wrote by : Meray Mahmoud
last update : 13/11/2014
The
Colonization and English Development
Nowadays English has been spoken by 2000 thousand people in hundreds of countries
(Seargeant,8). However, before English became an international language, it was
only spoken by the Britain in England
only. Yet after the French left England, it become a powerful country
with a powerful army. It started to colonize other countries. Colonization
means is to take other county by force.
That made the opportunity to English to spread in different countries.
All in all, English spread in those countries in different ways on different
motivates such as economic, social and political . This essay will discuss the pattern of colonization based on
geographical location, the linguistic consequences of colonization and the
development of the varieties, and third is categories of language speaker according
to Kachru.
First, After England became an
independent country and English became their first language in England, they
used it in everything. They needed materials to make their factories work and
to end the Unemployed so they colonized other countries to take their goods and
make an end to their economic, social and political problems. Colonization
means a powerful country that invaded
another country by power and made their people live there (Leith,
Philip, 103_105). All in all, those countries did not colonized in the same way
but basically with three different patterns and they are displacement that mean
that country sent a huge number of people to the country that they wanted to
colonize and take their land by force, they made communities that speak their
native language. so, they removed their
original language and the original people of those countries and displaced
their native language. Then people used it as their native language or speak
the language as a mother tongue. Best example of displacement is when Britain
wanted to colonize USA. They took a lot of people from Britain, Scotland, and
Ireland and send them to America to live and work there because there was a lot
of unemployed and inflation combine that created a huge number of vagrants
(105,116_122). Subjection is the second way of colonization and it mean sending a
group of people to different areas not too far from each other making a
small communities and control those countries, the best example for that when
Britain did in south Africa which made the English language as a second
language there. They also took slaves from there and brought them to Jamaica,
Caribbean and America to work there and take the goods they make then sending
them back to Britain. The last way that Britain used to colonize countries
is replacement. Replacement happened
when England brought small number of people from different places that talk
different languages like the people in Jamaica and West Africa and live in one
country or area, so there was a communication problem because of those slaves
was speaking different languages like African and English, so they invited a
new language called pidgins that could be used to communicate. Pidgins is a
language created of West African slave language and English language and spoken
as a invented language for communication so they took vocabulary from English
and used the West African grammar, this language had no native speaker. After
few generations this language became spoken as a mother tongue and native
language by people who lived there and the name became Creoles.
Second point is the linguistic
consequences of colonization. The pattern of colonization played a main role in
linguistic consequences like in displacement the language consequence was a native and mother tongue language like USA when people who represented
the Britain and went to North America to displace their original language with
English, subjection as second language like Ghana also pidgins and creoles
in Jamaican and Caribbean. The last
linguistic happen in pidgins and creoles which happen in Jamaica and the
Crabbing when the British brought the slaves there and they did not have a
common language to communicate with so they made a new language made of the
vocabulary in English and African language grammar. Other linguistic
consequences are five stages putted by Edgar Schneider. First stage is
foundation it happened when English come to the area for the first time by the
people who has been sent by Britain. So they were speaking different language
so they feel that they are a different group. According to that the
communication, it became limited on the interpreter and the high class people.
Second stage is Exonormative stabilization in this stage English is made up from
different dialect of English and they get rid of other dialect, this process called dialect
levelling, like what happened in American they made it when they made the
American English. Moreover, English expanded and became spoken in different
varieties like administration, education and legal system. Third stage is
called Nativisation it is the most important stage because in this stage, the original people they got rid of their old
language and culture and became to see that English is an important and powerful language and they started to use it as a
native language, it also became their
culture and identity. Moreover, they did not stop on using it but they improved
it and after that providing it like America and Australia. The fourth stage is
Endonormative stabilization which also mean internal variation which promotes
their own language and to be independent from Britain. Fifth, differentiation
is the last stage in linguistic consequences. The different variety of English
has been found and there are different dialects of the varieties spoken in the territory.
(Leith&Philip,2008,1070-111). Other linguistic consequence is substrate
that mean language was effected by English like Hiberno-English which happened
between the English language and the Irish.
Third, at 1607 the first wave
from South England brought with them the slandered English to North America
which colonized by pattern called displacement. It means to remove the original
people with their original culture and language and they made the
English language the official language in America.
The motive behind that colonization was when the British Isles realized that
the numbers of people raised and some of them lost
their homes and they began to suffer from famine. Another problem
was that, the British government had to face with political separation. Second
waves was from north England, Ireland, Scotland and
Wales but this time they came to America with different variety of English.
“The first English speaking colony in Jamestown, Virginia followed by Plymouth
Massachusetts in 1620” (Smith, 2008, 213). English
became the native language in north America not just because of the
role of the country were speak English or they were powerful and protected by
the British army, but also because the original people
realized the important of English as a power, prestige and
fashion language so they started to learn it and speak it as a native language.
According to that they removed their own identity and replaced it with
another one. That made America become one of inner circle countries
and as a norm providing the English language. After the second waves became
with their new variety of English which made
America had different dialects in it. First example is that Ocracoke island
in North Carolina which spoke the Ocracoke dialect, it used unique grammatical,
lexical and phonological forms, example of that
grammatical they use were instead of was to represents a third person
singular she weren’t there. Also, different in pronunciation like once they
pronounce it ancet and sody instead of soda. Other dialect
you can found in America is the New York
dialect has different pronunciation in sound /r/
identified as non-prevocalic. Important point is that the New Yorker
used to hate their dialect because they see it as a low working class. Other
dialect is the African American dialect and we can see
different in grammar when they talk. They say she sick without putting
the verb to be (is) and different in phonology skreet Indication of street
(Smith, 2008, 218-219). After few generations the people that
lived in America, their loyalty became to the country that they born
in which is America and they wanted all the goods that they made and all the
benefits that they make to go to them instead of Britain.
Moreover, they wanted to protect their identity, and made it
different from the British identity. That action named a national reaction and
it happened in at the first time 1776 and it moved by Cancers
over to ration parliamentary. It started to fight against the Britain.
When Britain felt dangers from other countries to see North America as an
example and started to fight agents it to avoid that,
Britain suggested what is call self-government in 1867 also they made what call
a commonwealth. Dr. Johnson’s made the first American dictionary and it was the
first step of the American to have their own identity so they
change in vocabulary, in grammar also they change pronunciation
of the words. It is Important to mention the important role of DR Noah
Webster when he played an important role
in reinforcement the American dialect. He also made a dictionary call American
dictionary of English(Leith&Philip.2008,116-123, Smith,2008.213-219)
After become the
English spoken by people around the world and people know how much important is
English nowadays in communication and in businesses in general. Learning and
speak English increasingly rised so,
Kachru made the three circles to identify those countries and see the pattern
of acquisition and the functional allocation. First circle called the inner
circle and it represents the people who speak the invented language and speak
it as a native and mother tongue
language also they used it in all their functions. Example of those countries is U.K, USA,
Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Kachru also called a norm-providing because
those countries who invented the language and made up the vocabulary and the
grammar. The second circle Kachru called it the outer circles and it represents
the countries which speak the language as a second language the reason behind
the spread the language in those countries because of colonization. He also
called them a norm developing because they are studying the English and
developed it. English language used in education and literature. Is important
to mention that English language did not replace the main language in those
countries but it used alongside with it, examples of those countries are
Bangladesh, Ghana, India and Philippines and example of language like pidgins and creoles. The third and last
circle is called the expanding and they are using and studying the language as
a foreign language and as an
international language, it used there in education and for businesses it also
use in tourism. Kachru called those countries a norm depending because when
they studied English they depended on variety of English like Britain English or
American English as it is without developing it, example of those countries
like China, Egypt, Korea, and Russia. (seargeant.27_35)
Conclusion, we could see that there were three different ways to
colonize a country, they are displacement, subjection and replacement and those
ways of colonizing effected on the linguistic consequences like as a native
language or as a second language. example of displacement is north America
which also an inner circle also it have been through allot to be independents
from Britain, subjection second language outer circle like India and Malaysia,
and expanding circle as an international language like Egypt and Japan which depending on the
three circles of Kachru.
the references :
•
Seargeant & joan (2008)
English in The World History, Diversity, Change This published by Routledge in
association with The Open University.
•
Graddol, D. (2006) English
Next, London, The British Council. pages 34_35
•
Crystal (1997, 2003) English
as a global language. Second addition Cambridge University Press, published
in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York (PDF). Page
31, 72-78, 147-158 15/4/2015
•
in North America’ in Hogg,
R. and Denison, D. (eds) A History of the English Language, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press.
•
Holm, J. (2000) An
Introduction to Pidgins and Creoles, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
published by The Three Syndicate of The University of Cambridge. Page
1-4, 16, 18-19
•
Kachru et al. The
Handbook of World Englishes. the publishers
JohnWiley & Sons copyright 291-299
