Socilolinguistics and the Sociology of Language
Language, Dialects, and Varieties
Language: a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication
Variety :
A
specific set of linguistic items or human speech patterns (presumably,
sounds, words, grammatical features) which we can uniquely associate
with some external factor (presumably, a geographical area or social
group).We find varieties such as London English, Oxford English,
religious English. For some linguists ‘variety’ is given a more restricted definition, as a specialized type of language used within a dialect, e.g. for occupational purposes.
Lingua Franca:
Language
used for communication between two or more groups that have different
native languages. It may be a standard language--for example, English
and French are often used for international diplomacy, and Swahili is
used by speakers of the many different local languages of E Africa. A
lingua franca may also be a pidgin, like Melanesian Pidgin, widely used
in the S Pacific. The term lingua franca (Latin: "Frankish language")
was first applied to a pidgin based on French and Italian developed in
the Mediterranean.
Idiolect :
The
unique characteristics of the language of an individual speaker (a
personal dialect). English may have 400 000 000 idiolects, or the number
equal to the number of speakers of English.
Dialect :
Mutually intelligible
form of a language that differs in systematic ways from each other. A
dialect can be seen as an abstraction deriving from the analysis of a
large number of idiolects. When the Javanese of speakers in different
geographical regions and from different social groups shows systematic difference, the groups are said to speak different dialects of the same language.
It is not always easy to decide whether the systematic difference
between two speech communities reflect two dialects or two languages. A
rule of thumb definition can be used: “ When dialects become mutually
unintelligible – when the speakers of one dialect group can no longer
understand the speakers of another dialect group – these ‘dialects’
become different languages” However, to define “mutually intelligible”
is itself a difficult task. Danes speaking Danish and Norwegians
speaking Norwegian and Swedes speaking Swedish can converse with each
other; yet Danish and Norwegian and Swedish are considered
separate languages because they are spoken in separate countries and
because there are regular differences in their grammar. Similarly, Hindi
and Urdu are mutually intelligible “languages” spoken in Pakistan and
India, although the differences between them are not much
greater than between English spoken in America and Australia. A dialect
is a subordinate variety of a language, so that we can say that Texas
English and London English are dialects of English. A language is a
superordinate term. A language may contain more than one dialect.; e.g.,
English, French, and Italian are spoken in various dialects.
Accent :
The characteristics of speech that convey information about speaker’s dialect. The term accent
is also used to refer to the speech of someone who speaks a language
nonnatively; for example a French person speaking English is described
as having a French accent.
Regional dialects :
Difference
in pronunciation, in the choices and forms of words, and in syntax from
one location to another in a geographical area in which a language is
spoken.
Dialect geography:
The
term used to describe attempts made to map the distributions of various
linguistic features so as to show their geographical provenance (asal).
For example, in seeking to determine features of the dialects of
English and to show their distributions, dialect geographers try to find
answers to questions such as ; is this an r- pronouncing area of
English, as in words like car, cart, or is it not ?; what names do people give to particular objects in the environment, e.g., elevator or lift, petrol or gas ?; Do people say ‘I haven’t any’, ‘I don’t have any’ or ‘I ain’t got none’? and so on.
Isoglosses :
boundaries
in a map so as to distinguish an area in which a certain feature is
found from areas in which it is absent. When several such isoglosses coincide (bertepatan/serupa), the result is called a dialect boundary. We may say that speakers on one side of that boundary speak one dialect and speakers on the other side, a different dialect.
Social dialect:
differences in speech associated with various social groups or classes. Sociolect
is another term for the same reason. Whereas regional dialects are
geographically based, social dialects originate from social groups and
depend on a variety of factors such as social class, religion, and
ethnicity. In India, for example, caste, one the clearest of all social
class differentiators, quite often determines which variety of a
language a speaker uses. In a city like Baghdad the Christian, Jewish,
and Muslim variety inhabitants speak different varieties of Arabic. In
this case the first two groups use their variety solely within the group
but the Muslim variety serves as a lingua franca ( auxiliary language
used
to enable routine communication to take place between groups of people
who speak different native languages; English is the world’s most common
lingua franca, followed by French)
among the groups. Consequently, Christians and Jews who deal with
Muslims must use two varieties: their own at home and the Muslim variety
for trade and in all inter-group relationships.
Style :
This term refers to the formality of speech. The study of dialects is further complicated by the fact that speakers can adopt different styles
of speaking. Nearly everybody has at least an informal and formal
style. We can speak very formally or very informally, the choice being
governed by circumstances. Ceremonial occasions almost invariably
require very formal speech, public lectures somewhat less formal, casual
conversation quite informal, and conversations between intimates on
matters of little importance may be extremely informal and casual.
Register :
sets
of vocabulary items associated with discrete occupational or social
groups. Surgeons, airline pilots, bank managers, sales clerks, and jazz
fans use different vocabularies.
Pidgin :
Pidgin is a language with no native speakers: it is no one‘s first language but is a contact language. A
pidgin is sometimes regarded as a ‘reduced’ variety of a ‘normal’
language, with simplification of the grammar and vocabulary of that
language, considerable phonological variation, and an admixture of local
vocabulary to meet special needs of the contact groups. Pidgin usually
arise to permit communication between groups with no
language in common. The process of pidginization probably requires a
situation that involves at least three languages, one of which is
‘dominant’ over the others. Such developments need considerable
motivation on the part of the speakers, and it is therefore not
surprising that pidgin language flourish (tumbuh subur) in areas of
economic development, as in the pidgins based on English, French,
Spanish, and Portuguese, in the East and West Indies, Africa and the
Americas.
Pidginized
varieties of language are used much more as lingua francas by people
who cannot speak the corresponding standard languages than they are used
between such people and speakers of the standard varieties. For
example, Pidgin Chinese English was used mainly by speakers of different
Chinese language, and neo-Melanesian (or Tok Pisin) is today used as a
unifying language among speakers of many different languages in Papua
New Guinea. In both cases few speakers of standard English ever really
mastered the pidgins. Structures which have been reduced in this way are
said to be ‘pidginized’. A common view of a pidginized variety of a
language, for example, Nigerian Pidgin English, is that it is some kind
of ‘bad’ English, that is, English imperfectly learned and therefore of
no possible interest. Consequently, those who speak a pidgin are likely
to be regarded as deficient in some way, almost certainly socially and
culturally, and sometimes even cognitively.
Pidgins
such as Chinese Pidgin English and Melanesian Pidgin English arose
through contact between English-speaking traders and inhabitants of the
Far East and the Pacific islands. Other Pidgins appeared with the slave
trade in Africa and with the importation African slaves to Caribbean
plantations. Most of the small vocabulary of a pidgin language
(Melanesian Pidgin has only 2000 words, Chinese Pidgin English only 700)
is usually drawn from a single language (Melanesian Pidgin, for
example, has an English word stock of more than 90%). If a pidgin
becomes established as the native language of a group, it is known as a Creole.
Creole :
a
pidgin language which has become the mother-tongue of a speech
community, as in the case in Jamaica, Haiti, Dominica, and in several
other ex-colonial parts of the world. The process of creolization
expands the structural and stylistic range of the pidginized language,
such that the creolized language becomes comparable in formal and
functional complexity to other languaes.
Pidginization
generally involves the simplification of a language, e.g. reduction in
morphology (word structure) and syntax (grammatical structure),
tolerance of considerable phonological variation
(pronunciation), and extensive borrowing of word forms from local
mother-tongue. On the other hand, creolization involves expansion of the
morphology and syntax, regularization of the phonology, deliberate
increase in number of functions in which language is used, and
development of a rational and stable system for increasing vocabulary.
Pidgin and creole language are distributed mainly in the equatorial belt
around the world, usually in places with direct or easy access to
oceans. The distribution is closely related to long standing patterns of
trade, including trade of in slaves. Such varieties of language also
tend to be associated with dark skin and membership for their speakers
in the third world community of notions.
The examples of pidgin language:
Yu à (‘you’ singular); yupela à (‘you’ plural)
Me à (‘I’ or ‘me’)
Mepela à (‘we’/ ‘I and other(s) but not you’)
Yume à (‘I and you’)
i no tu had à (It’s not too hard’).
The distribution of Pidgin and Creole is :
- in the equatorial belt around the world
- usually in places with direct or easy access to the oceans.
- closely related to long standing patterns of trade, including trade in slaves.
- to be associated with dark skin and membership for their speakers in the third world community of nations.
Linguistic Characteristics of Pidgin and Creole are as follows:
- Each pidgin or creole is a well-organized linguistic system. We cannot speak Neo-
Melanesian (Tok Pisin) by just simplifying English quite arbitrarily. We have to learn like
other languages
- The sounds of a pidgin or Creole are likely to be fewer and less complicated in their
possible arrangements than those of the corresponding standard English.
e.g. In Neo-Melanesian no contrat is possible between it and eat, and sip, ship, and
chip. The result is there are more potential homophones.
The concepts of Neo-Melanesian is reflected in the following examples :
Gras belong het à ‘hair’
Gras belong fes à ‘beard’
Gras belong maus à ‘moustache’
Theories of Origin
- Pidgins arise because the people among whom they are found lack the ability to learn
the standard languages with which the pidgins are associated. Pidgins arise as contact
languages under very special circumstances.
- Pidgins and Creoles retain certain characteristics of ancestral African language. This
theory is called Sub-Stratum Theory. African slaves were often multilingual, spoke
languages of similar structure but different vocabulary, and tended to treat English,
French, and Portuguese in the same way.
- Pidgins and Creoles have a variety of origins; any similarities among them arise from
the shared circumstances of their origins. This theory is called Polygenesis theory.
For example, speakers of English have had to make themselves understood for the
purposes of trade and those trading with them have had to be understood.
Consequently, certain simplified forms of English have developed in a number of
places, giving rise to varieties of pidgin English.
- Bickerton says that the essential difference between pidginization and creolization is
that pidginization is second-language learning with restricted input and creolization is
first language learning, also with restricted input.
Choosing a Code
Code :
Code (the general sense) is a set of conventions for converting one signaling system into another. In Sociolinguistics, code
refers to a language or a variety of language. The term is useful
because it is neutral. This term is mainly used as a neutral label for
any system of communication involving language and which avoids the
sociolinguist having to commit himself to such terms as dialects,
language or variety, which have special status in his theories. What is
interesting is the factors that govern the choice of a particular code
on a particular occasion. Why do people choose to use one code rather
than another, what brings about shifts from one code to another, and why
do they occasionally prefer to use a code formed from two other codes
by mixing the two ?
Monolingualism : Monolingualism is the ability to use a single language code.
Bilingualism : Monolingualism is the ability to use two languages.
Multilingualism : Multilingualism is the ability to use more than two languages.
Diglossia (diglossic) :
Diglossia
is a situation where two very different varieties of language co-occur
throughout speech community, each with a distinct range of social
function. A diglossic situation exists in a society when it has two
distinct codes which show clear functional separation; that is, one is
employed in one set of circumstances and the other in an entirely
different set. A key defining characteristic of diglossia is that the
two varieties are kept quite apart functionally. One is used in one set
of circumstances and the other in an entirely different set. For
example, the high (H) varieties are used for delivering sermons and
formal lectures, especially in a parliament or legislative body, for
giving political speeches, for broadcasting the news on radio and
television, and for writing poetry, fine literature, and editorials in
newspaper. In contrast, the low (L) varieties are used in giving
instructions to workers in low-prestige occupations or to household
servants, in conversation with familiars and so on.
In a multilingual
society, people are usually forced to select a particular code whenever
they choose to speak, and they may also decide to switch from one code
to another or to mix codes. The situations which bring a speaker to
choose a certain code are solidarity with listeners, choice of topic,
and perceived social and cultural distance. In other words, the
motivation of the speaker is an important consideration in the choice.
Moreover, such motivation need not be at all conscious, for apparently
many speakers are not aware that they have used one particular variety
of a language rather than another or sometimes even that they have
switched languages, i.e., have code-switched or they have mixed languages, i.e., have code mixed. There are two kinds of code-switching: situational and metaphorical. Situational code-switching,
occurs when the languages used change according to the situation in
which the conversants find themselves: they speak one language in one
situation and another in a different one. No topic change is involved.
When a change of topic requires a change in the language used we have metaphorical code-switching. Code mixing
occurs when conversants use both languages together to the extent that
they change from one language to the other in the course of a single
utterance. Instances of situational code-switching are usually fairly
easy to classify for what they are. What we observe is that one variety
is used in a certain set of situations and another in an entirely
different set. However, the changeover from one to the other may be
instantaneous. Sometimes the situations are so socially prescribed that
they can even be taught, e.g., those associated with ceremonial or
religious functions. Metaphorical code-switching has an affective
dimension to it: you change the code as you redefine the situation:
formal to informal, official to personal, serious to humorous, and
politeness to solidarity.
Speech Communities
Language
is both an individual possession and a social possession. We would
expect, therefore that certain individuals would behave linguistically
like other individuals: they might be said to speak the same language,
or the same dialect or the same variety, i.e., to employ the same code,
and in that respect to be members of the same speech community. A
community or group is any set of individuals united for a common end,
that end being quite distinct from ends pursued by other groups.
Consequently, a person may belong at any one time to many different
groups or communities depending on the particular ends in view. What is speech community ?
Bloomfield says that speech community is a group of people who interact by means of speech. Gumperz offers another definition of the speech community: Any
human aggregate (kumpulan) characterized by regular and frequent
interaction by means of a shared body of verbal signs and set off from
similar aggregates by significant differences in language use. Most groups of permanence, be they small bands bounded by face-to-face contact,
modern nations divisible into smaller sub regions, or even occupational
associations or neighborhood gangs, may be treated as speech
communities, provided (asalkan) they show linguistic peculiarities that
warrant (memerlukan) special study. Not only must members
of speech community share a set of grammatical rules, but there must
also be regular relationships between language use and social structure.
Hymes distinguishes between participating in speech community and being a fully fledged member of speech community.
To participate in a speech community is not quite the same as to be
member of it. Here we encounter the limitation of any conception of
speech community in terms of knowledge alone even knowledge of patterns
of speaking as well as of grammar, and of course, of any
definition in terms of interaction alone. Just the matter of accent may
erect a barrier between participation and membership in one case,
although be ignored in another.
Based
on the explanation above, Each individual is a member of many different
speech communities. It is in the best interests of most people to be
able to identify themselves on one occasion as members of one community
and on another as members of another. You are a member of one speech
community by virtue of the fact that on a particular occasion you
identify with X rather than Y when apparently X and Y contrast in a
single dimension. This approach would suggest that there is an English
speech community (because there are French and German ones). A Texas
speech community (because there are oxford and Barkley ones), Chicano
speech community (because there are Spanish and English ones), and so
on. An individual must therefore belong to various speech communities at
the same time, but on any particular occasion will identify with only
one of them, the particular identification depending on what is
especially important or contrastive in the circumstances. One of the
consequences of such intersecting identifications is, of course,
linguistic variation: people do not speak alike, nor does any individual
always speak in the same way on every occasion. The variation we see in
language must partly reflect a need that people feel to be seen as the
same as certain other people on some occasions and as different on
others.
No
two individuals are exactly alike in their linguistic capabilities,
just as no two social situations are exactly alike. People are separated
from one another by fine gradations of social class, regional origin,
and occupation; by factors such as religion, sex, nationality, and
ethnicity; by psychological differences such as particular kinds of
linguistic skills, e.g., verbality and literacy; and by characteristics
of personality. These are some of the more obvious differences that
effect individual variation in speech. Any individual has a speech repertoire;
that is, he or she controls a number of varieties of a language or of
two or more languages. Quite often, many individuals will have virtually
identical repertoire. A speech repertoire is the range of linguistic
varieties which the speaker has at his disposal (yag tersedia baginya) and which he may appropriately use as a member of his speech community.
Language and Culture
A few words are necessary concerning what we mean by ‘culture’. We do not intend to use the term culture
in the sense of ‘high culture’, i.e., the appreciation of music,
literature, the arts, and so on. Rather, we intend to use it in the
sense of whatever a person must know in order to function in a
particular society. This is the same sense as Goodenough’s well known
definition ; ‘a society’s culture consists of whatever it is one has to
know or believe in order to operate in a manner acceptable to its
members, and to do so in any role that they accept for any one of
themselves.’ That knowledge is socially acquired: the necessary
behaviors are learned and do not come from any kind of genetic endowment
(anugerah).
One
long-standing claim concerning the relationship between language and
culture is that the structure of a language determines the way in which
speakers of that language view the world. A somewhat weaker version is
that the structure does not determine the world-view but still extremely
influential in predisposing (mempengaruhi) speakers of a language
toward adopting a particular world-view. The opposite claim would be
that the culture of a people finds reflection in the language they
employ: because they value certain things and do them in certain way,
they come to use their language in ways that reflect what they value and
what they do. If speakers of one language have certain words to
describe things and speakers of another language lack similar words, then
speakers of the first language will find it easier to talk about those
things. We can see how this might be the case if we consider the
technical vocabulary of any trade, calling, or profession; for example,
physicians talk easily about medical phenomena, more easily than you or
I, because they have the vocabulary to do so.
The
claim that the structure of a language influences how its speakers view
the world is today most usually associated with the linguist Edward
Sapir and his student Benjamin Lee Whorf. Today, the claim is usually
referred to as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis or Whorfian hypothesis.
Those
who find the Whorfian hypothesis argue that the language a person
speaks affects that person’s relationship to the external world in one
or more ways. If language A has a word for a particular concept, then
that word makes it easier for speakers of language a to refer to that
concept than speakers of language b, who lack such a word and are forced
to use a circumlocution (pemakaian kata-kata yang terlalu banyak).
Moreover, it is actually easier for speakers of language A to perceive
instances the concept. If a language system requires
certain distinctions to be made because of its grammatical system, then
the speakers of that language become conscious of the kinds of
distinctions that must be referred to: for example, sex, time, and
number. These kinds of distinctions may also have an effect on how
speakers learn to deal with the world, i.e., they can have consequences
for both cognitive and cultural development.
Data
such as the following are sometimes cited in support of such claims.
The Garo of Assam, India, have dozens of words for different types of
baskets, rice, and ants. These are important items in their culture.
However, they have no single-world equivalent to the English word ant. Both people and bulls have legs in English, but Spanish requires people to have piernas and bulls to have patas.
Bedouin Arabic has many words for types of camels; English does not.
Speakers of English have many words for different kinds of automobiles,
just as the Inuit have many words for different kinds of snow and
Trobriand Islanders of the Pacific have many words for different kinds
of yams (ubi rambat). The Navaho of the Southwest United States, the
Shona of Rhodesia, and the Hanunoo of the Philippines divide the color
spectrum differently from each other in the distinctions they make, and
English speakers divide it differently again. English has a general
cover term animal for various kinds of creatures, but it lacks a term to cover both fruit and nuts; however, Chinese does have such cover term.
Kinship Systems
One
interesting way in which people use language in daily living is to
refer to various kinds of kin. Kinship systems are a universal feature
of languages, because kinship is so important in social organization.
Some systems are much ‘richer’ than others, but all make use of such
factors as sex, age, generation, blood, and marriage in their
organization. One of the attractions that kinship systems have for
investigators is that these factors are fairly readily ascertainable
(hampir dg. Mudah dapat diketahui). One can therefore relate them with
considerable confidence to the actual words that people use to describe a
particular kin relationship.
There
may be certain difficulties, of course. You can ask a particular person
what he or she calls others who have known relationships to that
person, for example, that person’s father (Fa), or mother’s brother
(MoBr), or mother’s sister’s husband (MoSiHu), in an attemp to show how
individuals employ various terms, but without trying to specify anything
concerning the semantic composition of the terms: for example, In
English, both one’s father’s father (FaFa) and one’s mother’s father
(MoFa) are called grandfather, but that term includes another term father.
You will find, too, in English that one’s brother’s wife’s father
(BrWiFa) cannot be referred to directly; brother’s wife’s father (or
sister-in-law’s father) is circumlocution rather than the kind of term
that is of interest in kinship terminology.
This
kind of approach sometimes runs into serious difficulties. It is often
virtually impossible to devise an exhaustive account of a particular
system. You may also be unable to account for many instances you may
find of terms which are very obviously kinship terms but are used with
people who are very obviously not kin by any of criteria usually
employed, e.g. the Vietnamese use the terms equivalent to English sister,
brother, uncle, and aunt in various social relationship. Such an
approach also misses the fact that certain terms recur to mark different
relationships; for example; English uncle is used to designate
FaBr, MoBr, FaSiHu, and MoSiHu, and also non-kin relationship, as when
children are sometimes taught to use it for close friends of their
parents. A rather different approach to kinship terminology is therefore
often employed.
In
this later approach, an investigator seeks to explain why sometimes
‘different’ relationships are described by the ‘same’ term, e.g. why
Spanish tio is equivalent to both English uncle and either father’s or mother’s male cousin, and why ‘similar’ relationships are described by ‘different terms’. Burling describes
the kinship system of Njamal, a tribe of Australian aborigines, in this
way. To understand why the Njamal use the terms they do, you must know
that every Njamal belongs to one of two ‘moieties’, that of his (or her)
father; the mother belongs to the other moiety. Marriage must be with
someone from the other moiety so that husbands and wives and fathers and
mothers represent different moiety membership. This fact, and the need
also to indicate the generation, and sometimes the sex, of the reference
or ego (i.e., the person from whom the relationship is expressed), and
occasionally the other’s age relative to the age (i.e., as being younger
or older), provide the keys to understanding the Njamal system. One
consequence is that a young Njamal man calls by the same name, njuba, his mother’s brother’s daughter (MoBrDa) and his father’s sister’s daughter (FaSiDa), which are both English cousin. But he uses turda
for his father’s brother’s daughter (FaBrDa) and his mother’s sister’s
daughter (MoSiDa) when both are older than he is. He calls any such
daughters who are younger than he is maraga. All of these are cousins in English. He may marry a njuba, since a cross-cousin is of the opposite moiety, but he cannot marry a turda or a maraga,
a parallel cousin of the same moiety. Moiety membership is the
overriding consideration in the classification system, being stronger
than sex. For example, a term like maili is sexually marked as
‘male’, e.g., Fafa, FaMoHu, or FaMoBrWiBr when used to refer to someone
in an ascending generation and in the same moiety. In a descending
generation, however, maili also used to designate membership in
the same moiety, but in this case it can be applied to both males and
females, to DadaHu, BrSoDa, and Da SoWiSi.
Taboo
Certain
things are not said, not because they cannot be, but because ‘people
don’t talk about those things’; or, if those things are talked about,
they are talked about in very roundabout ways. In the first case we have
instances of linguistic taboo; in the second we have the employment of euphemisms so as to avoid mentioning certain matters directly.
The word taboo
was borrowed from Tongan, a Polynesian language, in which it refers to
acts that are forbidden or to be avoided. When an act is taboo,
reference to this act may also become taboo. That is,
first you are forbidden to do something; then you are forbidden to talk
about it. Taboo is one way in which a society expresses its disapproval
of certain kinds of behavior believed to be harmful to its members,
either for supernatural reasons or because such behavior is held to
violate a moral code. Consequently, so far as language is concerned,
certain things are not to be said or certain objects can be referred to
only in certain circumstances, for example, only by certain people, or
through deliberate circumlocutions, i.e., euphemistically.
What
acts or words are forbidden reflect the particular customs and views of
the society. Some words may be used in certain circumstances and not in
others; for example, among the Zuni Indian, it is improper to use the
word takka, meaning ‘frogs’ during the religious ceremony; a
complex compound word must be used instead, which literally translated
would be
‘several-are-sitting-in-a-shallow-basin-where-they-are-in-liquid’.
In
certain societies, words that have religious connotations are
considered profane (kotor/tidak sopan) if used outside of formal or
religious ceremonies. Christians are forbidden to ‘take the Lord’s name
in vain’ (menggunakan nama tuhan tanpa meng-hormatinya), and this
prohibition has been extended to the use of curses (kutukan), which are
believed to have magical powes. Thus hell and damn are changed to heck and darn, perhaps with the belief or hope that this change will fool (mengelabui) the ‘powers that be’. In England the word bloody is a taboo word, perhaps because it originally referred to the blood of Christ. The Oxford English Dictionary states that bloody
has been in general colloquial use from the Restoration and is ‘now
constantly in the mouths of the lowest classes, but by respectable
people considered “ a horrid word ” on a par with Setara/sama
dengan) obscene (cabul) or profane (kotor) language, and usually
printed in the newspapers “ b________ y.” ‘ It further states that the
origin of the term is not quite certain. This uncertainty itself gives
us a clue about ‘dirty’ words: people who use them often do not know why
they are taboo, only that they are, and to some extent, this is why
they remain in the language to give vent (celah) to strong emotion.
Words
relating to sex, sex organs, and natural bodily function make up a
large part of the set of taboo words of many cultures. Some languages
have no native words to mean ‘sexual intercourse’ but do borrow some
words from neighboring people. Other languages have many words for this
common and universal act, most of which are considered taboo.
Two or more words or expression can have the same linguistic meaning, with one acceptable and the others the
cause of embarrassment or horror. In English, words borrowed from Latin
sound ‘scientific’ and therefore appear to be technical and ‘clean’,
whereas native Anglo-Saxon counterparts are taboo. This fact reflects
the opinion that the vocabulary used by the upper classes was superior
to that used by the lower classes, a distinction going back at least to
the Norman conquest in 1066, when, as Farb puts it, ‘ duchess (istri
orang bangsawan) perspired and expectorated and menstruated while a
kitchen maid sweated and spat (spit ‘meludah’) and bled.’
There is no linguistic reason why the word vagina is ‘clean’ whereas cunt is ‘dirty’; nor why prick or cock is taboo, but penis is acknowledged as referring to part of male anatomy; or why everyone defecates /def keit/ (buang air besar), but only vulgar people shit. Many people even avoid words like breast, intercourse, and testicles as much as words like tits, fuck, and balls.
There is no linguistic basis for such view, but pointing this fact out
does not imply advocating the use or non-use of any such words.
Taboo
is one way in which a society expresses its disapproval of certain
kinds of behavior believed to be harmful to its members, either for
supernatural reasons or because such behavior is held to violate a moral
code. Consequently, so far as language is concerned, certain things are
not to be said or certain objects can be referred to only in certain
circumstances, for example, only by certain people, or through
deliberate circumlocutions, i.e., euphemistically. Of course, there are
always those who are prepared to break the taboos in an attempt to show
their own freedom from such restrictions or to expose the taboos as
irrational and unjustified, as in certain movements for ‘free speech’.
English
has its taboos, and most people who speak English know what these are
and observe the ‘rules’. When someone breaks the rules, that rupture
(perpecahan) may arouse considerable comment. Linguistic taboos are also
violated on occasion to draw attention to oneself, or to show contempt,
or to be aggressive or provocative, or to mock authority
Solidarity and Politeness
When
we speak, we must constantly make choices of many different kinds: What
we want to say, how we want to say it, and the specific sentence types,
words, and sounds that best unite the what with how. How we say something is at least as important as what we say; in fact, the content and the form are
quite inseparable, being but two facets of the same object. One way of
looking at this relationship is to examine a few specific aspects of
communication: namely, pronominal choice between tu and vous
forms in languages which require such a choice; the us of naming and
address terms; and the employment of politeness markers. In each case we
will see that certain linguistic choices a speaker makes indicate the
social relationship that the speaker perceives to exist between him or
her and the listener or listeners. Moreover, in many cases it is
impossible to avoid making such choices in the actual
‘packaging’ of messages. We will also see that languages vary
considerably in this respect, at least in regard to those aspects we
will examine.
Many languages have a distinction corresponding to the tu—vous (T/V) distinction in Frensch, where grammatically there is ‘singular you’ tu (T) and ‘plural you’ vous (V) but usage requires that you use vous
withindividuals on certain occasions. The T form is sometimes described
as the ‘familiar’ form and the V form as the ‘polite’ one. Other
languages with similar T/V distinction are Latin (tu/vous), Russian (ty/vy), Italian (tu/Lei), German (du/sie), Swedish (du/ni), and Greek (esi/esis). English, itself, once had such a distinction, the thou/you distinction.
According
to Brown and Gilman , the T/V distinction began as a genuine difference
between singular and plural. By medieval times the upper classes
apparently began to use V forms with each other to show mutual respect
and politeness. However, T forms persisted (tetap bertahan), so that the
upper classes used mutual V , the lower classes used mutual T, and the
upper classes addressed the lower classes with T but received V. This
latter nonreciprocal T/V usage therefore came to symbolize a ‘power’
relationship. It was extended to such situations as people to animals,
master or mistress to servants, parents to children, priest to penitent,
and officer to soldier, with, in each case, the first mentioned giving T
but receiving V.
Reciprocal
V usage became ‘polite’ usage. This polite usage spread downward in
society, but not all the way down, so that in certain classes, but never
the lowest, it became expected between husband and wife, parents and
children, and lovers. Reciprocal T usage was always available to show
intimacy, and its use for that purpose also spread to situations in
which two people agreed they had strong common interests, i.e., a
feeling of ‘solidarity’. This mutual T for solidarity gradually came to
replace the mutual V of politeness, since solidarity is often more
important than politeness in personal relationship. Moreover,
the use of the non-reciprocal T/V to express power decreased and mutual
V was often used in its place, as between officer and soldier. Today we
can still find non-reciprocal T/V uses, but solidarity has tended to
replace power, so that now mutual T is found quite often
in relationships which previously had non- reciprocal usage, e.g.,
father and son, and employer and employee.
English,
of course, has no active T/V distinction. The use of T forms by such
groups as Quakers is very much limited, but those T forms are a
solidarity marker for those who do use them. The T/V use that remains in
English is archaic (kuno), found in fixed formulas such as prayers or
in use in plays written during the era when the T/V distinction was
alive or in modern works that try to recapture aspects of that era. It
is still possible, however, for speakers of English to show power and
solidarity relationships through language; they just have to use other
means. As we will see, speakers of English, just like speakers of other
languages, can use address terms for that purpose.
Address Terms
How
do you name or address another? By title (T), by first name (FN), by
last name (LN), by a nickname; by some combination of these, or by
nothing at all, so deliberately avoiding the problem? What
factors govern the choice you make ? Is the address process
non-reciprocal; that is, if I call you Mr. Jones, do you call me John? Or is it reciprocal, so that Mr. Jones leads to Mr. Smith and John to Fred? All kinds of combinations are possible in English: Dr Smith, John Smith, Smith, John, Johnnie, Doc, Sir, Mack, and so on. Dr. Smith himself might also expect Doctor from a patient, Dad from his son, John from his brother, Dear from his wife, and Sir
from a police officer who stops him if he drives too fast, and he might
be rather surprised if any one of these is substituted for any other,
e.g., ‘Excuse me, dear, can I see your licence?’ From the police
officer.
Address by title alone is the least intimate form of address in that titles usually designate ranks or occupations, as in Colonel, Doctor, or Waiter. They are devoid of ‘personal’ content. We can argue therefore that Doctor Smith is more intimate than Doctor
alone, acknowledging as it does that the other person’s name is known
and can be mentioned. Knowing and using another’s first name is, of
course, a sign of considerable intimacy or at least of a desire for such
intimacy. Using a nickname or pet name shows an even greater intimacy.
When someone uses your first name alone in addressing you, you may feel
on occasion that that person is presuming an intimacy you do not
recognize or, alternatively, is trying to assert some power over you.
Note that a mother’s John Smith to a misbehaving son reduces the intimacy of first name alone, or first name with diminutive (Johnny), or pet name (Honey), and consequently serves to signal a rebuke.
We
can see some of the possible dangers in cross-cultural communication
when different relationships are expressed through what appears,
superficially at least, to be the same address system. The dangers are
even greater if one learns the terms in a new address system but fails
to appreciate how they are related to one another. Ervin-Tripp (1972,
P231) in Wardaugh (1988: 260) provides the following example:
Suppose the speaker,
but not the listener, has a system in which familiarity, not merely
solidarity, is required for the use of a first name. He will use TLN in
the United States to his new colleagues and be regarded as aloof or
excessively formal. He will feel that first-name usage from his
colleagues is brash and intrusive. In the same way, encounters across
social groups may lead to misunderstandings within the United states.
Suppose a used-car salesman regards his relation to his customers as
solidarity, or a physician so regards his relation to old patients. The
American… might regard such speakers as intrusive, having ,made a false
claim to a solidarity status. In this way, one can pinpoint abrasive
features of interaction across groups.
I
might add that the use of person’s first name in North America does
not necessarily indicate friendship or respect. First names are required
among people who work closely together, even though they may not like
each other at all. First names may even be used to refer to public
figures, but contemptuously as well as admiringly.
In
certain circumstances, the use of a first name by one person to another
without reciprocity can be heavily marked for power. In the southern
states of the United States, white have often used naming and addressing
practices to put blacks in their place. Hence the odious use of Boy
to address black males. The asymmetrical use of names also was part of
the system. Whites addressed blacks by their first names in situations
which required them to use titles, or titles and last names, if they
were addressing whites. There was a clear racial distinction in the
practice.
Address Terms
How
do you name or address another? By title (T), by first name (FN), by
last name (LN), by a nickname; by some combination of these, or by
nothing at all, so deliberately avoiding the problem? What
factors govern the choice you make ? Is the address process
non-reciprocal; that is, if I call you Mr. Jones, do you call me John? Or is it reciprocal, so that Mr. Jones leads to Mr. Smith and John to Fred? All kinds of combinations are possible in English: Dr Smith, John Smith, Smith, John, Johnnie, Doc, Sir, Mack, and so on. Dr. Smith himself might also expect Doctor from a patient, Dad from his son, John from his brother, Dear from his wife, and Sir
from a police officer who stops him if he drives too fast, and he might
be rather surprised if any one of these is substituted for any other,
e.g., ‘Excuse me, dear, can I see your licence?’ From the police
officer.
The
Nuer, a Sudanese people, have very different naming practices from
those with which we are likely to be familiar. Every Nuer has a personal
or birth name, which is a name given to the child by the parents
shortly after birth and retained for life. A personal name
may be handed down, particularly to sons, for a son may be called
something equivalent ‘son of [personal name]’. Nuer personal names are
interesting in what they name, e.g., Reath ‘drought’, Nhial ‘rain’ Pun ‘wild rice’, Cuol ‘to conpensate’, Mun ‘earth’, and Met
‘to deceive’. Sometimes the maternal grandparents give a child a second
personal name. The consequence is that a child’s paternal kin may
address the child by one personal name and a child’s maternal kin by
another. There are also special personal names for twins and children
who are born after twins. Males are addressed by their personal names in
their paternal villages during boyhood, but this usage shifts in later
years when senior males are addressed as Gwa ‘father’ by less senior males, who themselves receive Gwa
from much younger males. Children, however, call everyone in the
village by their personal names, older people and parents included.
Every
Nuer child also has a clan name, but name is largely ceremonial so that
its use is confined to such events as weddings and initiations. Use of
the clan name between females expresses considerable formality as when a
woman uses it to address her son’s wife. The clan name may also be used
by mothers to their small children to express approval and pleasure.
Clan names are also used when one is addressed outside one’s local
tribal area by people from those tribes.
In
addition to personal names, which are given, and clan names, which are
inherited, the Nuer also have ox name, that is, names derived from a
favored ox. A man may choose his own ox name. This is a name which a man
uses in the triumphs of sport, hunting, and war, and it is the name
used among age-mates for purposes of address. Women’s ox names come from
the bulls calved by the cows they milk. Women’s ox names are used
mainly among women. Occasionally , young men will address young girls by
their ox names as part of flirting behavior or their sisters by these
names if they are pleased with them. Married women replace the ox names
with cow names taken from the family herds, and men do not use these
names at all.
Evan-Pritchard
points out a number of further complication in naming and addressing,
having to do with the complicated social arrangements found in Nuer
life. A person’s name varies with circumstances, for each person has a
number of names which he or she can use. In addressing another, the
choice of name which one uses for the other depends both on one’s
knowledge of exactly who that other is. (e.g., his or her age and
lineage).
Having
taken this brief glance at Nuer name and addressing practices, we can
now turn our attention to English usage. Brown and Ford’s study (1961)
of naming practices in English was based on an analysis of
modern plays, the naming practices observed in a business in Boston,
and the reported usage of business executive and children in the
mid-western United States and in ‘Yoredale’ in England. They report that
the asymmetric use of title, last name, and first name (TLN/FN)
indicated inequality in power, that mutual TLN indicated inequality and
unfamiliarity, and that mutual FN indicated equality and familiarity.
The switch from mutual TLN to FN is also usually initiated by the more
powerful member of the relationship. Other options exist too in
addressing another: title alone (T), e.g., Professor or Doctor; last name alone (LN), e.g., Smith; or multiple naming, e.g., variation between Mr. Smith and Fred. We should note that in such a classification, titles like Sir or Madam are generalized variants of the T (title) category, i.e., generic titles, and forms like Mack, Buddy, jack, or Mate are generic first names (FN), as in ‘What’s up, Mate?’ or Hey, Mack, I wouldn’t do that if I were you.’
Address by title alone is the least intimate form of address in that titles usually designate ranks or occupations, as in Colonel, Doctor, or Waiter. They are devoid of ‘personal’ content. We can argue therefore that Doctor Smith is more intimate than Doctor
alone, acknowledging as it does that the other person’s name is known
and can be mentioned. Knowing and using another’s first name is, of
course, a sign of considerable intimacy or at least of a desire for such
intimacy. Using a nickname or pet name shows an even greater intimacy.
When someone uses your first name alone in addressing you, you may feel
on occasion that that person is presuming an intimacy you do not
recognize or, alternatively, is trying to assert some power over you.
Note that a mother’s John Smith to a misbehaving son reduces the intimacy of first name alone, or first name with diminutive (Johnny), or pet name (Honey), and consequently serves to signal a rebuke.
We
can see some of the possible dangers in cross-cultural communication
when different relationships are expressed through what appears,
superficially at least, to be the same address system. The dangers are
even greater if one learns the terms in a new address system but fails
to appreciate how they are related to one another. Ervin-Tripp (1972,
P231) in Wardaugh (1988: 260) provides the following example:
Suppose
the speaker, but not the listener, has a system in which familiarity,
not merely solidarity, is required for the use of a first name. He will
use TLN in the United States to his new colleagues and be regarded as
aloof or excessively formal. He will feel that first-name
usage from his colleagues is brash and intrusive. In the same way,
encounters across social groups may lead to misunderstandings within the
United states. Suppose a used-car salesman regards his relation to his
customers as solidarity, or a physician so regards his relation to old
patients. The American… might regard such speakers as intrusive, having
,made a false claim to a solidarity status. In this way, one can
pinpoint abrasive features of interaction across groups.
I
might add that the use of person’s first name in North America does
not necessarily indicate friendship or respect. First names are required
among people who work closely together, even though they may not like
each other at all. First names may even be used to refer to public
figures, but contemptuously as well as admiringly.
In
certain circumstances, the use of a first name by one person to another
without reciprocity can be heavily marked for power. In the southern
states of the United States, white have often used naming and addressing
practices to put blacks in their place. Hence the odious use of Boy
to address black males. The asymmetrical use of names also was part of
the system. Whites addressed blacks by their first names in situations
which required them to use titles, or titles and last names, if they
were addressing whites. There was a clear racial distinction in the
practice. According to Johnson (1943, P. 140), one consequence of this
practice was that
Middle-and upper-class Negro women never permit their first names to be known … The wife of
well-to-do Negro business man went into a department store in Atlanta
to enquire about an account. The clerk asked her first name and she said
‘ Mrs. William Jones’. The clerk insisted on her first name, and when
she refused to give it declared that the business could not be completed
without it. It was a large account; and the manager, to whom appeal was
made, decided that ‘Mrs’ was simply good business and not ‘social
equality’.
In this case ‘good
business’ overrode the desire to reinforce the social inequality that
would have resulted from the woman’s giving the sales-clerk the
information requested and then the inevitable use of that first name
alone by the clerk in addressing the customer.
In
English, when we are in doubt as to how to address another we can
actually avoid the difficulty by not using any address term at all. We
can say Good morning as well as Good morning, Sir/Mr. Smith/Susie. In other languages such avoidance may be either impolite or deficient.
