Wales!

Thank you very much for looking at my blog, I have now had well over 400 views from 10 different countries! Tomorrow I am going to Wales for a week before I return to sixth form. While exploring, I hope to do some research about the Welsh language and why its’ popularity is decreasing. So, next week I will be able to upload some posts about the current state of the language and its’ future.

In the meantime, I wonder how many of these phrases you can pronounce…

English	Welsh
Hello	Helô / Hylô / Shwmae / S'mae
Good morning	Bore da
Pleased to meet you	Mae'n dda gen i gwrdd â ti / Neis cwrdd â ti (inf)
How are you?	Shwmae? Sut mae? (inf)
I’m fine thanks, you?	Da iawn, diolch. A tithau? (inf)
What’s your name?	Be(th) ydy dy enw di? (inf)
My name is…	... dwi / ... ydw i

Phrases and correct pronunciation can be found on: http://www.omniglot.com/language/phrases/welsh.php

Antonio Gaudí

Gaudí was born in Reus, Catalonia in 1852. When he was growing up he seemingly spoke Catalan, Spanish and English but this has not been officially confirmed. At 18 years old, Gaudí moved to Barcelona to study architecture, where he cultivated a love of modern architecture. However, the reason why he is so famous was his innovative thinking and his desire to create a ‘new architectural language’

As he learnt and gained experience, Gaudí worked on many different projects, including the lampposts in the Plaça Reial, a building in Mataró and Casa Vicens. However, his first major project was Park Güell.

I thoroughly recommend that you visit these buildings if you go to Barcelona not only because they’re beautiful but you can learn a lot about Gaudí’s history and Catalan culture.

Park Güell

Park Güell is located 5.3km inland and north of the Gothic centre of Barcelona. It is easy to access by local transport, especially the metro, as you can reach it by using Line 3 and get off at Vallacara. This large park has many facilities and is situated on a hill, therefore you can see magnificent views of the city. However, the main reason to visit the park, is to see Gaudí’s mosaics. There are many different pieces of Gaudí’s works around the park, but mainly at ‘la entrada’ where there are two buildings, the famous lizard and main seating area.

Casa Mila

This building has been opened up to the public as a museum and inside are many exhibitions explaining Gaudí’s work and there is a reconstructed flat showing how it would have been. Each area of this building follows a theme of being underwater – which explains the iron seaweed on the exterior and intricate painting on the lower floors. Also, this building is situated in a beautiful part of the city, around many other magnificent buildings and only a ten minute walk away from La Sagrada Familia.

Sagrada familia

Gaudí only became involved with La Sagrada Familia a year after construction began. However, he adapted the design to suit his style. This building, though originally started in 1882, remains unfinished however, plans show that the anticipated date of completion is in 2026 to celebrate one hundred years after Gaudí’s death. This is one of the main tourist attractions in Spain and therefore very busy. I recommend that you book tickets online (follow the link below) before you visit so that you can skip the queues.

 

Tickets for La Sagrada Familia: http://www.ticketmaster.es/nav/landings/en/mucho_mas/entradas_sagrada_familia/entradas.html

The Catalan Language

When I arrived in Barcelona, I was surprised at the amount of Catalan I heard and how different it was to Spanish. Catalan is a Romance language and therefore evolved similarly to Spanish and French from Vulgar Latin. Therefore there are many resemblances between these languages, as you can see from these lexical comparisons:

English	Latin	French	Spanish	Catalan
Window	Fenestra	Fenêtre	Ventana	Finestra
Morning	Matvtīnvs	Matin	Mañana	Matí

Catalan has 26 letters in the alphabet which are identical to Modern Latin and English. However, the letters K, W and V are only used in loan words from other languages. Also, diacritics such as Ç are used regularly to aid pronunciation and differentiate between different words. For example, if it is before a vowel or at the end of a word, it is softly sounded.

Catalan phonology depends on the dialect. In Barcelona there is a ‘central’ dialect. This is comparable to the ‘standard English’ dialect generally spoken on news programmes in the UK. However, there is a huge divide between the dialects in eastern Catalonia compared to the West. Even though there are differences in phonology, they also have different vocabulary and grammar. For example, ‘I speak’ in the west is ‘parle’, but is ‘parlo’ in the east.

As you can see, this is a fascinating language but it is very specialised to the few areas that it is spoken and hardly found anywhere else. In order to rejuvenate Catalan to the state it was before the Francoist Regime, the government needs to do more than print Catalan signs. They need to promote and spread awareness of the language all over the world so that more people learn the language and its’ future it secured.

Languages of Barcelona

Technically speaking the official language of Barcelona is Catalan. Although Catalan is on the street signs and menus, I have rarely heard this spoken since only 40% of inhabitants speak Catalan as their main language. Contrastingly, Spanish is the native tongue of 60% of inhabitants. Originally, Catalan was by far the most widely spoken however during the dictatorship of Franco, he tried to stamp out minority languages and therefore anyone who spoke the language was punished.

Nowadays, Catalan has been revitalised but is much less widely spoken than before the reign of Franco, but most people in Catalonia can speak both Spanish and Catalan. This bilingualism is very important in Barcelona because of the amount of tourists. In just one day here, I was able to identify a huge variety of languages being spoken in the tourist areas, like La Rambla, including Chinese, French and a lot of English. In fact many of the waiters and restaurant owners were able to speak basic English and possibly many other languages. The ease of learning these different languages may be due to their bilingualism from birth as they have the ability to acquire different languages more easily.

Barcelona!

Tomorrow (very early in the morning) I’m going to Barcelona, Spain for a family holiday. I am doing language classes at a local school and will be visiting many of the tourist hotspots. Hopefully, I will be able to update you daily depending on wifi access.

If you have any experiences in Barcelona, please email me and let me know where to go and where to avoid.

Computational linguistics

Computational linguistics is the study and use of computer programmes which analyse language in automatic translation or properties of texts.

The first automatic calculation machine was designed by Babbage in 1822. However, the first programmable computer was invented just after World War II. After this, computer scientists in America began to develop applications to translate documents. Particularly, to translate research papers regarding the Apollo-Soyuz space project from Russian to English.

Even though computers use arithmetic calculations in their algorithms, machine translations were unable to produce accurate translations. It was discovered that in order to translate languages using computers they had to factor in the morphology, syntax, lexicon, semantics and pragmatics of both languages. This was a very large ask and an accurate translation software has still not been created.

 Currently, the most advanced computers are able to translate 10,000 words per hour. Although, afterwards translations need further editing to make them accurate and coherent, the computational method is much faster than translators working ‘by hand’.

However, it would be naïve to say that translation is the only way computers can help linguists. For example, computers allow linguists to gather large amounts of discourse recordings and analyses them automatically. This technique can be used in theoretical computational linguistics to form hypotheses and predictions about language and behaviour.

Scientists are always trying to improve current translation and analysis programmes but it is unlikely that machines will completely replace human translators or linguists in the near future despite their efforts.

 

More information is available at:

Page 360-361 in 'The Encyclopaedia of Language' by David Crystal

http://www.mitpressjournals.org/loi/coli

Esperanto III

Modern day Esperanto speakers have seized Zamnehof’s dream. On the 16^th of July 2013, a group of 1,000 campaigners gathered in Iceland to discuss how they could spread awareness and boost the reputation of Esperanto.

But, is Esperanto the future of international communications? If any language becomes universal, I believe that Esperanto is as good as any. I say this because it is very similar to a range of different languages and is very easy to learn because of its’ regularity. Also, Esperanto already has a great reputation as ‘the international language’, therefore everyone who believes in a global language will automatically turn to Esperanto.

I do not think that Esperanto should wipe out all minority languages or that Esperanto should become the only language since separate languages define our culture and history. But that in an ever changing world an international language would be helpful. It will allow people to travel all over the world without worrying about the language barriers and will aid both business and politics.

As quoted by James R. Piton, Brazil in a reply to a magazine:

'Learning any language improves one's career, as probably one can get more informed, get more skills in one's own language and so on. But reaching a deep knowledge of Esperanto is not as time consuming as for national languages, so the development of relationships to others in the same professional field is easier and more productive. I speak to my children only in Esperanto. They are six and four years old and bilingual in Portuguese and Esperanto. Our aim, for my Esperanto-speaking wife and me, is to give them some resources to easily learn more languages, but especially to become open-minded to cultural diversity in the world. That is commonly overridden by the international use of English. Esperanto is a sort of "linguistic handshaking", as some writer brightly defined it.'

 

Find more information at:

http://www.independent.co.uk/student/news/u-vi-parolas-esperanton-esperanto-speakers-launch-new-drive-to-gain-international-recognition-8732416.html?origin=internalSearch

http://www.icelandreview.com/icelandreview/daily_news/World_Esperanto_Congress_in_Reykjav%C3%ADk_Tomorrow_0_401646.news.aspx

http://cyrilgupta.com/?p=140

Esperanto II

As we saw yesterday, it was Zamenhof’s childhood dream for there to be an international common language. Therefore, he brought it upon himself to create one. This was an incredibly difficult task because it must be easy for children to learn as a second language, no matter what their mother tongue was.

He began to consider rejuvenating Latin and encouraging schools to teach it. But he found learning Latin very complicated. Therefore, he created a new language based on existing languages to form an orderly language system.

Phonetics

Esperanto has 28 letters in the alphabet:

However, if a computer is unable to put circumflexes or breves onto the letters, an ‘x’ is placed after the letter to signify the same thing. I.e. cx can be used to mean ĉ  

Stress is always placed on the second to last vowel, unless the last vowel is elided with the following word. In this case, the last vowel has the stress. Even though tone is important in Esperanto, like most language, words cannot normally be differentiated by the tone.

Vocabulary

Most vocabulary is based on Romance languages and therefore very similar to Latin, French and Spanish. For example, the word for house is ‘domo’ which is derived from the Latin ‘domus’ and the Italian ‘domestico’. This similarity is thought to be the reason why if school students are taught a year of Esperanto and then three of French, they will reach a much higher level of French than other students who spend 4 years learning French.

Words are formed by adding prefixes and suffixes to roots. For example the suffix -aĉ- can be added near the end of a root to form a pejorative (expresses negative opinion of an object). An example of this is ‘domaĉo’ which means a shack (instead of ‘domo’ – home).

Zamenhof published a dictionary in 1894 containing 9,000 roots. However, these could form hundreds of thousands when suffixes and prefixes are added.

Grammar

Since Esperanto was created by man, it is very regular and contains a simple grammar system. A similarity to Latin and German is that Esperanto has cases – but only the subject and object.

For example:

Nouns	Subject	Object
Singular	-o	-on
Plural	-oj	-ojn

Esperanto verbs can only exist in three different tenses: past, present and future. Verbs can also exist in three moods: infinitive, jussive and conditional. The verb does not show person or plurals. For example: the infinitive ‘kanti’ means to sing.

Esperanto	English
Mi kantas	I sing
Vi kantis	You sung
Illi kantos	They will sing

To conclude, although Esperanto was constructed and therefore is not genealogically related to any natural language, it is closely based on many different languages. The vocabulary and grammar is very regular and therefore as long as you learn vocabulary and the basic rules, Esperanto is very easy to learn as a second language.

Esperanto I

Language barriers have always restricted international communication. This was a huge problem in the 19^th century as globalisation began to occur and the public began to travel more frequently. Therefore Dr. Ludwig Lazarus Zamenhof designed a language in the 1880s.

As quoted by Zamenhof himself:

"The place where I was born and spent my childhood gave direction to all my future struggles. In Bialystok the inhabitants were divided into four distinct elements: Russians, Poles, Germans and Jews; each of these spoke their own language and looked on all the others as enemies.”

(Zamenhof, 1895)

Therefore, he aimed that the language would be learned as a second language to allow people to communicate freely and to unite communities. Originally, he called this ‘La Internacia Lingvo’ (The international language) but users decided that ‘Esperanto (the one that hopes) was a more suitable title. However this language had many problems. For example, Zamenhof was targeted by Hitler as he was Jewish and therefore Nazi Germany wanted to eradicate the language.

Although, Esperanto was never officially proclaimed as a secondary language in any country, it had many plans in the 20^th century. For example, it was though that Neutral Moresnet would be the first official Esperanto state and Qian Xuantong, a Chinese linguist, proclaimed that Esperanto should be spoken instead of Chinese.

But Esperanto does have a place in modern society. Around 1,000 children are brought up with Esperanto by their parents, around 20,000 speak Esperanto as a second language and it is thought that over 10,000,000 people have studied that language at some time. Because of this popularity, magazines, books and songs are written in Esperanto and there is even a radio station broadcasted in the language! Also, in February 2013, a petition was created to make Esperanto one of the official languages of the European Union!  

Therefore I think to a certain extent, Zamenhof achieved his goals. He managed to construct a language which is now used all over the world. Esperanto is a common language for many people, giving them the opportunity to communicate to each other and break down the language barrier.

Tomorrow, I’m going to investigate the language itself – how was it formed? What is the language like? Is there a future for Esperanto?

Flag of Esperanto

 

British etiquette in decline

In November 2011, there was a flurry of newspaper articles about the ‘death of thank you’ following a research poll. This discovered that 70% of people say thank you when they don’t mean it and that there is an increased popularity of different forms of gratitude like ‘ta’, ‘cool’ and even the French ‘merci’. Also, one third of people felt it was easier to send a thank you card, but humorously, 45% confess that usually it takes more than 6 months before they send one.

Much more recently, a Guardian article was released on the 17^th of July which also explored these changes after a more current survey. Apparently, the reason for this decline is that the ‘dated’ phrase thank you is now considered too formal- even in the work place. It is now as common for colleges to send a ‘x’ at the end of their correspondence than to say ‘regards’.

Both experiments show how Brits are changing. But this does not end at ‘thank you’ – the whole English language is completely reforming to suit the modern environment and technology. There are many theories of how these changes with develop further. But, it is likely that these changes will continue.

 

Read more at:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8910902/Death-of-thank-you.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2065313/Thank-replaced-cheers-fab-cool.html

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/jul/17/thank-you-fell-out-of-fashion?INTCMP=SRCH

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2065958/Thank-going-fashion--Im-cool-cheers-heart.html

Should signed languages be classed as natural languages?

As we saw yesterday, there are many different sign languages which aid communication in deaf communities. But should this form of communication be labelled as ‘real’ language?

Jean Aitchison (1998) recorded that there are ten characteristics which are essential for human languages. These are arbitrariness, semanticity, cultural transmission, use of the vocal-auditory channel, spontaneous usage, turn taking, duality, displacement, structure dependence and creativity. In order to judge the similarity between sign and spoken languages we need to discuss whether sign language shows these features.

1)      Arbitrariness means that there are no connections between words and the object that it describes. An example of this is that the word chair does not in any way reflect the shape of a chair. Many signs do show arbitrariness, for example the ASL for keep (http://www.handspeak.com/word/index.php?dict=ka&signID=1188). However, some signs do relate very closely to their meaning and are very iconic. Such as in ASL, the action for ‘cat’ is using fingers to imitate their whiskers on one cheek. This hints that may be not all signs are arbitrary. But, in English there are also exceptions to this rule since onomatopoeias, like ‘meow’, show the sound of certain actions.

 

2)      Semanticity is the use of symbols to refer to objects or actions. All sign languages show this because they contain a variety of linguistic components, including verbs and nouns. Many sign languages contain these components in very similar way to spoken languages and must refer to the actions and objects as they are understood by other users.

3)      Cultural transmission is the ability for parents to teach their children the language. Deaf children learn sign language in similar stages as hearing children would learn spoken language. Especially if the parents use sign language, the child will pick up the language within the first 6 years. If the children have learning disorders, this will obviously take longer unless they learn a more suited sign language like Makaton.

4)      Obviously, sign language does not use the vocal-auditory channel. However, in certain sign languages like Signed English people may speak at the same time as they sign.

5)      Just like any other language, sign language has spontaneous usage because people are able to use the language freely.

6)      Turn taking is a major characteristic in any language because it is the only way in which we can communicate effectively, so that we can gain information and contact. Sign language uses turn taking to form a conversation.

7)      Duality is the idea that language has two different layers; the constituents of language such as letters or sounds and the words that they form when put together. This is shown in finger spelling/ manually coded sign language because they use the alphabet to form words. This is also shown when forming proper nouns, for in the majority of sign languages you have to sign each letter of the name using the alphabet.

8)      Displacement is the ability to refer to things that are not physically present. Sign language users have this ability as they can use their signs to discuss anything that they want to. 

9)      Structure dependence is a more complicated idea people are able to recognise clauses and that certain words are related to each other. This is harder to find in sign languages because they tend to be simpler, however Signed English must show this characteristic as it relates closely to the English language.

10)   Creativity shows that humans can discuss anything that they like – even if it is absurd. It also shows that there are a number of different responses to stimuli. For example, in an art gallery someone may evaluate the art my saying ‘it’s lovely’ others may say ‘it’s too bright’ where as someone else may say ‘I’m too hungry to look at art’. This ability to communicate any thought is also shown in sign languages as there are a vast variety of signs for every occasion.

As we have seen, Sign language shows a number of characteristics shown throughout spoken languages and therefore I think it is right that they are classed as natural languages. This was recently reflected by an internet petition given by the Whitehouse. In December 2012 the minimum signature requirement of 250,000 was met. The conclusions of this were that the US parliament recognised ASL as a ‘foreign language’ and soon ASL should be announced a ‘natural language’. Hopefully, this trend will shortly follow in the United Kindgom. This shall boost awareness across the UK and hopefully help users and the deaf communities. As quoted by G.Yule:

There is a very old joke among the deaf which begins with the question ‘What is the greatest problem facing deaf people?’ Perhaps increased knowledge and appreciation for the language among the world at large will bring about a change in the old response to that question. The traditional answer was ‘Hearing people’

Different types of Sign language

In the same way that normal children learn how to speak, deaf children who are brought up to deaf families learn sign language. Until recently a vigorous teaching programme of oralism was accepted as the best teaching method for deaf children. Children were taught to practise producing English sounds and to develop lip-reading skills so they could eventually have normal communication. Less than 10% of children involved in this scheme could speak understandable English and about 5% were able to lip-read effectively. As this failure became apparent, deaf communities needed another method of communication and therefore many different sign languages were formed and used.

American Sign Language is still one of the most widely spoken sign language, with over 500,000 users. From this, British Sign language was created.  In the UK, British sign language is the most popular amongst the British deaf community. They use facial expressions, body language and hand movements to communicate. In 2003, BSL was recognised formally as an official language. However, BSL contains a separate grammar system from English, which can make it difficult for hearing parents to teach their children, so many opt for different types of language.

For this reason, Signed English is becoming more popular. This language is formed by signs corresponding to each word and follows English syntax rules. Because of this, people are able to speak at the same time that they sign so Signed English facilitates the interaction between hearing and deaf communities.  There are many different types of Signed English catered for different abilities. For example, Makaton is spoken by 100,000 people in the UK and is preliminary aimed at those who have learning or communication difficulties.

 Also, Finger Spelling/ Manually Coded English is increasing in popularity. They use the signed alphabet to spell out each word, which possibly makes it easier for them to learn to write. Many sign languages incorporate some finger spelling if there are no apparent signs to go with an action and are used in many sign languages for proper nouns.  

British signed alphabet:

For more information you can visit:

http://www.makaton.org/

http://www.britishsignlanguage.com/

Thank you!

Wow! This blog has now had over 100 page views from 5 different countries! I hope that you are finding this site interesting and helpful. Please continue to email me if there are any topics that you would like me to cover.

An introduction to linguistic variation and change

No language ever remains the same. Each language is constantly changing to suit its’ speakers and the world around them. Some of these changes are very sudden; however others take hundreds of years. Linguists have tried to track these changes using the ‘comparative method’ to find historical relationships between languages.

American linguists in the 20^th century studiesd lexicostatistics in a study called glottochronology. In this, they wanted to see the rate at which a language has changed and the length of time since two languages diverged. In this study, sets of vocabulary were compared to each other and any recognised cognates are counted. Any words that are completely different show that the languages have changed. Percentages were taken to compare these and any pair of languages with 50% similarity were said to have diverged before a language which had 70% similarity. This technique was able to find family trees of many different sets of languages. They also found that over time, every feature of language changes, but most frequently variations occur in pronunciation and vocabulary.

Changes in sound

Grimm (1822) noticed some regular ‘sound shifts’ between neighbouring languages. For example, when a word began [p] in Sanskrit, Latin or Greek, the Germanic languages used an [f]. For example: ‘pater’ (Latin) became ‘father’ (English). Nine sound changes like this were identified and these are very regular. But Grimm’s law did not explain all of the changes toward Germanic languages. There are many other types of changes in sound over languages, such as ‘loss’ where a sound completely disappears from a language.

Grammatical changes

The main way in which grammatical systems change is called analogy. This is when irregular grammatical patterns are changed into regulars. For example, in Anglo saxon, ‘healp’ was the past tense of ‘helpan’ (help) but in the 14^th century the past tense began to be the ‘helped’ with the usual ending.

Semantic change

Semantics can vary very quickly because they relate very closely to life and culture of society. An example of this is called ‘amelioration’ which is when a word loses its previous negative tone. For example, mischievous used to mean ‘disastrous’, but now is used to mean ‘up to mischief’ which is much milder.

Language and the brain

Until recently, the brain has been a mystery. Now, after scientific advancements, some areas of the brain have been linked to language.

Primary Somatic Motor Area

Penifield and Roberts (1959) located the primary somatic motor area and discovered that it controls all voluntary bodily movements. This area stretches down from the top of the braina dn runs through both hemispheres. They found that each section of the area accounts for a body part upside down (i.e. the top of the area controls the feet). However, ‘a disproportionate amount of space is allocated to the area controlling the hands and mouth’ (Aithchison, 1998), showing that it must allow us to use precise movements in both sign language and spoken communication.

Broca’s Aphasia

If people have brain damage in ‘broca’s area’ (left frontal cortex in the left hemisphere) they are very unlikely to have the ability to produce utterances normally. For example, many people with this problem speak very slowly and ungrammatically (i.e. many drop the –ed ending in English verbs).

However, some people are able to retain this grammatical information and production ability. This shows that even though it is incredibly likely that Broca’s area is related very closely to language, there may be other areas in the brain with similar functions.

Wernicke’s Aphasia

Carl Wenicke located another area in the brain, located in the left temporal lobe. If patients have Wernicke’s aphasia, they usually produce grammatically correct sentences, however include made-up words that often do not fit. Therefore, this area may be responsible for the retrieval of words and linguistic memory.

Future of Brain Imaging

Some theorists believe that various areas of the brain will be found to be responsible for language. For example, Chomsky’s LAD (Language Acquisition Device) which may give children an expectation of language and grammar though linguistic universals and therefore hastens the learning process. However, no such area has currently been found.

Further reading:

Aitchison, J. (1997) The Articulate Mammal: An introduction to Psycholinguistics. Abingdon: Routledge

Yule, G. (1985) The Study of Language. Avon: Bath Press

Pinker, S (1994) The Language Instinct. London: Penguin books Ltd.

Carter, R (2010) Mapping the Mind. London: Orion books Ltd.

'The Study of Language' by G. Yule

George Yule has worked as an English teacher in four different countries and has taught Applied Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh. He has also written many books on grammar and the English language; however, this one is most accessible to the public with no prior knowledge required.

This textbook contains twenty chapters, each addressing a fundamental part of linguistics. He covers an incredible range of topics, including morphology and the role language plays in society. At the end of each section are some ‘study questions’ which required you to recall a fact or a name and then are a list of intriguing discussion topics which are great starters for further research.

The study of language is written in a very concise and orderly way and therefore appropriate for beginners as an introduction. It also links very closely to the linguistics and English language degree and therefore may be a good starting point for research; however, each topic may seem very brief because the book covers so many areas of linguistics.

Why don't you speak English?

There are more than 6 million immigrants living in the UK and this figure is steeply rising. Almost 1 million of these immigrants hardly speak the English Language. These statistics lead to the question, how do they get jobs? The answer is with great difficulty.

Why don’t you speak English? Is a two-part series on channel four which followed the lives of four immigrants, trying to make a better life for themselves and their families in Britain. They were each paired with an English family who they visited and then hosted at their own home. On these visits, the British families tried to teach as much English as they could and give advice about interviews and jobs, whilst learning about their background.

This eye-opening series allowed the British public to delve into the lives of immigrants and see how difficult their lives really are. It will make you think about serious modern-day problems, such as immigration, minor community groups and the importance of English in society.

Website link to the first episode - http://www.channel4.com/programmes/why-dont-you-speak-english/4od#3553255