The Ecology of Language and the New Englishes: toward an integrative framework
Abstract
Previous research has repeatedly pointed to the need for a unified framework for language contact phenomena - one that would include social factors and motivations, structural factors and linguistic constraints, and psycholinguistic factors involved in processes of language processing and production. In this paper, I argue that the New Englishes offer a promising opportunity to integrate the three components of a unified framework for the study of contactinduced change. Such a framework must address, among other things, the nature of the processes underlying contact-induced change, that is, both the actuation and implementation of change (Weinreich et al. 1968), which relate respectively to the roles played by the individual and the community in the origin and spread of change. This would be in keeping with Weinreich’s observation that language contact can best be understood only “in a broad psychological and socio-cultural setting” (1953: 4). In that spirit, I assess the contribution of the Ecology of Language (EL) framework (Mufwene 2001, 2008) to our understanding of the processes by which the New Englishes emerged. In the first place, I argue that, while this framework offers valuable insight into the social ecology of contact-induced changes, it fails to provide a principled explanation for the actuation of such changes, that is, the psycholinguistic mechanisms underlying the innovations that individuals introduce into their emerging interlanguage grammars or idiolects. Secondly, contra the EL framework, I argue in favor of the traditional view that all New Englishes, including creoles, arose via natural SLA, involving processes of restructuring, not in Mufwene’s sense, but in the sense intended by researchers in first and second language acquisition (Hulstijn 1990: 32). Such restructuring includes, among other things, the replication of L1 grammatical patterns in the learners’ interlanguage systems (ILs), which involves the psycholinguistic mechanism of imposition, that is, applying the language production procedures of one’s L1 in producing structures in an emerging L2. An approach of this kind provides principled explanations for the kinds of innovative restructuring found in the formation of the New Englishes - explanations which the EL framework has so far failed to offer. A truly comprehensive framework for the study of the New Englishes must therefore establish links between linguistic, sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic approaches to language contact and change.
Abstract
Previous research has repeatedly pointed to the need for a unified framework for language contact phenomena - one that would include social factors and motivations, structural factors and linguistic constraints, and psycholinguistic factors involved in processes of language processing and production. In this paper, I argue that the New Englishes offer a promising opportunity to integrate the three components of a unified framework for the study of contactinduced change. Such a framework must address, among other things, the nature of the processes underlying contact-induced change, that is, both the actuation and implementation of change (Weinreich et al. 1968), which relate respectively to the roles played by the individual and the community in the origin and spread of change. This would be in keeping with Weinreich’s observation that language contact can best be understood only “in a broad psychological and socio-cultural setting” (1953: 4). In that spirit, I assess the contribution of the Ecology of Language (EL) framework (Mufwene 2001, 2008) to our understanding of the processes by which the New Englishes emerged. In the first place, I argue that, while this framework offers valuable insight into the social ecology of contact-induced changes, it fails to provide a principled explanation for the actuation of such changes, that is, the psycholinguistic mechanisms underlying the innovations that individuals introduce into their emerging interlanguage grammars or idiolects. Secondly, contra the EL framework, I argue in favor of the traditional view that all New Englishes, including creoles, arose via natural SLA, involving processes of restructuring, not in Mufwene’s sense, but in the sense intended by researchers in first and second language acquisition (Hulstijn 1990: 32). Such restructuring includes, among other things, the replication of L1 grammatical patterns in the learners’ interlanguage systems (ILs), which involves the psycholinguistic mechanism of imposition, that is, applying the language production procedures of one’s L1 in producing structures in an emerging L2. An approach of this kind provides principled explanations for the kinds of innovative restructuring found in the formation of the New Englishes - explanations which the EL framework has so far failed to offer. A truly comprehensive framework for the study of the New Englishes must therefore establish links between linguistic, sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic approaches to language contact and change.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Table of contents v
- List of abbreviations vii
- Changing English: global and local perspectives xi
-
I. Towards the study of Global English
- Editors’ Introduction to Part I 3
- Crisis of the “Outer Circle”? – Globalisation, the weak nation state, and the need for new taxonomies in World Englishes research 5
- The Ecology of Language and the New Englishes: toward an integrative framework 25
-
II. Ongoing changes in Englishes around the globe
- Editors’ Introduction to Part II 59
- The Present Perfect as a core feature of World Englishes 63
- Innovative structures in the relative clauses of indigenized L2 Asian English varieties 89
- Morphosyntactic typology, contact and variation: Cape Flats English in relation to other South African Englishes in the Mouton World Atlas of Variation in English 109
- Omission of direct objects in New Englishes 129
- The definite article in World Englishes 155
- Aspects of Verb Complementation in New Zealand Newspaper English 169
- Extended uses of the progressive form in Inner, Outer and Expanding Circle Englishes 191
-
III. Expanding the horizons: lingua franca, cognitive, and contact-linguistic perspectives
- Editors’ Introduction to Part III 219
- A glimpse of ELF 223
- Lending bureaucracy voice: negotiating English in institutional encounters 255
- On the relationship between the cognitive and the communal: a complex systems perspective 277
- Transfer is Transfer; Grammaticalization is Grammaticalization 311
- Subject index 331
- Languages and Varieties index 340
- Author Index 343
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Table of contents v
- List of abbreviations vii
- Changing English: global and local perspectives xi
-
I. Towards the study of Global English
- Editors’ Introduction to Part I 3
- Crisis of the “Outer Circle”? – Globalisation, the weak nation state, and the need for new taxonomies in World Englishes research 5
- The Ecology of Language and the New Englishes: toward an integrative framework 25
-
II. Ongoing changes in Englishes around the globe
- Editors’ Introduction to Part II 59
- The Present Perfect as a core feature of World Englishes 63
- Innovative structures in the relative clauses of indigenized L2 Asian English varieties 89
- Morphosyntactic typology, contact and variation: Cape Flats English in relation to other South African Englishes in the Mouton World Atlas of Variation in English 109
- Omission of direct objects in New Englishes 129
- The definite article in World Englishes 155
- Aspects of Verb Complementation in New Zealand Newspaper English 169
- Extended uses of the progressive form in Inner, Outer and Expanding Circle Englishes 191
-
III. Expanding the horizons: lingua franca, cognitive, and contact-linguistic perspectives
- Editors’ Introduction to Part III 219
- A glimpse of ELF 223
- Lending bureaucracy voice: negotiating English in institutional encounters 255
- On the relationship between the cognitive and the communal: a complex systems perspective 277
- Transfer is Transfer; Grammaticalization is Grammaticalization 311
- Subject index 331
- Languages and Varieties index 340
- Author Index 343
