BÀI GIẢNG DẠNG VĂN BẢN (SCRIPT)
Môn học: BÁO CÁO CHUYÊN ĐỀ NGÔN NGỮ ANH
Bài 2: The early dispersal of English around the world
Who speaks English?
Slide Nội dung
Hello Students,
1, 2 In Unit 2 we are going to explore the early dispersal of English around the
world and who speaks English.
Before we have further information of this topic, please take a look at the
explanation of types of language we meet during the presentation.
Pidgin /ˈpɪdʒ.ɪn/ is a type of language with no native speakers. It
develops when people who do not speak the same language need
to communicate with each other which usually has a simple grammar and
vocabulary influenced by several different languages
3
Creole /ˈkriː.əʊl/ is a type of language that developed from a mixture of
different languages, and which is now spoken by a group of people as
their first language.
Lingua franca /ˌlɪŋ.ɡwə ˈfræŋ.kə/ is a language used for communication
between groups of people who speak different languages, for example,
English.
Jenkins (2014) catergorised the spread of English into two dispersals
/dɪˈspɜː.səl/ of English.
4
The first diaspora /daɪˈæs.pər.ə/, initially involving the migration of around
25,000 people from the south and east of England primarily to America and
Australia, resulted in new mother-tongue varieties of English. The second
diaspora, involving the colonisation of Asia and Africa, led to the
development of a number of second language varieties, often referred to as
'New Englishes'.
The first dispersal /dɪˈspɜː.səl/: English is transported to the 'New World'.
The first diaspora involved relatively large-scale migrations of mother-
tongue English speakers from England, Scotland and Ireland predominantly
to North America, Australia and New Zealand. The English dialects which
5 travelled with them gradually developed into the American and Antipodean
Englishes we know today. The varieties of English spoken in modern North
America and Australasia are not identical with the English of their early
colonisers, but have altered in response to the changed and changing
sociolinguistic contexts in which the migrants found themselves.
In 1607, the first permanent colonists arrived and settled in James town,
Virginia, to be followed in 1620 by a group of Puritans and others on the
Mayflower. The latter group landed further north, settling at what is now
Plymouth, Massachusetts, in New England. Both settlements spread rapidly
and attracted further migrants during the years that followed. Because of
their different linguistic backgrounds, there were immediately certain
6
differences in the accents of the two groups of settlers. Those in Virginia
came mainly from the west of England and brought with them their
characteristic rhotic /r/ and voiced /s/ sounds. On the other hand, those who
settled in New England were mainly from the east of England, where these
features were not a part of the local accent.
During the seventeenth century; English spread to southern parts of America
and the Caribbean as a result of the slave trade. Slaves were transported
from West Africa and exchanged, on the American coast and in the
Caribbean, for sugar and rum. The Engfishes which developed among the
slaves and between them and their captors were initially contact pidgin
languages but, with their use as mother tongues following the birth of the
next generation, they developed into creoles .
Then, in the eighteenth century, there was large scale immigration from
Northern Ireland, initially to the coastal area around Philadelphia, but
quickly moving south and west. After the Declaration of American
Independence in 1776, many Loyalists (the British settlers who had
supported the British government) left for Canada.
Meanwhile, comparable events were soon to take place in Australia, New
Zealand and South Africa. James Cook 'discovered' Australia in 1770,
landing in modern-day Queensland and the First Fleet landed in New South
Wales in 1788. From then until the ending of transportation in 1852, around
160,000 convicts were transported to Australia from Britain and Ireland, and
from the 1820s large numbers of free settlers also began to arrive. The
largest proportion of settlers came from London and the southeast, although
7 in the case of the convicts, they were not necessarily born there. Others
originated in regions as widely dispersed as, for example, southwest
England, Lancashire, Scotland and Ireland. The result was a situation of
dialect mixing which was further influenced by the indigenous aboriginal
languages.
New Zealand was first settled by European traders in the 1790s, though
there was no official colony until after the British-Maori Treaty of Waitangi
in 1840. Immigrants arrived in three stages: in the 1840s and 1850s from
Britain, in the 1860s from Australia and Ireland, and from 1870 to 1885
from the UK, when their number included a considerable proportion of
Scots. As in Australia, there was a mixture of dialects, this time subject to a
strong Maori influence, especially in terms of vocabulary.
The second dispersal: English is transported to Asia and Africa
The second diaspora took place at various points during the eighteenth and
8
nine-teenth centuries in very different ways and with very different results
from those of the first diaspora.
Although South Africa was colonised by the Dutch from the 1650s, the
British did not arrive until 1795 when they annexed the Cape, and did not
begin to settle in large numbers until 1820. The majority of Cape settlers
originated in southern England, though there were also sizeable groups from
9 Ireland and Scotland. Further settlement occurred in the 1850s in the Natal
region, this time from the Midlands, Yorkshire and Lancashire. From 1822,
when English was declared the official language, it was also learnt as a
second language by blacks and Afrikaans speakers (many of whom were
mixed race) and, from the 1860s, by Indian immigrants to the territory.
The history of English in Colonial Africa has two distinct patterns
depending on whether we are talking about West or East Africa. English in
West Africa is linked to the slave trade and the development of pidgin and
creole languages. From the late fifteenth century onwards, British traders
10 travelled at different times to and from the various coastal territories of West
Africa, primarily Gambia, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nigeria and Cameroon.
However, there was no major British settlement in the area and, instead,
English was employed as a lingua franca both .among the indigenous
population (there being hundreds of local languages), and between these
people and the British traders. English has subsequently gained official
status in the above five countries, and some of the pidgins and creoles which
developed from English contact, such as Krio (Sierra Leone) and Cameroon
Pidgin English, are now spoken by large numbers of people, especially as a
second language.
East Africa's relationship with English followed a different path. The
countries of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe
were extensively settled by British colonists from the 1850s on, following
the expeditions of a number of explorers, most famously, those of David
Livingstone. These six countries became British protectorates or colonies at
various points between the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
11 with English playing an important role in the major institutions such as
government, education and the law. From the early 1960s, the six countries
one after another achieved independence. English remains the official
language in Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe and (along with Chewa) Malawi
and has large numbers of second language speakers in these places, although
Swahili is more likely than English to be used as a lingua franca in Uganda,
as it is in Kenya and Tanzania.
English was introduced to the sub-continent of South Asia (India,
Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan) during the second half
of the eighteenth century although English have had a toehold on the Indian
subcontinent since the early 1600s, when the newly formed East India
12
Company established settlements in Madras, Calcutta, and later Bombay:
A key point was the Macaulay Minute of 1835, which proposed the
introduction in India of an English educational system. From that time,
English became the language of the Indian education system. Even today,
when Hindi is the official language of India, English is an 'associate official
language' used alongside Hindi as a neutral lingua franca, and has
undergone a process of Indianization in which it has developed a distinctive
national character comparable to that of American and Australian English.
British influence in South-East Asia, East Asia, and the South Pacific began
in the late eighteenth century as a result of the seafaring expeditions of
James Cook and others. The math territories involved were Singapore,
Malaysia, Hong Kong and the Philippines. Papua New Guinea was also, for
a short time, a British protectorate (1884 to 1920), and provides one of the
world's best examples of an English-based pidgin, Tok Pisin.
Stamford Raffles is the name most closely associated with British
colonialism in South-East Asia. An administrator of the British East India
Company, he played an important role in the founding of Singapore as part
of the British colonial empire in 1819. Other major British centres were
founded around the same time in Malaysia, and Hong Kong was added in
13
1842. After the Spanish-American War at the end of the nineteenth century;
the US was granted sovereignty over the Philippines which, although
gaining independence in 1946, has retained a strong American-English
influence.
In recent years, the use of English has increased in Singapore and a local
variety has begun to emerge. On the other hand, the use of English has
declined in Malaysia as a result of the adoption of the local language,
Bahasa Malaysia, as the national language and medium of education when
Malaysia gained independence in 1957. While still obligatory as a subject of
study at school, English was regarded as useful only for international
communication. However, there has recently been a change of policy, with
English-medium education being reintroduced from 2003. And even before
this development, the situation was complex with, for example, radio
stations using English and Bahasa together for a local audience.
Nowadays English is also learnt in other countries in neighbouring areas
such as Taiwan, Japan and Korea, the latter two having recently begun to
consider the possibility of making English an official second language.
Between 1750 and 1900 the English-speaking settlements of the first and
second diasporas all shared three similar and major changes.
First, the number of the English-speaking settlements greatly increased in
size and became states with colonial governments. Second, the colonies
began to take their independence from Britain, which greatly reinforced the
degree of linguistic difference. Third, quite large numbers of people
become nonnative speakers of English because they had to learn to use the
language in order to survive, or to find employment with the governing class
14
(Strevens, 1992).
These Englishes have much in common, through their shared history and
their affinity/əˈfɪn.ə.ti/ with either British or American English. But there is
also much that is unique to each variety, particularly in terms of their
accents, but also in their idiomatic uses of vocabulary; their grammars and
their discourse strategies. Since 1945, most of the remaining colonies have
become independent states, with English often being retained in order to
provide various internal functions and/or to serve as a neutral lingua franca.
So now who speaks English today?
English speakers are commonly divided into three categories: English as a
15
native language (ENL), English as a second language (ESL) and English as
a foreign language (EFL).
English as a Native Language (ENL) or English as a mother tongue is the
language of those born and raised in one of the countries where English is
historically the first language to be spoken. Kachru (1992: 356) refers to
these countries (mainly the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand)
as “the traditional cultural and linguistic bases of English”. Their English
speakers are thought to number around 350 million.
English as a Second Language refers to the language spoken in a large
number of territories such as India, Bangladesh, Nigeria and Singapore,
which were once colonised by the English. These speakers are also thought
to number around 350 million.
English as a Foreign Language is the English of those for whom the
language serves no purposes within their own countries. Historically, they
learned the language in order to use it with its native speakers in the US and
UK - though this is no longer the case because today, English is used to
communicate with other nonnative English speakers. Many people may not
actively travel to a ‘traditional’ English-speaking country, but it is
increasingly likely that they will need to write and carry out negotiations in
English, particularly if they are working in the globalized business arena.
The current number of EFL speakers is more difficult to assess, and much
depends on the level of competence which is used to define such a speaker.
But if we use the criterion of 'reasonable competence, then the number is
likely to be around 1 billion (although it should be said that this figure is not
uncontroversial).
In recent decades, there are already a number of difficulties with this three-
way categorization. Jenkins (2014) summarize as follows:
1 ENL is not a single variety of English, but differs markedly from one
territory to another (e.g. the US and UK), and even from one region with a
given territory to another. In addition, the version of English accepted as
'standard' differs from one ENL territory to another.
2 Pidgins and creoles do not fit neatly into any one of the three categories.
They are spoken in ENL settings, e.g. in parts of the Caribbean, in ESL
settings, e.g. in many territories in West Africa, and in EFL settings, e.g. in
Nicaragua, Panama and Surinam in the Americas.
3 There have always been large groups of ENL speakers living in certain
ESL territories, e.g. India and Hong Kong as a result of colonialism. And
there are also large numbers of ESL speakers living in ENL settings,
particularly the US and UK as a result of immigration.
5 The three categories do not take account of the fact that much of the world
is bi- or multilingual, and that English is often spoken within a framework
of code-mixing and code-switching.
6 The basic division is between native speakers and non-native speakers of
English, that is, those born to the language and those who learnt it through
education. The first group has always been considered superior to the
second regardless of the quality of the language its members speak. This is
becoming an ever more
We have just explored the early dispersal of English around the world and
16 who speaks English. See you next time to read more about why English is
an international lingua franca. Goodbye!