Standard language

A standard language (also standard dialect, standardized dialect, or standardised dialect) is a language variety used by a group of people in their public discourse.[1] Alternatively, varieties become standard by undergoing a process of standardization, during which it is organized for description in grammars and dictionaries and encoded in such reference works.[1] Typically, varieties that become standardized are the local dialects spoken in the centers of commerce and government, where a need arises for a variety that will serve more than local needs.

A standard written language is sometimes termed by the German word Schriftsprache.

Contents

Features

The creation of a prescriptive standard language, derives from the national (cultural, political, social) cohesion requiring an agreed, standardized tongue. Generally, standard languages usually are established upon:

Standard languages

Standard Arabic

Arabic comprises many varieties (many mutually unintelligible ), that are considered a single language, because the standard Arabic register, Modern Standard Arabic, is generally intelligible to all speakers. It is based upon modified Classical Arabic, the language of the Qur'an, the contemporary refined vernacular of Muhammad’s time, the 7th century CE.

Standard Chinese

The Chinese language (漢語) comprises a wide varieties of spoken forms, which are known as fangyan (方言, “regional speech”). The major spoken variants are:

  1. Mandarin
  2. Wu
  3. Cantonese
  4. Min

These spoken variants are not mutually intelligible, thus why the English linguistic usage “dialect” is inaccurate, given it also denotes mutual intelligibility. Among the spoken variants, Standard Mandarin is the official language of the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China (Taiwan), and the Republic of Singapore.

This standard spoken form of the Chinese language is named 'Putonghua' (普通话, “common speech”) in the PRC, 'Guoyu' (國語, “national language”) in Taiwan, and 'Huayu' (华语, “Chinese language” or "Han Language") in Singapore. Standard Mandarin pronunciation derives from the Beijing dialect of Mandarin Chinese, and the grammar and syntax are based upon modern vernacular Chinese.

The Chinese language also enjoys official status in Hong Kong (together with English) and in Macau (together with Portuguese). However, Standard Mandarin is not widely spoken in these territories. The majority of the population speaks Hong Kong Cantonese, of which the standardised form is Standard Cantonese.

In terms of ortography, all the dialects of Chinese are written in the idiom of Mandarin. This makes writing hard for some dialects, Cantonese. Since Hong Kong has a large number of Anglophone residents, it is but natural that heavy borrowings from English language exist. Terms like 'Ba-see (bus) cannot be written in Manbdarin.

Standard English

Today, the English language is highly polarised between the British and American variants. Mainly, those with historical connection with the British Empire (like the Commonwealth States) follow the British dialect while those formerly colonised by the United States follow the American dialect. The only exemption to this rule is Canada, since while it maintains its status as a British Commonwealth, follows the Americans in terms of both accent and ortography.

British English

Main article: British English

In British English, the standard, known as Standard English (SE) is historically based on the language of the medieval English court of Chancery.[2] The late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw the establishment of this standard as the norm of "polite" society, that is to say of the upper classes.[3] The spoken standard has come to be seen as a mark of good education and social prestige.[4] Although often associated with the RP accent, SE can be spoken with any accent.[5]

American English

Main article: American English

The dialects of American English vary throughout the US, but the General American accent the unofficial standard language for being accentless; it is based on Midwestern English, distributed within an isogloss area encompassing the states of Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, and to some extent Nebraska.

World English

Though the Anglophone world is primarily divided between the American and British variants, some countries are starting to adopt distinct standards. For example, the Macquarie University has published a dictionary to describe the norms used in Australia.

Standard Filipino

Though Tagalog is a fairly stable language, there still exist at least four dialects of Tagalog found all over the 'Katagalugan' (The Tagalog Homeland). Today, the Standard Dialect is based on the language used in Metro Manila, which is characterised by heavy borrowings from English.

Standard Finnish

The basic structure and words of standard Finnish (yleiskieli) are mostly based upon the dialects of Western Finland, because Mikael Agricola, who codified the written language in the sixteenth century, was from Turku, the regional centre of the time. Finnish was developed to integrate all of the nation’s dialects, and so yield a logical language for proper written communication. One aim was national unification, in accordance to the nationalistic principle; the second aim was linguistic regularity and consistency, even if contradicting general colloquial usage, e.g. in Standard Finnish, ruoka becomes ruoan, and the pronunciation is ruuan.

Standard French

Though most Francophones consider Parisian French as the standard in French literature, some countries have been so active in preserving their dialect that they even form a body to preserve it.

Foremost among these countries is Canada which formed the Office québécois de la langue française or the Quebec Office of the French Language in 1961.

Standard German

Standard German was developed for several centuries, during which time writers tried to write in a way intelligible to the greatest number of readers and speakers, thus, until about 1800, Standard German was mostly a written language. In that time, northern Germany spoke Low German dialects much different from Standard German. Later, the Northern pronunciation of written German became considered as the universal standard; in Hanover, because of that adoption, the local dialect disappeared.

Standard Hindi/Urdu

Two standardized registers of the Hindustani language have legal status India: Standard Hindi (one of 23 co-official national languages) and Urdu (Pakistan’s official tongue), resultantly, Hindustani often called “Hindi-Urdu”.

Standard Irish/ Gaelic

In the case of Irish, the four dialects are so diverse that the government, through the Foras na Gaeilge, to make a standard dialect known as the An Caighdeán Oifigiúil.

However, this dialect is an artificial dialect and not really spoken by anyone. A person usually learns the dialect used by his teacher (which depends on where he lives) and it is possible that his teachers speak different dialects.

Standard Italian

Standard Italian derives from the city speech of Florence and the regional speech of Tuscany: the Florentine influence upon early Italian literature (e.g. Divine Comedy) established that dialect as base for the standard language of Italy.

Standard Norwegian

Bokmål and Nynorsk, the two written standard languages of Norway, by municipality

In Norwegian, there are two parallel written standard languages: Bokmål (an adaptation of written Danish from when Denmark ruled Norway) and Nynorsk (comparatively derived from Norwegian dialects).

Standard Portuguese

Portuguese has two official written standards, (i) Brazilian Portuguese (used chiefly in Brazil) and (ii) European Portuguese (used in Portugal and Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and São Tomé and Príncipe). The written standards slightly differ in spelling and vocabulary, and are legally regulated. Unlike the written language, however, there is no spoken-Portuguese official standard, but the European Portuguese reference pronunciation is the educated speech of Lisbon.

In Brazil, actors and journalists usually adopt an unofficial, but de facto, spoken standard Portuguese, originally derived from the middle-class dialect of Rio de Janeiro, but that now comprehends educated urban pronunciations from the different speech communities in the southeast. In that standard, <s> represents the phoneme /s/ when it appears at the end of a syllable (whereas in Rio de Janeiro this represents /ʃ/) the rhotic consonant spelled <r> is pronounced [x] in the same situation (whereas in São Paulo this is usually an alveolar trill). European and African dialects have differing realizations of /ʁ/ than Brazilian dialects, with the former using [ʁ] and [r] and the latter using [x], [h], or [χ].[6] Between vowels, <r> represents /ɾ/ for most dialects.

Standard Spanish

Though the Real Academia Española claims authority over the Spanish language, there are about twenty Spanish language academies all over the world which also claim similar authority in their territories.

Today, there are four main dialects of Spanish which are transnational in character:

List of standard languages and regulators

language standard register regulator non-standard dialects
Mandarin Chinese Standard Mandarin, Vernacular Chinese National Languages Committee Mandarin dialects
English Standard English none English dialects
Hindustani (Hindustani) Khariboli (Standard Hindi, Urdu) Central Hindi Directorate, National Language Authority of Pakistan Hindi dialects
Arabic Standard Arabic the Qur'an, several Arabic Academies Arabic dialects
Dutch Standard Dutch Dutch Language Union, Nederlandse Taalunie Dutch dialects
Afrikaans Standard Afrikaans Language commission, Die Taalkommissie Afrikaans dialects
Spanish Standard Spanish Real Academia Española, Association of Spanish Language Academies Spanish dialects
Portuguese Standard Portuguese International Portuguese Language Institute, Community of Portuguese Language Countries Portuguese dialects
German Standard German, Swiss Standard German Rat für deutsche Rechtschreibung German dialects
French Standard French Académie française, Office québécois de la langue française, Council for the Development of French in Louisiana French dialects
Norwegian Nynorsk, Bokmål Norwegian Language Council Norwegian dialects
Swedish Standard Swedish Swedish Language Council, Svenska språkbyrån Swedish dialects
Modern Greek Standard Modern Greek official introduction under Constantine Karamanlis in 1976 Modern Greek dialects
Filipino Standard Filipino (also known as Manila Tagalog or Central Tagalog) Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino Bulacan Tagalog (Northern Tagalog), Batangan Tagalog, Insular Tagalog
Irish Gaelic An Caighdeán Oifigiúil Foras na Gaeilge Munster Irish, Connacht Irish, Ulster Irish

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Finegan, Edward (2007). Language: Its Structure and Use (5th ed.). Boston, MA, USA: Thomson Wadsworth. p. 14. ISBN 9781413030556. 
  2. ↑ Smith 1996
  3. ↑ Blake 1996
  4. ↑ Baugh and Cable, 2002
  5. ↑ Smith, 1996
  6. ↑ Mateus, Maria Helena & d'Andrade, Ernesto (2000) The Phonology of Portuguese ISBN 0-19-823581-X (Excerpt from Google Books)

Bibliography

  • Baugh, Albert C. and Thomas Cable. 2002. "A History of the English Language" fifth ed. (London: Routledge)
  • Blake, N. F. 1996. "A History of the English Language" (Basingstoke: Palgrave)
  • Smith, Jeremy. 1996. "An Historical Study of English: Function, Form and Change" (London: Routledge)