Language

English Language Distribution 1.5 Billion fluent 50 Countries: 2 billion people Official language in most former colonies Distributed in every continent

English Speaking Countries Fig. 5-1: English is an official language in 50 countries, including some in which it is not the most widely spoken language. It is also used and understood in many others.

English Migration over 400 Years North America 1600s Ireland 1600s South-Asia mid 1700s South Pacific late 1700s early 1800s South Africa late 1800s

Norman Invasion Why doesn’t English sound more like German? Normans make French the official language for 300 years Leaders/Nobility/Clergy= French, everyone else=Germanic 1204 Normans lost control war made French less popular Statute of Pleading 1362= English used in Court Parliament used French until 1489

Modern English Common language mingled with the Elite language Simple/straightforward words : Sky, horse, man, woman are Germanic roots Elegant/complex words: celestial, equestrian, masculine, and feminine from the French invaders

Old & Middle English Dialects Fig. 5-3: The main dialect regions of Old English before the Norman invasion persisted to some extent in the Middle English dialects through the 1400s.

American English! Isolation Vocabulary Spelling Pronunciation New objects/experiences Animals/Native American vocab Spelling Noah Webster Ignored old and created new rules Pronunciation Geography A and R Class

Dialects in the Eastern U.S. Hans Kurath divided the eastern U.S. into three dialect regions, whose distribution is similar to that of house types.

Spatial Interaction helps create: Lingua franca – A language used among speakers of different languages for the purposes of trade and commerce. Pidgin language – a language created when people combine parts of two or more languages into a simplified structure and vocabulary. Creole language – a pidgin language that has developed a more complex structure and vocabulary and has become the native language of a group of people.

Toponym Toponym – a place name A toponym: Imparts a certain character on a place Reflects the social processes in a place Can give us a glimpse of the history of a place When people change the toponym of a place, they have the power to “wipe out the past and call forth the new.” - Yi-Fu Tuan

Where are MLK Streets in the US?

Monolingual State a country in which only one language is spoken Multilingual State a country in which more than one language is in use Official Language should a multilingual state adopt an official language?

Indo-European Language Family The main branches of the Indo-European language family include Germanic, Romance, Balto-Slavic, and Indo-Iranian.

Countries with an IE language with official status Majority Speakers=IE

Germanic Branch of Indo-European The Germanic branch today is divided into North and West Germanic groups. English is in the West Germanic group.

South Asian Languages & Language Families Fig. 5-7: Indo-European is the largest of four main language families in South Asia. The country of India has 18 official languages.

Romance Branch of Indo-European Fig. 5-8: The Romance branch includes three of the world’s 12 most widely spoken languages (Spanish, French, and Portuguese), as well as a number of smaller languages and dialects.

Kurgan Theory of Indo-European Origin In the Kurgan theory, Proto-Indo-European diffused from the Kurgan hearth north of the Caspian Sea, beginning about 7000 years ago.

Anatolian Hearth (Renfew) Theory of Indo-European Origin Fig. 5-10: In the Anatolian hearth theory, Indo-European originated in Turkey before the Kurgans and diffused through agricultural expansion.

Language Families of the World Fig. 5-11: Distribution of the world’s main language families. Languages with more than 50 million speakers are named.

Major Language Families Percentage of World Population The percentage of world population speaking each of the main language families. Indo-European and Sino-Tibetan together represent almost 75% of the world’s people.

Language Family Trees Family trees and estimated numbers of speakers for the main world language families.

Chinese Ideograms (Sino-Tibetan Language Family) Ideograms represent concepts rather than sound The Ideograms are used for all dialects and regional variations in order to be literate, a person must memorize thousands of symbols.

Language Families of Africa The 1000 or more languages of Africa are divided among five main language families, including Austronesian languages in Madagascar.

Languages of Nigeria More than 200 languages are spoken in Nigeria, the largest country in Africa (by population). English, considered neutral, is the official language.

Ireland Road Signs Road signs in Ireland are written in both English and Gaelic (Goidelic).

Jerusalem Street sign A street in Jerusalem was re-named New York after Sept. 11, 2001. The street name is shown in Hebrew, Arabic, and English

Language Areas in Switzerland Switzerland remains peaceful with four official languages and a decentralized government structure.

French-English Boundary in Canada Although Canada is bilingual, French speakers are concentrated in the province of Quebec, where 80% of the population speaks French.

Online Population, 1996 - 2005 English is still the largest language on the internet, but there has been rapid growth in many others, especially Chinese.

E-Commerce Languages 2000 & 2004 English and English-speaking countries still dominate e-commerce, but other languages are growing rapidly.