What is
language?
Language is a
learned human behavior.
All human
societies have language.
Languages
share certain universal traits.
The
relationships between sounds and meaning are basically arbitrary.
Language uses
a finite set of elements to create an infinite set of possible sentences.
Language
consists of sounds, forms and meaning.
People use
language for a wide variety of purposes.
Language use
involves many psychological and emotional factors.
Linguistic
knowledge includes knowledge of sounds, forms and meaning.
Language
ability is innate in humans.
Language
ability is common to individuals with vastly different levels of intelligence.
Language
abilities are related to specific areas of the brain.
Aphasia
studies show how particular areas of the brain relate to language functions.
Regardless of
how primitive or abbreviated language may be, it is pivotal to
cognition: by
means of it we designate numbers, perform mathematics, calculations, analyze
perceptions, distinguish the essential from the nonessential, and form
categories of distinct impressions. Apart from being a means of communicating,
language is fundamental to perception and memory, thinking and behavior. It
organizes our inner life.
There are
numerous definitions of language. David Crystal defines language as
"The
systematic, conventional use of sounds, signs or written symbols in a human
society
for
communication and self-expression."
Lyons presents
four major distinctives of human language:
1. Arbitrariness
2. Duality 3. Discreteness 4. Productivity
Language is
arbitrary in terms of how certain sounds represent certain meanings in a
society.
Except for onomatopoeia (and even these forms are culturally accepted
approximations
of the real world sounds they represent), most words are simply a set of
sounds used as
a symbol to represent an agreed upon meaning. The grammatical
structures of
language are also arbitrary in that there is no single pattern for clauses or
noun phrases,
etc. that all languages must follow. (Later, we will look at language
universals,
which show some limits to this general statement.)
The duality of
language refers to the fact that every 'piece' or unit of language fits into
larger
'pieces' or units. Sounds fit into syllables, syllables into words, words into
phrases,
phrases into
clauses, etc. We might also think of this as hierarchical.
Discreteness
in language summarizes the fact that linguistic units are not constantly
changing;
there are limits within in which change occurs. Thus, we can identify the
sounds, the
syllable types, the clause types, etc. The number of total patterns is both
limited and
identifiable.
Pinker notes: Non-human
communication systems are based on one of three designs: a finite repertory of
calls...a continuous analog signal that registers magnitude of some
state... or a
set of random variations on a theme.... human language has a very different
design. The combinatorial system called 'grammar' makes human language
infinite... digital... and compositional....
Human language
is also productive: speakers can always add (within limits) more words
or phrases or
substitute synonymous forms in a sentence to make a "first time in the
history of the
universe" statement.
The principle
underlying grammar is unusual in the natural world. A grammar is
an example of
a 'discrete combinatorial system.' A finite number of discrete
elements (in
this case, words) are sampled, combined, and permuted to create
larger
structures (in this case, sentences) with properties that are quite distinct
from those of their
elements.
Neurolinguistic
studies have shown that there are a number of areas in the brain which
are used
primarily for producing and comprehending language. By studying how damage
or injury to
the brain (aphasia) affects language behavior, researchers have found that
language is
primarily a function of the left hemisphere.
Two main types
of aphasia suggest that language may be organized in terms of a lexical
and a
grammatical part.
Broca's
aphasia 'is characterized by labored speech, word-finding pauses, loss of
'function'
words (grammatical morphemes), and, quite often, disturbed word order.'
Wiernicke's
aphasia is characterized by semantic and lexical difficulties such as word
substitutions,
difficulty comprehending speech, etc.
Language is
used in many ways. Nida discusses eight ways that language is used:
Aesthetic - using
language in aesthetic ways (e.g. poetry, advertising)
Cognitive - using
words to think
Emotive - influencing
the emotive state of the receptors
Expressive - expressing
emotions
Informative - conveying
information
Imperative - influencing
behavior (stimulating action)
Interpersonal
- making and maintaining relationships
Performative -
modifying the state of the receptors
We might also
add several other functions of language:
Documentary - recording
information
Identificational
- expressing one's identity
Interrogative -
obtaining information
Words can do
wonderful things. They sound purr. They can urge, they can
wheedle, whip,
whine. They can sing, sass, singe. They can churn, check,
channelize.
They can be a hup, 2, 3, 4. They can forge a fiery army out of a
hundred
languid men. (Gwendolyn Brooks, afterword, Contending Forces, 1968)
Speech is
power; speech is to persuade, to convert, to compel. (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
The following
chart adapted from Webb (1986:51) illustrates six factors that precede any
linguistic
message:
A.
Psychological factors: intentions of the speaker, and the speaker's opinions,
attitudes, etc.
+ B. Social
factors: social properties of the speaker (and hearer[s]). The traditional role
of
speech in the
society, the social roles of the participants, the social setting, etc.
+ C.
Situational factors: e.g. the physical setting
ARE PROCESSED THROUGH
THE
D. The total
set of linguistics resources available to the speaker
+ E. Rhetorical
devices: discourse genres, conversational routines, strategies, forms and norms
+ F.
Nonlinguistic communicative resources: gestures, facial expressions, body language,
clothes
TO CREATE
G. The Text or
linguistic message
Children
acquire language in stages and these stages appear to be universal.
The ability of
children to acquire language is not generally dependent on race, social
class,
geography, or intelligence.
At some point
the ability to acquire language decreases.
Adults can
learn additional languages given sufficient opportunity.
Adults learn
in different ways than children.
Adult language
learners benefit from using their preferred learning style(s).
By imitating
speech a subject is more easily learned than by study and books.
Definitions
Many linguists
distinguish language acquisition and language learning; children acquire
their first
language, after that people learn additional languages.
Children
around the world develop linguistic knowledge in similar ways and at similar
stages of their
life, no matter how 'difficult' the language may appear.
Pinker notes
"...acquisition of a normal language is guaranteed for children up to the
age
of six, is
steadily compromised from then until shortly after puberty, and is rare
thereafter."
Researchers
have concluded that some aspects of language are innate in humans; human
beings are
predisposed to learn and use language. The innate form of language contains a
universal
grammar that is later shaped by the particular forms of the language(s) a child
is exposed to.
Aitchinson outlines the characteristics of biologically controlled
behaviors such
as language as follows:
·
Language emerges before it is "necessary".
·
Language is not the result of a conscious decision.
·
Language is not triggered by external events.
·
Language is not the result of direct teaching or intensive practice.
·
Language develops along standard lines correlated with age and other types of development.
·
Language is acquired during a "critical period".
How do infants
acquire their first language?
1. Not by
imitation
2. Not by
reinforcement
3. Not by
memorizing grammar rules
4. In stages
5. By
assimilating rules
I
have...discovered by observation how I learned to speak. I did not learn by
elders
teaching me words in any systematic way, as I was soon after taught to
read and
write. But of my own motion...I strove with cries and various sounds and
much moving of
my limbs to utter the feelings of my heart—all this in order to get
my own way.
Stages of
language development
pre-linguistic
sounds
early
linguistic sounds
babbling
holophrastic
phrases
two-word
phrases
telegraphic
speech
Cross-language
studies show that infants start babbling with certain sounds, no matter
what language
is spoken around them. Among the first consonants made by infants
around the
world are (Data from O'Grady, et. al. 1994:364):
p t k
b d g
m n
w j h
s
How children
learn the meaning of words
Over
generalization
'Daddy' as any
adult male
Under
generalization
'doggie' as
just the family pet
The critical
age hypothesis
Pinker
presents many aspects of the critical age hypothesis. In summary, he says:
Thus, language
acquisition might be like other biological functions. The linguistic
clumsiness of
tourists and students might be the price we pay for the linguistic
genius we
displayed as babies, just as the decrepitude of age is the price we pay
for the vigor of
youth.
Differences
between children and adult learners
linguistic
patterns
emotional
makeup
situational
variety
time
types of input
These natives
are unintelligent—We can't understand their language.
(Chinweizu,
"Colonizer's Logic" in Voices from Twentieth-Century Africa, 1988)
In Paris they
simply stared when I spoke to them in French; I never did succeed
in making
those idiots understand their language. (Mark Twain)
Paul Robeson
spoke twenty-five languages not as an exercise but as a source
through which
he could absorb the many cultures into which he had not been
born, but to
which he was instinctively determined to belong. He consumed a
language for
the cultural essence it contained and became in practice, in custom,
and in habit a
loyal member of all the groups whose songs he sang.
Charles V said
that a man who knew four languages was worth four men.
(Lord
Macauley)
Language is
the building block of consciousness. To accurately understand the
soul of a
people, you not only search for their outward manifestations…but you
examine their
language. (Haki Madhubuti)
Knowing
your own learning style(s)
visual
auditory
tactile
Adapting
your language learning to your best learning patterns
writing
notes
interactive
activities
active
participation
He
that travelleth into a country before he hath some entrance into the language,
goeth
to school, and not to travel. (Francis Bacon)
The Beginnings of Literacy Joan Brooks McLane and
Gillian Dowley McNamee
Erikson Institute
Literacy often begins early,
long before children encounter formal school instruction in writing and
reading. Literacy itself is not easy to define, and there are many disputes and
unresolved questions about how literacy develops. Central to many recent
discussions of literacy is the notion that writing and reading are ways of making,
interpreting, and communicating meaning. Reading is defined as the ability to
"take meaning from print," (Heath, 1982) and writing as the ability
to use print to communicate with others. According to these definitions,
reading and writing are more than simply decoding and encoding print: they are
ways of constructing and conveying meaning with written language. Becoming
literate, then, is a multifaceted phenomenon that involves more than learning a
set of technical skills (such as learning the alphabet, learning how to form
letters and spell words, and learning how to decode print) that are typically
taught in elementary school; becoming literate also includes mastering a
complex set of understandings, attitudes, expectations and behaviors, as well
as specific skills, related to written language (Erickson, 1984; Cook-Gumperz,
1986).
Many young children begin to
learn about writing and reading well before they start elementary school.
However, their early literacy activities may look quite different from more
mature, conventional forms of writing and reading. For example, one weekend,
Jennifer, who had just turned two, went with her father to visit her
grandmother in the country. Her grandmother read her Johnny Lion's Book by
Edith Thacher Hurd-- a story book about a young lion who dreams of going
hunting in the woods. About an hour later, Jennifer, who had been playing
outside, called to her father, "I read a book, Daddy." She had picked
two big leaves which she now held, one lying flat on the palm of each hand. She
and her father sat down on the steps, side by side, and Jennifer started
"reading" her "book" in what her grandmother described as a
"dramatic voice," which sounded very much like reading: "And a
big bear (pause) went into the woods and she chased a big lion (pause) and she
caught a big lion." After another pause, her father said, "and then
what did the bear do?" Jennifer answered, "Then the big bear went
home to her mommy."
Jennifer's pretend reading
makes it clear that she is interested in reading and stories. She does not yet
know how to read (or write) in a conventional sense, but she pretends to know.
Playing with reading is one way she learns about written language and how it
can be used. This incident also shows how familiar Jennifer already is with
reading--two leaves can serve as her "text" and she can invent a
simple but coherent story and tell it in a voice that accurately mimics a
reading intonation. And it indicates that Jennifer finds reading interesting and
pleasurable--as well as a good way to capture her father's attention.
There are many ways that
children make connections with writing and reading, and many pathways into
literacy. Writing and reading can enter young children's lives in a variety of
ways. Early experiences with literacy may be initiated by the child or by other
people, they may be playful or work-like, and may take place at home, in the
neighborhood or in community settings such as preschools, daycare centers, and
churches. Early literacy experiences can include pretending to write and read
stories and poems, writing a thank-you letter to a distant grandmother,
receiving instruction in how to form the letters of one's name, listening to a
story being read aloud, or reading passages from the Bible. The range and
diversity of early literacy experiences suggests that there are many ways that
children make connections with writing and reading, and many pathways to
literacy.
Bridges to literacy
Literacy development often
starts in young children's early symbol using activities: in talking, in play
and fantasy, in scribbling and drawing, in pretend reading and writing. Between
the ages of 1-5 children learn to use symbols they invent for themselves and
those "donated by the culture" (Gardner & Wolf, 1979, p.vii). The
use of symbols--which may include words, gestures, marks on paper, objects
modeled in clay, and so forth--makes it possible to represent experience,
feelings and ideas. Symbols also allow children to go beyond the immediate here
and now and to create imaginary worlds. This is what they do when they talk
about storybook plots, when they make up stories, engage in pretend play, or
draw images on paper--and later when they read books and write stories. As
children begin to experiment with writing and reading, often in playful ways,
they may find they can use these new symbolic modes in some of the same ways
they used earlier developed symbolic forms--so that talking, drawing, and
playing can serve as "bridges" to literacy, as children discover that
writing and reading offer them new and interesting resources for constructing
and communicating meaning (Gundlach, 1982; Dyson, 1986; Vygotsky, 1978).
Play: making connections with
writing and reading
Play consumes much of young
children's time and energy, and for many children, play is where writing and
reading begin. Play is the arena in which young children make connections
between their immediate personal world and activities that are important in the
larger social world of family and community, and play is the context in which
many children find ways to make culturally valued activities part of their own
personal experience. When children play with writing and reading, they are
actively trying to use--and to understand and make sense of --reading and
writing long before they can actually read and write. When books, paper, and
writing material are among the objects children play with, important literacy
learning can occur. As they experiment with written language, often in playful
ways, children begin to learn what writing and reading are, and what they can
do with them. At the same time, children can acquire a range of information and
skills related to writing and reading, as well as feelings and expectations
about themselves as potential readers and writers. This multifaceted body of
knowledge and attitudes constitutes early or "emergent" literacy
(Holdaway, 1979; Teale & Sulzby, 1986).
Play appears to have at least
two potential links to the development of literacy: First, as a symbolic
activity, pretend play allows children to develop and refine their capacities
to use symbols, to represent experience, and to construct imaginary worlds,
capacities they will draw on when they begin to write and read. Second, as an
orientation or approach to experience, play can make the various roles and
activities of people who read and write more meaningful and hence more
accessible to young children.
When children create imaginary
situations in pretend play, they invent and inhabit "alternative" or
"possible worlds." This is similar to what they do when they listen
to storybooks, and to what they do when they read or write stories themselves.
Indeed, there are similarities between pretend play and storytelling, and in
the kinds of competence the two require (Britton, 1983; Bruner, 1984; Galda,
1984). Many children make up their first stories in the context of pretend
play, creating and enacting their own dramatic narratives (and reenacting
favorite stories they have heard being read aloud). Indeed, one of the things
that attracts young children to pretend play is the chance to tell stories.
Later, many children are attracted to writing and reading for the same reasons:
they find they can participate in stories told by others.
As children mature, their
pretend play and the symbolic transformations they use to create and sustain it
become increasingly elaborate, complex, and abstract. With development, pretend
play becomes less dependent on physical props, gestures, and actions, and
relies increasingly on ideas, imagination, and language. Children often employ
abundant, rich language in pretend play. An increasing proportion of the time
devoted to pretend play is spent in talk, as children discuss the setting, the characters
or roles, and the plots they will enact in their play. Indeed, at times it
seems as though "the saying is the playing (Garvey Berndt, 1975,
p.9)." As pretend play becomes increasingly dependent on language to
create possible worlds and to express and communicate meanings, it comes closer
to the experiences of storytelling, writing, and reading.
Children seem to be able to
play with almost anything: objects, movements, behaviors, roles, rules, and
language. Many play with the implements and materials of written language: with
paper, pencils, markers, crayons, and books, with the activities of writing and
reading, and with the roles of writer and reader. Children incorporate both
real and pretend writing and reading into their dramatic play, using them to
enhance the drama and realism of the pretend situation. They may use characters
and plots from their favorite storybooks. Some preschool children explore the
tools and activities of literacy in playful ways, using pretend writing to
create "stories," "poems," or "news
bulletins"--as 4-and-a-half year-old Joshua did one Sunday afternoon:
After dressing up in various costumes and pretending he was "a baby
learning to fly," Joshua wrote some letters and letter like figures on a
piece of paper. He showed this to this mother and said "Now wait for the
surprise." Then he held the paper in front of his face while he shouted:
"Good evening ladies and gentlemen! This is the ABC News! Now we have lots
of weather!"
Joshua's written news report and his reading of it contain
elements of real literacy--letter like shapes, and the understanding that these
carry a message. In this sort of play children practice and integrate what they
know or what they surmise about a range of activities and roles outside their
immediate experience and understanding. As Greta Fein observed, "pretense
[may] provide special opportunities for the partially understood and the dimly
grasped to become more firmly mastered
(1979, p.206)." By playing with writing and reading, children
become familiar with the tools of literacy and begin to learn how to use and
control them. Such play also allows children to acquire some global notions of
what writing and reading consist of and what they can do with them.
In play the focus is on
exploring rather than on accomplishing predetermined ends or goals, so there
are few pressures to produce correct answers or final products. Play's
nonliteral, not-for-real, "not-for-profit" orientation allows players
the freedom to manipulate materials, experiences, roles and ideas in new,
creative, experimental, "as if" ways (Bruner, 1977, p.v; Garvey,
1974). Play thus creates a risk-free context in which children do not have to
worry about "getting it right" or about "messing up." This
freedom may lead children to discover or invent possibilities--new ways of
doing things and new ways of thinking about ideas--which may, in turn, lead
them to new questions, problems, and solutions. Approaching writing and reading
with such an experimental, "as if" attitude may help children realize
that written language is something they can manipulate in a variety of ways and
for a variety of purposes. "Playing at writing and reading--by scribbling,
drawing, pretending to write, or pretending to read--may serve to open up the
activities of writing and reading for children's consideration and exploration
(Bruner, 1976; Sutton-Smith, 1979).
Pretend play often involves
reversals of everyday, real-life roles and power relationships. When they
pretend, children can enact powerful roles such as mother, father, doctor,
fireman, witch, monster, writer, and reader and take on the competencies that
come with these roles, as Joshua did when he "wrote" and
"read" the "ABC News". In doing this, Joshua assumed the
confidence and power of someone who can write and read, and engaged in writing
and reading on his own terms, defining them as he was able to carry them out at
the moment.
Play thus encourages children
to act as if they are already competent in and about to control the activity
under consideration: they can act as if they know how to cook, put out fires,
kill monsters, read books, or write stories. Playing with the roles of writer
and reader can give children a sense of ownership of these roles. Through play,
children may come to feel that they are writers and readers long before they
actually have the necessary skills and knowledge to write and read. The
feelings of competence and control that can be seen in children such as
Jennifer and Joshua are likely to nourish assumptions and expectations about
becoming literate, and to give children the motivation to work at learning to
write and read.
Literacy and relationships
While activities like talking,
playing, and drawing are closely linked to writing and reading, and while their
use often intertwine and overlap, there are no direct or inevitable transitions
between earlier-and later-developed symbol systems. Whether and how children
make connections between talking, playing, drawing, and writing and reading
depends on the children's interests and personalities, on what is available and
valued in their particular culture, on how the people around them use writing
and reading in their own lives, and how these people initiate and respond to
children's writing and reading activities.
In other words, early literacy
development does not simply happen; rather, it is part of a social process,
embedded in children's relationships with parents, siblings, grandparents,
friends, caretakers, and teachers. To understand the beginnings of literacy,
one must study the environments in which young children develop, and the ways
in which these settings provide opportunities for children to become involved
with books, paper, and writing materials. Early experiences with literacy are
part of the relationships, activities, and settings of young children's
everyday lives. It is people who make writing and reading interesting and
meaningful to young children. Family members, caretakers, and teachers play
critical roles in early literacy development by serving as models, providing
materials, demonstrating their use, offering help, instruction, and
encouragement, and communicating hopes and expectations. To their interactions
with young children, these people bring their own attitudes and expectations,
both conscious and unconscious, about writing and reading, and about the
child's eventual development as a writer and reader (Gundlach, McLane, Stott
& McNamee, 1985).
The beginning of writing
Early writing activities tend
to be more visible than early reading activities because they involve making
something. If given crayons or pencils, children usually begin to scribble
around the age of 18 months; they find scribbling interesting because it leaves
a visible trace--they have made something that didn't exist before. When
children encounter print in their environment, they use this visual information
in their scribbling and pretend writing. Marie Clay (1975) has shown that as
scribbling develops, it begins to incorporate various features of conventional
written language, such as linearity, horizontally, and repetition. As children
learn that marks and letters represent or stand for something, they are
developing an understanding of what Clay calls the "sign concept"--which
is of central importance in learning to write and read.
Robert Gundlach (1982) has
argued that beginning writers need to master the functions, uses and purposes
of writing; the forms and features of written language; and the processes of
writing. Children must learn what writing can do, and, in particular, what they
can do with writing.
The beginnings of reading
Young children can begin to
learn about the complex process of deriving meaning from print long before they
can decode or even recognize letters. Susan Knontos has pointed out that
"before they become readers, young children must learn why people read and
what people do when they read (1986, p. 58)." As in learning about
writing, young children begin to understand the enterprise of reading from
observing and participating in activities with family members and other
competent readers. When young children see other people reading, and when
others read to them or involve them in other activities related to reading,
they become familiar with print and some of its uses. For example, when they
see people who are important to them reading a recipe to bake a cake, reading a
newspaper to find out what movies are on TV, or reading letters from distant
relatives in Vietnam, young children experience reading as a meaningful
activity and part of everyday life. In addition, many adults point out print to
children, helping them notice a particular configuration of letters such as the
spelling of their name or the name of a favorite brand of breakfast cereal. In
this way, young children may develop a "sight vocabulary" of words
like "STOP," "Crest," and "McDonald's" (Heath,
1986, p.20; Harste, Woodward, & Burke, 1984).
Reading books to children is a
powerful way of introducing them to literacy, and it is the one early
experience that has been identified as making a difference in later success in
learning to read in school (Anderson, Hiebert, Scott & Wilkinson, 1985).
But this is not usually the reason that adults, particularly parents, read to
young children. More often, they do it because they find it enjoyable, they see
that children enjoy it, and they may believe that reading nourishes children's
minds and enriches their relationships. When adults read to children, the occasion
tends to be warm and intimate; parents, caretakers, and older children often
hold young children on their laps or sit close to them while reading aloud, and
their attention is focused on their interaction with the child. The reader is
usually sensitive to what interests the child, and what he or she finds scary,
exciting or amusing. Reading often includes conversations about the characters
in the book, about what they might be thinking and feeling, and about
experiences in the child's own life that are related to those in the book
(Lindfors, 1984; Deloache, 1984).
As children are read to they
acquire an enormous amount of information about reading and the world of books.
They learn what books are, what you do with them, and how you talk about them
(Snow & Ninio, 1986; Teale, 1982). They learn that
written words
can create imaginary worlds beyond the immediate here and now. They learn that
written language has its own rhythms and conventions. They learn about specific
features of written languages: for example, that the black marks on the page
are letters and words, and that print goes from left to right and from top to
bottom on the page. Gradually, children learn that the reader is reconstructing
the story through the words written on the page--that print has a precise and
unchanging meaning. And, perhaps most important, they come to expect that books
will be interesting, challenging, exciting, and comforting, developing, in
Holdaway's words, "high expectations of print" (1979).
One way that children show us
they are learning from being read to is through pretending to read storybooks
by themselves. Don Holdaway was probably the first to point out that very young
children who are read to frequently spend a great deal of time on their own
with favorite storybooks, pretending to read them and reenacting the behaviors
they observed while they were being read to. In observing a number of children
between the ages of 2 and 5 "reading" favorite storybooks, Holdaway
was struck by how hard the children worked to recapture the meaning of the
stories: "They have remembered very little of the surface verbal level:
what they have remembered most firmly is the meanings (Holdaway, l979, p.
44)." The children were not giving a memorized rendition of a story, but
were, instead, working to construct the message of the story using the rhythms
and sounds of language in which they first heard the message.
Elizabeth Sulzby (l985)
describes a progression of changes in children's pretend reading as they
gradually approach independent reading. Preschoolers' reading of favorite books
is, for the most part, guided by "reading" the pictures in the book.
Young children hold the book and turn the page quite deliberately, while naming
or commenting on what they see in the pictures. In time, and as they become
more familiar with the story, they "read" the book by making up a
story, creating a rough story line that follows the sequence of pictures.
Gradually the language they use in "reading" (while still looking at
the pictures), sounds more like real reading--the child's voice and intonation
come to sound like written language read aloud.
Children ages 3, 4 or 5 may
give close renditions or even verbatim recitations of stories they have heard
frequently. As Sulzby and Holdaway have observed, children do not simply
memorize the text but work from a strong sense of what the story should sound
like, and they work to retrieve and reconstruct the meaning of the text.
Children strive to get the exact working--they sometimes hesitate, correct
themselves, or ask others for help. Young children's independent efforts to
read books demonstrate the wealth of knowledge about books, print and narrative
they acquire while they are being read to.
It is clear that over the
months and years of being read to, children learn many of the subtle details of
behavior and speaking that go with reading a book. Pretend reading allows
children to role-play, to reenact and try out the behaviors, skills and
thinking processes that are part of reading. This long period of play brings
children very close to actual reading.
Conclusion
Early literacy development is
closely tied to the specifics of young children's relationships and activities.
To these relationships and activities, children bring their curiosity, their
interest in communicating and interacting with others, and their inclination to
be a part of family and community life. They also bring their desire to use and
control materials and tools that they perceive as important to the people
around them--their urge to "do it myself." And they bring their
willingness to seek help from more proficient writers and readers. When they
interact with more competent writers and readers, children serve as "spontaneous
apprentices" (in George Miller's phrase), learning about written language
and how to use and control it for a range of purposes.
What is the relationship
between early experiences with literacy and later, long-term literacy
development? There are as yet no definitive answers to this question, but as in
other aspects of psychological development, we assume that there is a
relationship between early literacy experience and later mature literacy. How
this relationship unfolds for a particular child will depend on several factors
which interact with one another in complex ways. These include the child's
interests, temperament and personality, opportunities at home and in the
neighborhood for writing and reading, as well as the nature and quality of the
instruction the child encounters in school.
Language and
culture are very interconnected.
People
typically adjust their way of speaking to different situations.
Language is
often a powerful symbol of ethnic identity.
People make
language choices for a number of reasons, including economic
advancement, a
desire for education, intermarriage, etc.
A language
consists of mutually intelligible dialects.
Dialects may
be based on differences of geography, social class, gender, age, etc.
People have
strong feelings about dialect and language differences.
People may
have negative attitudes about languages around them.
People may
have negative attitudes about their own language.
It is
important to understand people's attitudes towards various types of language.
A living
language is a throbbing, vital thing, ever changing, ever growing and
mirroring the
people who speak it and write it. It has its roots in the masses,
though its
superstructure may represent the culture of a few. (Jawaharlal Nehru)
It is
impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth, without making some other
Englishman
despise him. (G. B. Shaw, Pygmalion, Preface)
Definitions
Linguistics is
the scientific study of language. The study of the formal patterns of
language is of
interest to descriptive linguists and theoreticians. Language is more than
grammatical
structures, however. The performance of individuals and the ways
individuals adjust
their speech to different situations must also be studied. An
observationally
adequate sociolinguistic study would describe the competence factors of
native
speakers: those social factors which affect which lexical, phonological, and
grammatical
forms they use to convey a particular idea in a particular setting.
Sociolinguistics
can be defined in a number of ways. In general, sociolinguistics is the
study of how
language is used within a society. Sociolinguistics can include the study of:
dialects,
attitudes
toward language,
bilingualism,
language
planning, etc.
The tools of
phonetics and grammatical analysis still come into play, but other skills,
such as social
science research methods, are at least as important to sociolinguistic
research.
Nida summarizes
sociolinguistics as follows:
Sociolinguistics
looks at language from the standpoint of its social context. In
other words,
it is concerned about speakers, receptors, setting, content, form, and
the relation
of language to other codes. The focus is not so much upon the
sentence or
text but upon the speech event as such. In other words, this is
language in
action. (Nida 1986:1)
Nida (1986:4)
notes sixteen topics of interest to sociolinguistics, including the following:
bilingualism
and bidialectalism
code switching
jargons
registers
amount of
verbalization in a society
language
planning
Language and
culture
People have
often talked about the relationship between language and culture. Some,
such as Sapir
and Whorf (early 20th century), hypothesized that language constrains
thought and
perception.
Linguistic
determinism
Edward Sapir
and Benjamin Whorf studied Amerindian languages of North America and
noticed that
the lexical and grammatical structures were often quite distinct from English
and other
Indo-European languages. Based on their studies they proposed that language
controls a
person's thinking processes in some way. In 1929 Sapir said:
Human
beings...are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has
become the
medium of expression for their society...the 'real world' is to a large
extent
unconsciously built upon the language habits of the group. (Quoted in
O'Grady, et.
al. 1994:242)
Whorf later
stated:
We dissect
nature along lines laid down by our native language. The categories
and types that
we isolate from the world of phenomena we do not find there
because they
stare every observer in the face; on the contrary, the world is
presented in a
kaleidoscopic flux of impressions which has to be organized by our
minds—this
means largely by the linguistic systems of our minds. (Quoted in
O'Grady, et.
al 1994:242)
Eastman notes:
"The
views of Sapir and Whorf have been taken to mean that people who speak
different
languages segment their world differently: thus, the French language
structures
French reality by constraining what French speakers pay attention to,
Swahili does
the same for the Swahili 'world'—if there's a word for 'it' in the
language we
see 'it,' if not we don't." (Eastman 1990:103)
The concept of
language limiting perception has become known as the "Whorfian
Hypothesis"
or as "linguistic determinism".
Our concepts
structure what we perceive, how we get around in the world and
how we relate
to other people. Our conceptual system thus plays a central role in
defining our
everyday realities. (Lakoff and Johnson 1980:3)
The
individual's whole experience is built upon the plan of his language.
(Henri
Delacroix)
Linguistic
relativity
Many linguists
disagree with the strong deterministic stand of Sapir and Whorf. The fact
that people often
have ideas for which they have no adequate words indicates that they
use words to
label what they see, not that they see what they have words for. Based on
Berlin and
Kay's (1967) in-depth study of color terms in a variety of languages, linguists
conclude that
frequently used perceptual categories receive names or words, while less
frequently
used concepts, while perceived, do not always have separate lexical items.
Thus, as the
differences between colors, for example, become important to a society,
more words
will be added to distinguish them.
Nida notes:
Whorf regarded
language as largely determinative, but most other scholars have
taken the
position that the structure of language simply increases the facility with
which people
recognize certain distinctions; for example, the matter of color
contrasts,
kinship relations, and classifications of fauna and flora. It is certainly
true that
language reflects certain aspects of social structure. Relative status, for
example, is
marked at least in a general way in a number of European languages
by means of
varying forms of second person pronouns...Language is not,
however, a
direct inventory of a culture, but rather a kind of index, often based on
what one might
call 'fossilized relics' of the past. For the most part, language
follows
society rather than determining it. (Nida 1986:11) [emphasis added]
The idea that
the grammatical structure of a language reflects the thought
structure of
those speaking it and that it correspondingly reflects the differences
from the
thought of those speaking a language with different grammatical
structure, has
very great difficulties.
(James Barr
1961:39)
Since form and
meaning are arbitrary for the most part, it is not helpful to interpret a
culture
through its grammar.
What is
originality? To see something that has no name as yet and hence cannot
be mentioned
although it stares us all in the face. The way men usually are, it
takes a name
to make something visible for them. Those with originality have for
the most part
also assigned names. (Nietzsche, The Gay Science 1882-7)
The whole
problem can be stated quite simply by asking, "Is there a meaning to
music?"
My answer would be, "Yes." And "Can you state in so many words
what
the meaning
is?" My answer to that would be, "No."(Aaron Copland, composer)
Language
variation
Overview
Each
individual speaks in a variety of ways, even within the same 'language' or
'dialect'.
These
variations may be due to a number of factors, including:
age Old terms
vs. new terms (slang)
geographical region
e.g., Texas, New York City, Chicago
occupation
Insider talk (jargon)
social
situation Formal vs. informal
social status
Talking with "equals" vs. talking with "superiors"
The different
social settings that affect speech are called domains (at home, at school, at
church, at the
office.)
It [is]
necessary to acquire the skills needed for communicating in a mixed
society,
and…this requires a melting and blending of vernacular and…standard
speech, and a
grasp of the occasions in which each, or both, [are] called for.
(Ralph
Ellison, Going into the Territory, 1986)
Dialects and
languages
Dialects can
be defined in terms of geography or various social parameters.
Blair (1990:2)
explains the difference between a dialect and a language as follows:
Dialects are
"speech varieties which are linguistically similar enough to be
intelligible
to speakers of a related variety."
Languages are
"speech varieties which are so linguistically dissimilar as to be
unintelligible
to speakers of related varieties."
A language is a
dialect that has an army and navy. (Max Weinreich, 1894-1969)
Dialects can
be analyzed in terms of their distinctive sounds, words, or syntax.
Sounds
phonetic
differences (e.g., higher or lower vowels)
phonological
differences (e.g., no consonant clusters)
Words
difference
inflectional rules
different
meanings (e.g., a carbonated beverage = soda, pop, soft drink, etc.
Syntax
different word
order
variant
Phrase-Structure Rules
Standard
dialects versus other forms
Linguistic
aspects
Descriptive
studies of the sounds, words and syntax
Social aspects
Studies of the
opinions of people towards different ways of speaking
Studies of how
people become "insiders" in a particular group of speakers
Educational
aspects
Studies of the
effect of particular ways of speaking (or writing) on learning in a
school setting
Studies of
government policies towards language variety in school
Appropriate
language forms
Slang
Slang is
"informal, nonstandard vocabulary, usually intelligible only to people
from a
particular
region or social group" (Crystal 1992:355) and is often seen by outsiders
as
crude or
impolite. It serves as a way of identifying "insiders".
Jargon
Jargon or
argot is "technical terms and expressions used by a group of specialists,
which
are not known
or understood by the speech community as a whole" (Crystal 1992:200-
201). Jargon
is more for ease of communication than for excluding others, although
insiders need
to remember that they are using specialized words when they attempt to
communicate
with people from other professions.
Gender
specific words
Many languages
have grammatical distinctions between "gender" (e.g., he vs. she).
Sometimes the
"masculine" word is used as a generic and an affix must be attached
to
indicate that
the noun is feminine (e.g., waiter/waitress, actor/actress).
It has always
been lawful, and always will be, to issue words stamped with the
mint-mark of the
day. (Horace, Ars Poetica, c. 8 BC)
Language
attitudes
It is not easy
to begin discussing language attitudes without first defining attitudes and
discussing how
these attitudes might be measured.
Attitude can
be discussed in terms of three components:
thoughts
(cognitive)
feelings
(affective)
predispositions
to action (behavioral or conative)
Advertisers
seek to utilize positive language attitudes to affect behavior. Expensive items
are often
announced by male speakers with a proper British accent; appeals to young
people are
made using more informal language.
"S'pose a
man was to come to you and say Polly-voo-franzy—what would you
think?"
"I
wouldn' think nuffin; I'd take en bust him over de head..."
"Shucks,
it ain't calling you anything. It's only saying, do you know how to talk
French?"
"Well,
den, why couldn't he say it?"
(Mark Twain,
Huckleberry Finn, XIV)
When we
consider the role of language attitudes we need to differentiate the
significant
differences
that exist in any society.
members of the
language group
spokesmen for
the ethnic group
mainstream
population
educators
policy makers
Strategies for
measuring language attitudes
Fasold (1984)
notes a number of means of measuring language attitudes. These may be
either direct
or indirect.
matched-guise
tests
A test subject
listens to information in two languages or language varieties and is
asked to
evaluate the speaker in terms of intelligence, openness, etc. In reality, the
speaker is the
same person, who is fluent in both languages.
semantic
differential scales
A test subject
is asked to evaluate varieties of language on a scale of friendliness.
questionnaires
A test subject
responds to a written questionnaire about language varieties. Such
questionnaires
might ask which language the subject uses in a given situation or
what the
subject feels about people who speak a certain way.
interviews
The test
subject is asked to talk about language and the interviewer records the
basic points
of the discussion.
observation
The language
researcher observes which language is used in which situations,
what people
say about language varieties, etc.
Attitudes and
group identity
Our identity is
related to our attitudes towards our own speech and that of others.