Handout for LING 540: Language Spread

Harold F. Schiffman
University of Pennsylvania

1. Recommended Readings

Breton, Roland. 1991. Geolinguistics: Ethnolinguistic Geography and Language Dynamics. Ottawa: U. of Ottawa Press.
Cooper, R. Language Spread. Studies in Diffusion and Social Change. 1982, Center for Applied Linguistics.
Itself contains articles by:
- Cooper (Framework)
- Lieberson (Forces affecting)
- Ferguson (Religious factors)
- Ancient Near East (Paper)
- Heath and Laprade (Castilian, Quechua, Aymara)
- Misra (India, Hindi)
- Mahmud (Arabic in southern Sudan)
- Calvet (Mandingo)
- Omar (Malay in Malaysia and Malay archipelago)
- Lewis (Wales and USSR)
- Barnes (Mandarin)
- Fishman (Yiddish)
- Dressler (rates of language decay)
- Mikes (Hungarian and Serbocroatian)
Khubchandani, L. Plural Languages, Plural Cultures. Hawaii, East West Center, 1983.
Schiffman, H. 1993. Diglossia, Triglossia and Language Shift. (Coursepak)
See also this bibliography

2. Definitions: How, why, what, where, when?

Language spread: process by which languages gain speakers. (Cooper, preface, p. vii)
language spread as cultural diffusion
defining space, defining language
rates, degrees, numbers, percentages,
demographic factors: males or females? young or old? educated or not? For what functions, uses?
is language spread the same as diffusion of individual linguistic features, such as the spread of uvular /r/ (France, Germany, Danish, Dutch...) or the spread of devoiced final consonants (German, Danish, Dutch, Polish, Russian ...)? If enough linguistic features spread, can we speak of profound linguistic change, and therefore of spread of a different language? (see Goossens map, spread of /sh/ from German into Limburg.
Where to start?

3. Spread as a geographic phenomenon, over time

Start with Breton; he distinguishes between linguistic change (microfeatures) and language `viewed from outside' e.g. by the geographer.
Problems with this: geographers, sociologists, demographers assume that languages are well-defined unities; we know they're not.
geographers etc. thus work primarily with languages that are clearly perceived as different; work on vague perceptions of ethnolinguistic difference can be more problematical. (See Khubdhandani; see Yugoslavia. )
Time: over time, we notice changes: this population exhibits changes of linguistic habits, uses different language for a domain/function than previous generation. How many generations does this take?
Does language spread evenly across territories? Does it avoid obstacles, cross rivers and mountains? Does it follow transportation lines (rail, canal, road, airline?) does it hop over sluggish areas, e.g. from city to city? Is this a new phenomenon? (See map, Norway)
What effect do cataclysmic events have? Wars; famines; floods; pestilence?
Do all new trends originate in cities and spread outward?
What effect of the media? radio, TV, print, internet?

4. Cooper's refined definition

Spread: increase, over time, in the proportion of a communication network that adopts a given language or language variety for a given communicative function. (Cooper, p. 6)
We can discuss this definition in terms of
1. what is spreading
2. notion of spread as a time-dependent phenomenon
3. the medium through which language spread occurs

5. What is spreading?

Language does not spread, and languages do not acquire speakers; speakers acquire languages. What is spreading is linguistic behaviors

Form: what is the form of the language, how is it similar to or different from the other languages in the area? When English spreads, which kind(s) spread(s)? Spread of British English has given way to spread of American; if American, which kind(s) of American? If Spanish or Quechua, which variety/ies are spreading, what is happening to other varieties?
Function: purpose for which language(s) or variet/ies spread(s)? For written (administrative, educational, religious) purposes? spoken (trade, jokes, relaxed communication)? At same rates? (Schiffman 1993 claims that language shift proceeds domain by domain; does spread proceed domain by domain too?) One language may signal solidarity, another may signal educated status. Which function emphasized?
Pervasiveness: degree to which speakers adopt? how many domains? Distinguish between. classes of criterion variables, along a scale of behavioral pervasiveness:
1. Awareness: speaker is aware language exists, can/must be used for particular function
2. Evaluation: speaker forms a favorable/unfavorable attitude toward the personal usefulness of the language for particular function. (Not same as a favorable/unfavorable attitude toward speakers of the language.
3. Proficiency: speaker is able to use the language for a given communicative purpose; not grammatical accuracy or fluency, but extent of use for a function (gets the job done).
4. Usage: speaker actually uses the language for particular function

6. Spread as time-based

Diffusion of an innovation takes time (e.g. diffusion of oil exploration technology, high-yield grains, microwave ovens, the VCR, the computer, the internet) but it is proficiency in a language that requires more time than most other innovations. Some functions of a language may spread rapidly, require minimal knowledge; others may take years. (Compare spread of English, especially. southwestern American English, along with oil exploration technology, as Texans carry both to Scotland, Norway, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia...)

Time of adoption (early vs. late) vs. adoption itself that is important
Who are the early adopters? who the late? compare the two; establish diffusion curves. E.g. spread of a lingua franca may be an S-shaped diffusion curve: slow start, quick rise, slow tapering off.
Time of first adoption; often not noticed; must be reconstructed (ask people when they first used). Most language spread is unnoticed at first; noticed later, and early use must be remembered.
Tabouret-Keller: noted differential rates of adoption of French and dialect in two regions: in Pays d'Oc, all children know French by age 8, but dialect is acquired gradually until age 14, and then only by less than 50% of the population. In Alsace, all children who learn dialect are fluent in it by age 8, while acquisition of French is gradual, rising steeply until age 14, when all know it.
Comparison over time: (Lieberson:) use census data to show differential rates of spread. But note Khubchandani's caveat that differential rates of declaration of language, especially Urdu in the Indian census may just be differential rates of declaration of ethnic or religious affiliation! Note how same changes in declaration of ethnicity may also be happening in southern Russia.

7. Medium of spread

Who/what is the carrier? the agent? the vector? the vessel? As with epidemics, we want to know who or what carried the [innovation]? A mosquito? A flea? A rat? A native speaker of the spreading language, or a second-language learner?
Where and how do people move around, so what movements of people for what purpose carry language with them? urbanization? Railroad construction? Does the new language skip over territory, spreading from city to city? Seems to be true of linguistic innovation, spread of sound change.
Remember that spread is a metaphor; languages do not expand, their body of users expands, usage spreads, the number of people in contact with the language expands, through awareness, evaluation, knowledge, use...
Thus languages spread through populations not in space, except as populations are distributed in space.
spread and social structure: how constrained?
Across social structures? different interaction? across networks

8. Three research traditions:

Diffusion of Innovations: (Anthro, sociology)
Language Maintenance and Language shift: Fishman et al.
Language change (linguistic diffusion); Labov, Bloomfield, other historical linguistics and sociolinguists.

9. Who adopts what, where, when, how?

Who
adopts
what
where
when,
how?
Cooper pgs on this.

Harold Schiffman
Dec. 9, 2002