RokaiahHazilawatiSiti Murshida

LANGUAGE CHANGE

Variation and ChangeHow do changes spreadHow do we study language change

Reasons for language changeArticles on language change

Variation and change over time in a language's phonetic, morphological, semantic,

syntactic, and other features.

DEFINITION…

VARIATION & CHANGE

3 MAJOR WAYS

Over time

In physical space

Socially

• Current variation• Regional and social variants –provide the basis

Rhotic - Accent with post-vocalic [r]- Prestige in New York, regarded as rural & uneducated in England Changes From Above- People are conscious of their signifi cance as desirable or

prestige features of speech.- 2n d meaning- the source of change- A feature is spreading downwards through the social groups in a

speech community.

POST VOCALIC [R]

TextBook : PAGE 208 : Example 3

Changes from below- Changes in the pronunciation and vowel- A change which spreads from lower social

groups upwards to the higher social groups- Such changes may or may not be above the

level of conscious awareness.

THE SPREAD OF VERNACULAR FORMS

TextBook : PAGE 210 : Example 4

KOINES & KOINESATION

KOINE A variety which is the result of dialect contactHave some features from contributing

dialects, with most features coming from the largest group of speakers

KOINESATIONA new dialect or variety emerges when people

who speak diff erent dialects come into contact in monolingual communities

In linguistics, a koiné language (κοινή common language in Koiné Greek) is a standard language or dialect that has arisen as a result of contact between two or more mutually intelligible varieties (dialects) of the same language.

Since the speakers have understood one another from before the advent of the koiné, the koineisation process is not as drastic as pidginization and creolization. Unlike pidginization and creolization, there is no 'target' within Koine formation. It involves continuity, in that speakers do not need to abandon their own linguistic varieties.

Normal infl uence between neighbouring dialects is not regarded as koineisation. A koiné variety emerges as a new spoken variety in addition to the originating dialects; it does not change any existing dialect. This separates koineisation from normal evolution of dialects.

KOINES & KOINESATION

HOW DO CHANGES SPREAD

From group to group

From style to style

From word to word – lexical diffusion

CHANGE

C

C

C

FROM GROUP TO GROUP

AA A

Time 1 Time 2 Time 3

A

Time 4

BB BC C D

FROM STYLE TO STYLE

Change spread from one style to another

Formal speech more casual speech

FROM WORD TO WORD – LEXICAL DIFFUSION

Sound changes typically spread through different words one by one