Kevin Anderson
How does language change over time? Are new words just fads or do they become part of our repertoires forever? How do we measure change in language? Van Herk (2018) discusses how we should look at language through time. He mentions that linguistic change should be reflected in the variation of language at a single point in time. We can see the variation and we know people’s language will change over time, but exactly how that happens is more complex than it seems.
Van Herk (2018) describes how people individually go through changes and adopt new vocabulary in life. For pronunciation, there seems to be less change through time. People change along with changes seen in the community. As cited in Van Herk (2018, p. 64), people who mostly use the old form or the new form of language continue to do so over decades, whereas people who are in between and using both forms in approximately equal proportions shift towards the newer form. This means people who are not stubbornly sticking to the old form or the newer form of language will eventually drift toward the newer form of language. Van Herk (2012) mentions how teenagers are the most adventurous when it comes to using new words. Adults tend to shift toward language that benefits them socially and economically, as cited in Van Herk (2018, p.71).
There is a certain ‘community’ that forms around new words, a sense of belonging with other people who use similar terms. Likewise, people using older words will feel a sense of belonging with people who use the same words.
This article discusses the ways anglophone people of different generations pronounce street names in Montreal. Older people call St. Laurent, “St. Lawrence street”, as do I, and they say, “Mountain Street” instead of “De la Montagne”, which I do not. My father grew up in “Ville de Leery” near “Chatta-gee”, whereas younger people will say “Ville de Léry” and “Chateauguay” in a more accurate French accent. I find myself pronouncing these areas both ways depending on who I am talking to and what age they are. People of all ages seem to say, “Saint Catherine Street”, though. Change does not always involve only one language as can be seen.
Where do you fall within language and time? Do you stick to the old ways or the new ways? Are you somewhere in the middle, and if you are, how much will you slip towards the newer way of speaking? At what age will your language stop changing?
Reference:
Van Herk, Gerard. (2018). What is sociolinguistics? 2e Chichester, West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.
Hi Kevin: I feel the same with what you mentioned that people who share similar ways of expression and terms feel a sense of belonging as if being in the same community. This reminds me of a popular internet expression in Chinese, which translated as “we surf in the same area of the Internet” to show that we can understand and use some similar expressions or things on the Internet. Moreover, a person’s life experience, educational background, age and other factors will all affect his/her attitude towards new language expressions. I think maybe “time” is an important yardstick to decide whether a new expression can last longer or not.
-Wenwen
Hi Kevin! Great post, I find it fascinating how language evolves over time. I think, based on my experience anyway, that your language evolution can vary based on whether you are speaking your first or your second language. I’ll give a couple of examples:
My aunt’s brother, a native English-speaking Montrealer, married a British woman in his twenties and moved to England. Whenever he comes back to visit, his accent is as “Londoner” as someone from actual London, although apparently he does that on purpose to show off… who knows.
When I reflect on the languages I know, what was particularly interesting to me was the evolution of my French. As French is my third language, I still spoke it with a somewhat Montreal/Quebec anglo accent, however when I moved to Spain, I made many friends from France and started slightly picking up their accents and expressions. I figured that since I had never fully mastered French here in Canada, it was more malleable and subject to change. Likewise with my Spanish, I’d learned Colombian Spanish in school, but picked up a more Spain Spanish accent and vocabulary when living in Spain. Now, dating an Argentinian, it has further evolved closer to their way of speaking, and now sounds like a mix of Spain/Argentina. I think, over time, particularly for languages that are not your native language, these languages can shift over time closer to or farther from a certain way of speaking depending on your surroundings and interactions.
Thanks for the thought-provoking post!
– Daniele Iannarone
I definitely follow the new ways because most of my peers do. Language will never stop changing and one may never know how far they will sleep towards new ways of pronunciation. I think sometimes one does not even realize when they change how they speak. Other times one subconsciously pronounces a word or speaks in a certain way because the people around them are pronouncing or speaking differently. Many new words certainly become part of our repertoires forever. As much as some people may want to stick the old ways of pronouncing certain words or speaking am sure some word will fade over time. Young people like to adopt the new ways and soon pass it down to other generations.
Chaoyang Zhang