In a recent Guardian article Harry Ritchie asks the following question: ‘Why do we persist in thinking that Standard English is right, when it is spoken by only 15% of the population?’ It’s an interesting question. My observation is that, actually, fewer and fewer people do in fact persist in thinking this. But I’m not blogging in order to discuss the question. Rather, I’d like to draw attention to Ritchie’s truly mind-boggling answer to the question he poses: he blames Noam Chomsky.

I’ve read the article repeatedly now, and I have to say I’m still no closer to finding any real justification for Ritchie’s claim. Still, in the interests of cool-headed analysis as opposed to the vitriolic dismissal my emotions are screaming at me to write, let’s examine his case. As far as I can see, it rests on two related claims. Let’s examine them in turn:

Firstly, Chomsky (and his disciples, including Pinker) have been so convinced that language is partly innately-specified that the whole discipline has been (in Ritchie’s words) ‘hunting unicorns’ and ignoring matters such as language death, social and political factors in language use and environmental factors in language acquisition. Secondly (and I quote again), ‘Recent evidence from neurology, genetics and linguistics all points to there being no innate programming. Children learn language just as they learn other skills, by experience’.

Turning to the first claim, we can only take it seriously if it can be shown that Chomsky’s work has somehow prevented others from exploring language death, social and political factors in language use and environmental factors.[1] Has Ritchie ever visited a library devoted to language and linguistics? Over the past twenty years, there have been billions of words devoted to these areas of study. Does Ritchie really believe that if Chomsky hadn’t come along, there would have been more? Actually, I believe there would have been less. Without Chomsky there would be fewer, not more, departments of Linguistics.

Turning to the second, it is simply not true that all the evidence points against Chomsky’s claims of innateness. There is certainly some evidence from work on neural-nets in Connectionist frameworks that ‘minds’ can learn aspects of language from experience. But these rely on the highly controversial claim that neural-nets somehow model cognition. Equally, they conveniently ignore many of the linguistic data Chomsky had in mind that are patently unlearnable. Besides which, there is at least as much evidence in support of innateness claims as there is against it. (For those interested in Chomsky’s views, rather than take them from Ritchie I’d recommend the highly accessible introduction in ‘Problems of Knowledge: the Managua Lectures’, published, I think, in 1978.)

Ritchie also criticizes Pinker’s excellent book The Language Instinct. It has, he claims, ‘…a very specific agenda – to support Noam Chomsky’s theories about our language skills being innate’. He goes on: ‘other areas of linguistics are glimpsed, if at all, fuzzily in the background.’ From here, Ritchie moves on to the kind of linguistics he’s interested in and discusses how the language of the Proto-Indo-Europeans laid the foundations upon which many modern languages have been built.

Interested readers might notice that this topic, far from being ignored in The Language Instinct, actually receives a whole chapter. Has Ritchie read it, I wonder?

And how any of this justifies Ritchie’s blaming Chomsky for the view that most people (if they, in fact, do) believe that Standard English is the correct version of English, I just don’t know. I welcome an explanation. It appears to me to be some convoluted argument resting on the two claims above. Since the two claims are fallacious, however, it simply can’t go through.

The study of language and linguistics is in far better shape now than it was fifty years ago. Why? Because Chomsky.

Hello again, I’ve just finished my last lecture before Christmas, yay (I mean boo, I want to do more linguistics (I hope I get brownie points for saying that))!

I’m currently listening to Fairytale of New York by The Pogues, and getting in the Christmas spirit. This activity has got me thinking, how on earth do we understand what Shane MacGowan (he’s the lead singer, I know my stuff) is saying?

It’s a wonder of human communication that the noises departing his mouth can have any meaning whatsoever to a hearer, and to be honest, it’s a wonder he can make such vague word-like sounds.

When someone’s singing voice sounds like… that (I was trying to think of a simile/metaphor but I couldn’t quite do it justice) it’s kind of inevitable that everyone will have a different idea of what the lyrics actually are. Try getting a group together, putting the song on quietly in the background, and hearing all the different versions as a fun Christmas activity.

Until today I’d never listened to the song whilst reading the lyrics, and to be honest, it was rather strange.

It was also unpleasant. The song is unpleasant. Our friend Shane, at one point, sings:
‘You´re an old slut on junk
Lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed’…
Yes, not very nice, is it?

So, I guess the meaning of this rather strange but somewhat wondrous post is to not listen to the lyrics of Fairytale of New York, and just go along with the vague noises. It’s much more fun to sing along to.

Or you could use my guide to how to sing along, which is here, give it a try, you won’t regret it:

IwasChristmaseeeevebabe
Ithadrutak
Anolmasetome   wonseeanerrthrrone
Athetheysaso
Thrareolmantendew
Iturmfaceway andreamderboutya
Gotonaluckywen

Cameinatenterone
I´vegotafeelin
Thsyersformeenya
Sappychristmas
Iloveybabeeee
I cseeyabedrtime
Whenallourdreamscometrue.

(this bit is Kirsty it’s more clear)
They got cars big as bars
They got rivers of gold
But the wind goes (or windows) right through you
It´s no place for the old
When you first took my hand on a cold christmas eve
You promised me broadway was waiting for me
You were handsome you were pretty
Queen of new york city when the band finished playing they yelled out for more
Sinatra was swinging all the drunks they were singing
We kissed on a corner
Then danced through the night.

And the boys from the NYPD choir were singing Galway Bay
And the bells were ringing out for christmas day.

You’re a bum you’re a punk
Yeranolsludnjun
Layenntherealmodeadnadripenthabed
You scumbag you maggot
You cheap lousy faggot
Happy christmas your arse I pray god it´s our last.

And the boys of the NYPD choir’s still singing Galway Bay
And the bells were ringing out
For christmas day.

Icudvbeesomeone
Well so could anyone
You took my dreams from me
When I first found you
Ikethemwimebay
Iputhemwimyown
Candmekidoutalo
Avbillmadreamsroundyou
And the boys of the NYPD choir’s still singing Galway Bay
And the bells are ringing out
For christmas day.
I hope you enjoyed this festive post, this might be the last before the new year, I don’t know if anyone else has anything planned. Thanks to everyone who contributed to the blog this year, some more of you better get involved in the new year!

And to end, to paraphrase Shakin’ Stevens, Merry Christmas Everyone!

Marketing has always fascinated me. Sometimes, it works well and sells the product; other times, it is dire, bland and forgetful. Who remembers any other Cadbury advert after the eyebrow one? I don’t. Today, we have a new breed of marketing. Marketing that works, but throws out any rules of grammar they so wish. This irks me somewhat.

First is a rather fabulous PlayStation 4 advert that appeared on the back of many newspapers, in particular the Metro for me on the way to University.  It has in total 70 words, but only two commas and one full stop in the entire advert. If you were to hear this read aloud I’m pretty sure you would not be listening by the time you got to the third line. Commas are very much needed, prescriptively, but in terms of this advert maybe less so. It just about gets away with it, but varying font size to symbolise each new line has a voiced pause.

The other piece that caught my eye was the tag-line on the back of the Game of Thrones box set for series one (they learnt their lesson by the next series, thankfully). The quote reads: “Bloody and ambitiously epic… It’s addictive… once you start thrones dominates your life – Empire”. The problem, again, lies with the punctuation. For me, there needs to be a comma before thrones.

Maybe I’m just being a petty linguist, but is it that hard to read your (tiny) work out loud?

At four o’clock yesterday the Linguistics section held its second reading group. For some reason the turnout was significantly less than three weeks ago; in fact there were just four of us. Although this sounds like a complete disaster, I think it was actually a blessing in disguise. The four of us chose not to talk about the paper but rather general linguistics, university life and travelling. By the time we had left Checkland the meeting had lasted for longer than the first reading group.

We spoke about our experiences studying or, in Sandra’s case, teaching at Brighton University. I feel all four of us enjoy being part of the Linguistics department at Brighton and it’s testament to the department that the three students who came to the group – Connie, Justine and I – came to University primarily to study English Language but now all three of us are more interested in Linguistics. This seems to be a common trend amongst the English Language and Linguistics students at Brighton.

By speaking to Justine and Connie I got the impression that the third year linguistics group are close. The same can be said for the second years. Although we are 27 very different people, we get on really well and after over a year together I don’t think I have heard about any angry words being exchanged or a major falling out (*touch wood*). This isn’t the case with every course, which makes me think there must be something about studying a Linguistics degree at Brighton University that brings people together: the reason?  A common fear of a lecturer? Perhaps… A much needed outlet to complain about your housemates? Possibly… A shared passion for the subject? I’d like to think so. Whatever the reason I hope the first years are making the same effort with one another.

We also spoke about Sandra’s blog https://blogs.brighton.ac.uk/linguistics/2013/11/30/losing-a-language/ and how sad it is that so many languages are dying out. Sandra felt the reason Low German has all but died out is due to the perception of the language amongst school children; it is seen as the language of farm folk and the uneducated. The same reason can be applied to the failed attempts of reviving Irish Gaelic. We came to the conclusion that in order for a language to be resurrected it must be seen as desirable by the children who are trying to learn it. We can see this in the revival of the Maori language in New Zealand which must be a result of the language’s association with the All blacks and the importance Kiwi culture places on the it’s rugby team. We also exchanged ideas about the course I found it surprising how often the four of us agreed about what was good and what needs improving on our course, this felt like an important exercise and in my experience it’s often the way issues are resolved.

If like me, you see your future career in Linguistics you are pretty limited in job choice; writer, speech therapist, teacher, lecturer, translator… that’s about it. These are all jobs where it helps to know people in the same line of work; either as a reference or someone to take advice from. For this reason I think it is a really good idea to get to know the students and lecturers in the Linguistics department because in my experience the world is indeed very small and the chances that you will encounter another Brightonian Linguist in your professional life are pretty high.

I see my future career in education and over the summer I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to teach English in Bratislava. One of the things that struck me is that in order for education to be effective it has to be built on good relationships amongst students and teachers. I don’t know if this was one of Tim and Sandra’s reasons for starting the reading group but if it was, he should be pleased because I think it’s starting to work.

Most of the people I know who study Linguistics think the reading group is a really good idea and I understand that people have lives outside Linguistics. But If you saw the demonstrations on Tuesday or have read about the five Sussex students who have been suspended from University for their involvement in an occupation you will understand just how important education is to people (myself included) and how it is fast becoming a commodity. With this in mind, I think we must recognise that when a group of people are willing to give away their time and knowledge for free, it is something really special.

‘Ello again, how are you? I hope you’re good.

Today I thought I’d write about moving from Sheffield up in’t north, down to Guernsey in the south, and how I changed how I spoke, rather consciously, in order to fit in.

Those of you that know me now are probably thinking that I don’t seem like someone who would be bothered too much about fitting in, and thankfully, I’m not any more. Back in the day though I was very nervous and shy, and when I did move down all I wanted to do was make a few friends and not be laughed at for sounding all funny.

I made a very bad start. I remember on my first day I had no idea that some of my vocabulary would be completely alien to the people of Guernsey. ‘Mint’ meaning good, seemed to have everyone confused, and sitting next to some one and saying ‘utch up’ (make room) had them completely dumbfounded.

Working in groups was very hard due to the language barrier. ‘Stop faffin about’ (stop messing around) did not stop people messing around, but it did provoke a good laugh from the rest of the group at my expense. ‘I’m fed up wi’im’ I said about one of the laughers. Again, no one understood, and I could tell it was going to take a lot of effort for me to truly fit in in this place.

One day I walked into form and said ‘ow do?’ to one of my new friends. This flummoxed him, he had no idea, so again I had to explain myself, I decided the best thing to do was to try and speak as much like the Guernsey folk as possible, and my South Yorkshire expressions disappeared pretty quickly.

The pronunciation, though, was a different matter. That was something that was very hard to get rid of, and I found myself, for quite a while, talking like this:  ‘summetsupeer’ (something’s wrong here), ‘gerrartnit’ (get out of it) or ‘azeeginiter’ (has he given it to her).

Again, this brought great joy to the people of Guernsey, but still I felt like I didn’t fit in.

I guess it took me about 3 years to sound like I do today, and when I did finally start to sound like a Guern I felt great, I finally fit in, I’m not an outsider. Now though, I kind of wish I still had the Sheffield accent, after all, that’s home, and it’d be nice if I could take a bit of home around with me while I’m not there.

Thanks again for reading, have a lovely day!

In next week’s LX553 lecture I will be talking about language death. Of course, it’s not the language that dies as such; rather, the speakers… It is assumed that about half of the world’s languages are endangered and there are estimations that one language dies every other week.

I bet you are asking why this topic is important to me. German isn’t endangered after all, right? There are two reasons really. My MA dissertation was concerned with the processes that lead to language death but more importantly, I am part of one of these processes.

My late grandfather spoke what is called Low German (LG) and only LG. The status of LG is debatable. Some people argue that it’s a language and others argue that it is a dialect. In our family, whether it was a language or a dialect was unimportant: It was just a part of our life. Since we lived in the same house as my grandparents, my brother and I were constantly exposed to my grandpa speaking in this variety. However, my grandmother, who had fled from Silesia after WWII, did not speak LG but had learned to understand it over the course of time. Therefore, their children, my father and his two brothers, were not raised speaking LG fluently and my dad, who mainly speaks High German, only uses a few LG expressions. My mum, on the other hand, was raised speaking Low German and High German. When she gets together with her brother and her sisters now you hardly hear any High German but they all speak to each other in LG. Because LG was not fashionable and it was seen as language of farmers when I was born, my brother and I then learned High German as first language. At the dinner table my mum would be switching between Low German when speaking to my grandpa and then switching back to High German when talking to us. So we do understand Low German but when we try speaking it, it just sounds silly and therefore we don’t use it.

As far as I understand my mum, it was a conscious decision to raise us with High German.  And I can remember a scene in primary school when a teacher laughed at a student and corrected him because he had used Low German. After all, parents want to make the best choices for their children.

This is a fairly normal trajectory of decline, which we find in many endangered languages. So one could think I’m just a data point (considering my love for quantitative sociolinguistics) but this is not (only) the case. Language loss has an effect on the speakers. It took me a long time but in my twenties I realised that Low German is an important part of my identity, which I won’t be able to pass on to my children.

Hello, it’s me again, I hope you’re happy about that.

Today I will offer my typically witty and insightful take on what was a fascinating lecture from Dr. Billy Clark yesterday.

The lecture was very well attended, and as Tim said, we’re a credit to the university, which is nice, I like being a credit to something.

I hope Dr Clark wouldn’t mind me referring to him as Billy in this post, because that’s what I’m going to do.

I’ll start from the beginning of the lecture (rather conventionally). Before Billy went into detail about applying pragmatics to stylistics, he gave an introduction to what inferences are. Inferences are conclusions that we reach from evidence available and our own reasoning. He gave a comical example of an inference that Russell Brand came to when hearing a speaker say ‘we’re running out of time’. In a joke that even I would be proud of (kudos Russ), Russell Brand remarked, ‘we cannot run out of time, time is infinite’. Obviously, this is not what the speaker meant by saying that they would run out of time, he meant they would run out of the time they had allotted for the discussion they were having. Interesting, hmm?

Billy then went on to explain why we study inferences. My favourite reason is ‘because they exist’. He then went on to explain the link to linguistics, summing it up with the question of how the noises we make lead to certain reactions. He had pictures and stuff in the presentation, if you weren’t there, tough.

Now, ‘why is this linked to stylistics?’ you may ask. Seriously, you are allowed to ask. Okay, I’ll explain then, seeing as you asked so nicely. Inferences are linked to stylistics because texts are intended to be understood in certain ways, and to have certain effects. So, for example when I said/wrote ‘you may ask’ above, I imagine you inferred that I meant ‘you might ask because you’re interested’ but I said ‘you are allowed to ask’, to made a ‘joke’ (notice the inverted commas) by playing around with your inferences. By doing so I (hopefully) created an affect, and made you laugh. That is just one way in which we can use the inferences we expect people to have to our advantage, let your imagination run free and try and think of some more if you fancy.

This was just a short account of what I found interesting from Billy’s lecture, there is certainly a lot more to add but as always I don’t like to give you too much to read.

The final thing I’d like to say is that Billy has a very nice sounding voice (that’s not a weird thing to say, shush)

Thanks for taking the time to read my ramblings again, if you’d like me to stop for a while, write something yourself!

Liam out.

So, I’ve been trying to think of something to write about, and I remembered that for a presentation that I’m doing for one of my modules this year, we spoke about the language use of teenagers, and in particular, instant messaging.

I thought I’d create a little conversation between Steven and Holly (fictional characters) on Facebook, which will be both entertaining and, I hope, informative.

Here goes:

Steven: hey holly wubu2 2dai
Holly: been at skool wiv you
Steven: oh ye lol, science was sick 2dai
Holly: i h8 science lol
Steven: yeah me 2 lol i ment bad sick lol
Holly: okkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk
Steven: wuu2 l8r
Holly: nothin u?
Steven: nothin lol

5 minutes later…

Steven: u wanna do somethin 🙂 xxxx
Holly: yeah wot?
Steven: go kfc?
Holly: dont like kfc
Steven: maccy ds?
Holly: yeh i like that
Steven: k meet you at urs in half hour?
Holly: how u kno wear i live?
Steven: errm scotty told me
Holly: ow does scotty know?
Steven: dunno
Holly: not going maccy ds wiv you creep
Steven: i aint a creep
Holly: k. bye.

As heartbreaking and hard to read as that is, I hope you picked out some things that maybe even you did as a young teen and are now painfully ashamed of. Now go grab a Kleenex, I know how upset you are for poor Steven