Unit 5 Ap Human Geography Language 

I am highlighting in blue what I know if you see it just ignore it.

^^Key Issue #1^^- Language Distribution

A. What is it?

• Language- Communication though speech or writing with sounds and symbols that carry an agreed upon meaning
  • Example- sign language is included in the non-material culture

B. Language and Migration (Linguistic Geography)

• Linguistic Geography- the study of speech areas and can be used as a tool to trace migration patterns
• Interesting Facts
  • Madagascar´s language is similar to Indonesia though they are over 2,500 miles apart
• Self Questions
  • What language families would you expect to be alike
  • What conclusion can we draw from this
• Tracking Language History
  • Divergence- Language that breaks into different dialects due to lack of spatial interaction
  • Example- American English/ British English
  • Convergence- When two languages become similar due to constant spatial interaction
  • Example- Greek/Romanian
  • We can track migration by looking at language divergence and convergence

C. Classifying Languages

• 7,100 languages exists today
• Institutional- language used in education, work, and government
• Official- a government designated language (state language)
• Developing- a language with a literary tradition
• Vigorous- daily used language with no literary tradition
• Literary Tradition- language that has a written form
• Self Questions
  • What is the official language of India
  • What does that tell us about it’s history

D. Organizing Language Families

1. Language Families- language with a shared, but prehistoric origin language
2. Language Branches- smaller groups of languages within a family from the historic era
3. Language - group of languages in a family with many similarities in grammar and vocab
4. Language- Communication though speech or writing with sounds and symbols that carry an agreed upon meaning
5. Dialect- a particular version of a language
6. Accents- smaller pronunciation variations

E. Largest Language Families

1. Indo- European- language found in Europe, South Asia, North America, and Latin America

   • Branches
   1. Indo- Iranian (Hindi-India)
   2. Germanic (German-English)
   3. Romance (Spanish-French)

2. Sino- Tibetan

   • China- Mandarin the most common language in the world

F. Other Large Language Families

• Southeast Asia
  • Austronesian
  • Austro-Asiatic
• East Asia
  • Japanese
  • Korean
• Africa
  • Afro-Asiatic (Arabic)
  • Niger Congo (Swahili)
• Random
  • Dravidian
  • Altaic
  • Uracil
• Other American
  • Quechua

Review for Key Idea #1

1. Language is an example of what?
   • Non-material cultural
2. Madagascar’s language is most connected to the language of?
   • Indonesia
3. Lack of spacial interaction might cause a language to what?
   • Diverge
4. What do these terms mean
   • Institutional - language used in education, work, and government
   • Official - a government designated language (state language)
   • Developing - a language with a literary tradition
   • Vigorous - daily used language with no literary tradition
5. Put these in order from biggest to smallest “group”
   • Language Group (3rd)
   • Language Family (1st)
   • Dialects (5th)
   • Language Branch (2nd)
   • Language (4th)
   • Accent (6th)
6. What is the largest language family?
   • Indo- European
7. Which language is the most spoken
   • Mandarin

^^1232Key Issue #2^^- Indo-European Language Family

A. What is it?

• Indo- European- a language family spoken by 40% of worlds population and has a common prehistoric language ancestor

B. Theories of Origin

• Sedentary Farmer thesis (Peaceful)
  • Also called “Renfew Hypothesis”
  • Indo-European started in the Fertile Crescent
  • Language diffused peacefully though agricultural trade
• Nomadic Warrior Thesis
  • Kurgan Theory or Conquest Theory
  • Indo- European began in the vicinity of JW Russia
  • Kurgan Warriors brought the language with them as they conquered other areas

C. Indo-European Branches

• Romance language **

  1. French
  2. Spanish
  3. Italian

• Germanic Language

  1. English
  2. German
  3. Norwegian

• Slavic Language

  1. Russian
  2. Polish
  3. Czech

• **Orgin and Diffusion

  • Spread by the government and military of the Roman Empire
  • Came From the spoken Latin (Vulgar/Basic Latin) missing with the regional languages

D. Largest Indo-European Branch: Indo-Iranian

1. Persian (Farsi) - Iran
2. Hindi- India
3. Kurdish- Kurds

• Other Details
  • Linguistic Fragmentation- when people in a country speaks many different language, This is often caused by physical or cultural barriers
  • Example- Papua, new guinea has over 850 languages making it the most linguistically diverse place on earth

E. The English Language (Origin and Diffusion)

1. Origin of English
   • Britain was populated by staking tribes from Denmark and Germany called the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes
   • Vikings from Norway attacked later and adds their language
   • French Normans attacked later and adds their language
2. The Diffusion of English
   • Britain- British Colonies (N.A. Ireland South Asia, Australia, and South Africa)- United States- United States Annexes (Philippines)
3. Examples of English Language Convergences
   • Fraglais- French and English
   • Spanglish- Spanish and English

F. English as a Global Lingua Franca

1. What is a Lingua Franca?
   • Lingua Franca: a language of international communication to ease business and government interaction
   • Examples-
     • English
     • Mandarin Chinese
     • Swahili
   • Struggle to balance accepting global culture at the expense of local identity
2. English Speaking Countries
   • English is an official language in 58 countries and widely required education in European countries Japan, China, etc
   • English also dominated on the internet
3. What is a Pidgin
   • a simplified version of a language that rules and vocabulary from another language
   • It has no native speakers by definition

Key Issue #3- Language Variation Among Locations

A. Dialects and Sub dialects

• Dialect- a regional variation of language distinguished by distinctive vocab, spelling, and pronunciation and usually reflect differences in environment

B. English Dialects

• English Dialects- the differences in English result from colonization and thousands of miles of separation from the source nation
• Vocabulary- difference physical feature, animals, Indian, influence, and inventions (Biscuits and Cookies)
• Spelling- Webster’s dictionary deliberately diverged from the British spellings dropping u’s and c for s (Colour and Flavour)
• Pronunciation- difference due to only having printed contact between each other (Dropping the r’s on words like “car”)

C. Dialects in the U.K.

• Dialects and very much connected with the location at conquering tribes. The ‘standard language’ is called “received pronunciation”- the queens English

D. U.S. Dialects

• Isogloss- the boundary or limit of a word’s usage plotted geographically (Soda and Pop)

E. Distribution of U.S. Dialects

• Original 3 based on colonization
• Movement across the continent gave us a 4th western
• Mass Media is softening the differences
• Ebonics- controversial dialect based on…
  • African- American speech patterns (we be, you be)
• Appalachian English-
  • Controversial dialect based on mountain white speech patterns (going up yonder to the crick in the holler)
  • Creole- when a pidgin more fully develops from a colonized people group taking on simplified version of colonizer’s language

F. Dialects Become Languages

• Dialects- sometimes dialects diverge so much that they come reconsidered as separate languages
• Examples
  • Catalan- spoken in Andorra and Catalonia Spain. Represents a form of Independence (rebellion) for them

G. Standardizing Languages

• Government often promote standardizing languages to encourage cultural unity
  • Example- French Academie Francaise
• Natives also gather to standardize languages globally such as Portuguese and Spain

H. Gender and Language

• Some languages have male and female forms of words- not English

• Female are more likely to say “and uh”

• Women are less likely to interrupt men

• Self Question

  1. How do you live peacefully with multilingual places

  I) Multilingual Places

  1. Switzerland
  • Officially recognizes 4 languages and put political power in the local hands
  1. Canada
  • french spoken in Quebec and legally mandated this is cause of tension and calls for Independence
  1. Nigeria
  • strife and war between the 529 languages groups. Moved their capital to a “neutral” area
  1. Belgium
  • Divison by language and economics and led to call the separation and independence

Key Issue #4- Survival of Local Languages

A. Endangered Languages

• 7102 languages, 2447 are endangered, 1531 are troubled because they aren’t being taught by parents to their kids

• Worst areas- south pacific, latin america, and north america

  1. South Pacific
  • Australia- English is the official language and immigrants are required to learn it. Also original langues are secondary
  • New Zealand- Maori and English are both official
  1. North America
  • 142 dying languages, 61 troubled
  • Example- Miami native language is being revived by one single teacher

B. Preserving Languages (Ex. Celtic)

• The united nation and the European union and making efforts to persevere dying languages such as the “Year of Indigenous languages”

  1. Welsh
  • It was made required education, official language and promoted by being used on road signs, music, and entertainment
  1. Cornish
  • languages dead revived by standardizing of writing and now use in some church services
  1. Breton
  • Declining numbers but taught in schools
  1. Irish
  • Official laonguage of Ireland (Gaelic). taught and celebrated in Irish music found on road signs and etc
  1. Scottish Gaelic
  • Desire to presage Scottish heritage and literature

C. Languages Isolates and Extinct Languages

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  1. Language Isolates- is a language that has no relation to any other language
  • Example- Basque is a language isolate
  • Basque
  • Caused by limited interaction due to mountains surrounding them
  • Pre Indo-European language with no family
  • 600,000 people speak it and is sustainable

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  2. Unchanged Languages
  • Languages that have remained unchanged over long periods of time though they are part of the established branch
  • Example- Icelandic part of the German Branch of Indo-European

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  3. Extinct Languages- and language once used daily that has been abandoned
  • Example- Peru from 500 to 92 languages with only million speakers (Cuzco-Quechua Language)
  • Example- US- 74 languages are extinct
  • Think Globalization

D. New and Growing Languages

• Languages that are invented, revived and preserved

1. New Languages- newly discovered or newly created languages

• Example- Koro Aka
• Warlpiri Rampaku in Lamanujan Australia

1. Growing Languages- languages that were understood but rarely used, but are

• Example- Hebrew in Israel

E. Some Random Reminders

1. Why are some languages endangered

• Globalization
• Colonialism

1. Why preserve a language

• Maintain Independence and power
• Provide unity for a person
• Tourist appeal
• Preserve the cultural heritage
• Nationalism

1. Some Extra Vocab

• Agricultural Theory also called Anatolian hearth theory
• Kurgan Hearth theory

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