

SE got Chinese you3
(4a) She made a police report, the fella kena charge
Locative: Locative: (4b) His tail like like kena caught in the in the ratchet
(2f) Inside got a lot of fruits (3f) qiang2-shang4 you3 yi1-fu hua4 (4c) *He kena praised by his boss.
Inside, there are a lot of fruits wall-on have one-CL picture (4d) *The man kena known by everyone

On the wall there is a picture
Malay
(5a) kena to strike, to get: passive marker in preverbal position, semantic
Existential: Existential: function of adversative
(2g) Got a few times I nish rst (3g) you3 liang3-men ke4 wo3 xiang3 xuan3 Sinitic
(5b) Min (Hokkien): tioh8 to get, e.g. tioh8 siong1 get wounded
A few times, I nished rst have two-CL course I want take
Mandarin, Cantonese: semantically adversative, but product of dierent
There are two courses I want to take grammaticalisation path; in Cantonese require an agent.

Ansaldo (2004): typological convergence
impossible to conrm which substrates may be exact source
likely that kena passive is innovation based on partial replication of Malay
features, possibly reinforced by similar structure in Hokkien.

Zero copula & predicative adjectives, & Topic-Comment in SE (Ansaldo 2009)

(6) Careful, laksa very hot (7a) Che1 hou2 wu4jou4 (Cantonese) Substrates
Singapore English
Car very dirty

The car is very dirty cantik-cantik pretty-pretty
Why I never see you wear those
(7b) Buku itu baru (Malay) [= very pretty] (Malay)
short-short skirts ah? [=very short]
book that new khin-khin khiam-khiam thrifty-thrifty
Adj: INTENSIFICATION [=very thrifty] (Hokkien)
That book is new



(11a) Zhang1san1 yi3jing1 jian4-guo le Dont always stay in the house. Go minum-minum drink-drink
(10a) Fish you wan? [= just a drink] (Malay)
(Sinitic: Mandarin) outside walk-walk [=stroll]
Do you
want (some) sh (to eat)? John already see-EXP CRS V: ATTENUATION sue-sue wash-wash
[= wash quickly] (Hokkien)
Zhangsan I have already seen
(10b) Expensive the durian here
Dont like that stare-stare-stare at sui-sui-sui pretty-pretty-
The durian here is expensive (11b) Ikan boleh masak (Malay) people. [=keep on staring] pretty (Hokkien)
Fish can cook V: CONTINUITY
(I/you/we) can cook the sh

Dr Lisa Lim, 20 Sept 2017 5

CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

Singapore English particles

(7) A: But this one only for matriculated students. Indicates
(1) A: What do you want to talk about? obviousness,
B: Anything under the sun la21. Matter-of-fact B: Im matriculated wat21. contradicts previous
Im matriculated, as you well know (so I should be assertion
Persuasive eligible for this)
(2) Tired la24.

(3) Then you got to do those papers again a21? Response (8) The most I have fewer kids lo33. Indicates
required obviousness,
So do you have to do those papers again? At the very worst, Ill have fewer children. inevitability,
resignation
Rearming; no
(4) Then you got to do those papers again a24? response (9) A: But its beautiful in that I mean Finn got got a
So you have to those papers again (I know) required chance to realise himself right? Asserts proposition,
B: Hes quite innocent la21 ho24? Innocent? garners support
(5) Okay when you go to BBDC a24, you have to attend six Continuation Hes quite innocent, dont you agree?
class.
Softens
(6) You hold on a24. command
Hold on, if thats okay with you.

(10) No la21! Hes using Pirelli, you dont know me55? Indicates
No, he has Pirelli tyres; didnt you know that? surprise,
[incredulously] scepticism
(10)
A: My parents will disown me a22 if I marry someone Caucasian
(11) A: How come you call me? or Indian. My parents very what.
Why did you call me? Presents
B: *** old fashion a21.
information as
B: You page for me ma22. obvious A: My parents very old fashion a21? Then your parents le55?
You paged for me, after all (as you know) (so naturally Are you saying that my parents are old fashioned? Then what
Im returning your call) about your parents? [indicates comparison (what about?)]

(12) A: My parents will disown me a22 if I marry someone
Caucasian or Indian. My parents very what. cf. Cantonese:
B: *** old fashion a21. Indicates A: D gs maaih saai bi yhn la.
comparison CL furniture sell all to people PRT
A: My parents very old fashion a21? Then your parents le55? (what The furniture has all been sold.
Are you saying that my parents are old fashioned? about?) B: Ga ch l?
Then what about your parents? CL car PRT
what about the car? [comparison, what about?]

Dr Lisa Lim, 20 Sept 2017 6

CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

Quirk vs Kachru: non-native Englishes as ?

A: Eh, you know that Razid in Pizza Hut, right? Quirk: as decit Kachru: as dierence
B: Which one?
Native and non-native speakers have Constant touch with the
C: Razid ah, Razid ... the the other mat. (young) Malay
male [Malay] dierent intuitions about a native language does not
A: Razali Razalis friend ... You know what he was doing or not? language, e.g. they dier in their apply: non-native users of
B: Oh the one who always like to kow peh, is it? complain judgements of the grammatical English have internalisations
unnecessarily [Hokkien] correctness of sentences, have which are linked to their
A, C: Yah yah radically dierent internalisations of own multilingual,
C: The one who always making noise... the language sociolinguistic and
B: Dont like him, you know he ah like macam (is) like [Malay] There are no institutionalised non- sociocultural contexts
C: That botak botak fella bald bald = very bald [Malay] native varieties of English these
B: Ah like super that are merely an attempt to justify
A: The fella centre botak three side hair one. inability to acquire what they persist
The guy who [= has the quality of ] has hair on three sides (of his head) and in seeing as real English. the
is bald in the middle
English of the teachers themselves
C: Huhuh that guy there got problem ah, that fella
inevitably bears the stamp of locally
Huh, that guy has a problem, you know, that fellow
acquired deviation from the
standard language

Kachru: Quirks approach based on false assumptions

Fallacies: Reality:
Quirk: non-native Englishes as decit (contd)
1. In the Outer and Expanding 1. English is for interaction amongst
Circles, English is essentially its non-native users, with distinct
Learners of English outside Britain come to the language with learnt to interact with the linguistic and cultural
native speakers of the backgrounds
little or no prior knowledge, and need to learn Standard English language
in order to increase their freedom and their career prospects. 2. English is essentially learnt as a 2. In culturally and linguistically
tool to understand and teach pluralistic regions, English is an
American or British cultural important tool to impart local
The teaching of English in the countries of the Expanding Circle values traditions and cultural values
should not involve any conict over standards and where it 3. The international non-native 3. Such institutionalised varieties
does, is a reection of half-baked quackery that is mainly varieties of English are are varieties of English in their
perpetuated by minimally trained teachers and academic essentially interlanguages own right rather than stages on
linguists with little experience of foreign language teaching striving to achieve native-like the way to more native-like
character.
English
4.Native speaker of English as
teachers, administrators and 4.In global context, we need
material developers paradigm shift in concepts like
speech community, ideal
speaker-hearer, native speaker
of English

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CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

Native vs non-native debate

Quirk (1990): Non-native varieties of English as decit inadequately Alternatives to nativeness:
learnt versions of correct native English (decit linguistics) English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) or
Kachru (1991): Non-native varieties as dierent based on English as an International Language (EIL)
sociolinguistic realities of identity, creativity, and linguistic and
cultural contact (liberation linguistics)
When English is used as an international lingua franca (i.e.
amongst L2 speakers, often with no L1 speaker present),
Mufwene (1997): Distinctions between Englishes has more to do rather than a traditional foreign language, these speakers
with who have appropriated and speak them than with how they own their lingua franca makes no sense to describe
developed and how they are structurally from each other, hence with them as non-native speakers.
how mutually intelligible they are.
A lingua franca by denition has no native speakers all its
Legitimate ospring: spoken by descendants of European speakers
speakers have to learn to use it
of English
Illegitimate ospring: spoken by those who are not (thus Outer (e.g. Seidlhofer 2012)
Circle, pidgins & creoles)
Language contact also a feature of legitimate Englishes, e.g. Irish
and Scots-Irish Eng inuenced by contact with Gaelic.

Alternatives to nativeness: Expertise Alternative to nativeness: Bilingual users of English

Expert to describe accomplished users of English: Monolingual English Speaker (MES): Speakers of English
who speak no other language
Experts do not have to feel close to what they know a lot
about. Expertise is dierent from identication. Bilingual English Speaker (BES): Procient speakers of
English and at least 1 other language, regardless of order
Expertise is learned, not xed or innate. of acquisition
Expertise is relative; one expert is another persons fool. Non-Bilingual English Speaker (NBES): Not bilingual in
Expertise is partial: people can be expert in several elds, English, but able to speak it at reasonable level
but they are never omniscient. Recognises greater linguistic competence of the BES and
To achieve expertise, one goes through processes of less of the MES monolingualism is not preferable nor
the norm
certication, in which one is judged by other people; the
standards of assessment can be reviewed and disputed. Removes articial distinction between L1 and L2 speakers
(Jenkins 1996, 2000:8-10)
(Rampton 1990:98-99; Leung, Harris and Rampton 1997)

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CCGL9038 English as a global language in Asian contexts Lecture 3: Standards and nativeness rethought
(Sem I, 2017/18)

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