Language variety with substantially codified grammar and usage
Astandard language (orstandard variety,standard dialect,standardized dialect or simplystandard) is anylanguage variety that has undergone substantialcodification of itsgrammar,lexicon,writing system, or other features and that stands out among related varieties in a community as the one with the highest status orprestige.[1][2] Often, it is the prestige language variety of a whole country.[1]
Inlinguistics, the process of a variety becoming organized into a standard, for instance by being widely expounded ingrammar books or other reference works,[2] and also the process of making people's language usage conform to that standard,[3] is calledstandardization. Typically, the varieties that undergo standardization are those associated with centres of commerce and government,[4][2] used frequently by educated people and innews broadcasting, and taught widely in schools and to non-native learners of the language.[5][1] Within a language community, standardization usually begins with a particular variety being selected (often towards a goal of further linguistic uniformity), accepted by influential people, socially and culturally spread, established in opposition to competitor varieties, maintained, increasingly used in diverse contexts, and assigned a high social status as a result of the variety being linked to the most successful people.[6] As a sociological effect of these processes, most users of a standard dialect—and many users of other dialects of the same language—come to believe that the standard is inherently superior to, or consider it the linguistic baseline against which to judge, the other dialects.[7] However, such beliefs are firmly rooted in social perceptions rather than any objective evaluation.[5] Any varieties that do not carry high social status in a community (and thus may be defined in opposition to standard dialects) are called nonstandard orvernacular dialects.
The termstandard language occasionally refers also to the entirety of a language that includes a standardized form as one of its varieties.[18][19] In Europe, a standardizedwritten language is sometimes identified with the German wordSchriftsprache (written language). The termliterary language is occasionally used as a synonym forstandard language, a naming convention still prevalent in thelinguistic traditions of eastern Europe.[20][21] In contemporary linguistic usage, the termsstandard dialect andstandard variety are neutral synonyms for the termstandard language, usages which indicate thatthe standard language is one of many dialects and varieties of a language, rather than the totality of the language, whilst minimizing the negative implication ofsocial subordination that the standard is the only form worthy of the label "language".[22][23]
The termstandard language identifies a repertoire of broadly recognizable conventions in spoken and written communications used in a society; the term implies neither a socially ideal idiom nor a culturally superior form of speech.[24] These conventions develop from related dialects, usually by social action (ethnic and cultural unification) that elevate discourse patterns associated with perceived centres of culture, or more rarely, by deliberately defining the norms of standard language with selected linguistic features drawn from the existing dialects, as in the case ofModern Hebrew.[25][26]
Either course of events typically results in a relatively fixed orthography codified ingrammars and normativedictionaries, in which users can also sometimes find illustrative examples drawn from literary, legal, or religious texts.[26] Whether grammars and dictionaries are created by the state or by private citizens (e.g.Webster's Dictionary), some users regard such linguistic codifications as authoritative for correcting the spoken and written forms of the language.[27] Effects of such codifications include slowing the pace ofdiachronic change in the standardized variety and affording a basis for further linguistic development (Ausbau).[26] In the practices of broadcasting and of official communications, the standard usually functions as a normalizing reference for speech and writing. In educational contexts, it usually informs the version of the language taught to non-native learners.[28]
In those ways, the standard variety acquiressocial prestige and greater functional importance thannonstandard dialects,[28] which depend upon or areheteronomous with respect to the standard idiom. Standard usage serves as the linguistic authority, as in the case of specialistterminology; moreover, the standardization of spoken forms is oriented towards the codified standard.[29] Historically, a standard language arises in two ways: (i) in the case ofStandard English, linguistic standardization occurs informally and piecemeal, without formal government intervention; (ii) in the cases of the French and Spanish languages, linguistic standardization occurs formally, directed byprescriptive language institutions, such as theAcadémie Française and theRoyal Spanish Academy, which respectively produceLe bon français andEl buen español.[30][28]
A standard variety can be conceptualized in two ways: (i) as thesociolect of a givensocio-economic stratum or (ii) as the normative codification of adialect, an idealized abstraction.[31] Hence, the full standardization of a language is impractical, because a standardized dialect cannot fully function as a real entity, but does function as set of linguistic norms observed to varying degrees in the course ofusus – of how people actually speak and write the language.[32][33] In practice, the language varieties identified as standard are neither uniform nor fully stabilized, especially in their spoken forms.[34] From that perspective, the linguistSuzanne Romaine says that standard languages can be conceptually compared to theimagined communities ofnation andnationalism, as described by the political scientistBenedict Anderson,[33] which indicates that linguistic standardization is the result of a society's history and sociology, and thus is not a universal phenomenon;[33] of the approximately 7,000 contemporary spoken languages, most do not have a codified standard dialect.[33]
Politically, in the formation of a nation-state, identifying and cultivating a standard variety can serve efforts to establish a shared culture among the social and economic groups who compose the new nation-state.[35] Different national standards, derived from acontinuum of dialects, might be treated as discrete languages (along with heteronomous vernacular dialects)[36] even if there aremutually intelligible varieties among them,[37][38] such as theNorth Germanic languages of Scandinavia (Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish).[39] Moreover, in political praxis, either a government or a neighbouring population might deny the cultural status of a standard language.[40] In response to such political interference, linguists develop a standard variety from elements of the different dialects used by a society.
For example, when Norway became independent from Denmark in 1814, the only written language was Danish. Different Norwegian dialects were spoken in rural districts and provincial cities, but people with higher education and upper-class urban people spoke "Danish with a Norwegian pronunciation". Based upon the bourgeois speech of the capitalOslo (Christiania) and other major cities, several orthographic reforms, notably in 1907 and 1917, resulted in the official standardRiksmål, in 1929 renamedBokmål ('book tongue'). The philologistIvar Aasen (1813–1896) considered urban and upper-classDano-Norwegian too similar to Danish, so he developedLandsmål ('country tongue'), the standard based upon the dialects of western Norway. In 1885 theStorting (parliament) declared both forms official and equal. In 1929 it was officially renamedNynorsk (New Norwegian).
Likewise, inYugoslavia (1945–1992), when theSocialist Republic of Macedonia (1963–1991) developed their national language from the dialect continuum demarcated by Serbia to the north and Bulgaria to the east, theirStandard Macedonian was based upon vernaculars from the west of the republic, which were the dialects most linguistically different from standardBulgarian, the previous linguistic norm used in that region of theBalkan peninsula. Although Macedonian functions as the standard language of theRepublic of North Macedonia, nonetheless, for political and cultural reasons, Bulgarians treat Macedonian as a Bulgarian dialect.[41]
Chinese consists of hundreds oflocal varieties, many of which are not mutually intelligible, usually classified into seven to ten major groups, includingMandarin,Wu,Yue,Hakka andMin.Before the 20th century, most Chinese spoke only their local variety.For two millennia, formal writing had been done inClassical Chinese, a style modelled on theclassics and far removed from any contemporary speech.[42]As a practical measure, officials of the late imperial dynasties carried out the administration of the empire using acommon language based on Mandarin varieties, known asGuānhuà (literally "speech of officials").[43]
In the early 20th century, many Chinese intellectuals argued that the country needed a standardized language.By the 1920s, Literary Chinese had been replaced as the written standard bywritten vernacular Chinese, which was based on Mandarin dialects.[44]In the 1930s,Standard Chinese was adopted, with its pronunciation based on theBeijing dialect, but with vocabulary also drawn from other Mandarin varieties and its syntax based on the written vernacular.[45]It is the official spoken language of thePeople's Republic of China (where it is calledPǔtōnghuà "common speech"), the de facto official language of theRepublic of China governing Taiwan (asGuóyǔ "national language") and one of the official languages ofSingapore (asHuáyǔ "Chinese language").[46]Standard Chinese now dominates public life, and is much more widely studied than any othervariety of Chinese.[47]
In the United Kingdom, the standard language isBritish English, which is based upon the language of the medievalcourt of Chancery of England and Wales.[48] In the late-seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries,Standard English became established as the linguistic norm of theupper class, composed of thepeerage and thegentry.[49] Socially, the accent of the spoken version of the standard language then indicated that the speaker was a man or a woman possessed of a good education, and thus of highsocial prestige.[50] In England and Wales, Standard English is usually associated withReceived Pronunciation, "the standard accent of English as spoken in thesouth of England.", but it may also be spoken with other accents, and in other countries still other accents are used (Australian,Canadian,American,Scottish, etc.)[51]
Two standardizedregisters of theHindustani language have legal status in India:Standard Hindi (one of 23 co-official national languages) andUrdu (Pakistan's official tongue); as a result, Hindustani is often called "Hindi-Urdu".[53]
An Caighdeán Oifigiúil ('The Official Standard'), often shortened toAn Caighdeán, is the official standard of theIrish language. It was first published by the translators inDáil Éireann in the 1950s.[54] As of September 2013,[55] the first major revision of the Caighdeán Oifigiúil is available, both online[56] and in print.[57] Among the changes to be found in the revised version are, for example, various attempts to bring the recommendations of the Caighdeán closer to the spoken dialect of Gaeltacht speakers,[58] including allowing further use of the nominative case where the genitive would historically have been found.[59]
StandardItalian is derived from theTuscan dialect, specifically from itsFlorentine variety—the Florentine influence upon earlyItalian literature established that dialect as base for the standard language of Italy.[60][61] In particular, Italian became the language of culture for all the people of Italy, thanks to the prestige of the masterpieces of Florentine authors likeDante Alighieri, as well as to the political and cultural significance of Florence at the time and the fact that it was linguistically an intermediate between the northern and the southern Italian dialects.[62] It would later become the official language of all theItalian states, and after theItalian unification it became thenational language of theKingdom of Italy.[63] Modern StandardItalian's lexicon has been deeply influenced by almost allregional languages of Italy.
The standard language in theRoman Republic (509 BC – 27 BC) and theRoman Empire (27 BC – AD 1453) wasClassical Latin, the literary dialect spoken by upper classes of Roman society, whilstVulgar Latin was thesociolect (colloquial language) spoken by the educated and uneducated peoples of the middle and the lower social classes of Roman society. The Latin language that Roman armies introduced toGaul,Hispania, andDacia had a grammar, syntax, and vocabulary different from the Classical Latin spoken and written by the statesmanCicero.[64]
In Brazil, actors and journalists usually adopt an unofficial, butde facto, spoken standard ofBrazilian Portuguese, originally derived from the middle-class dialects ofRio de Janeiro andBrasília, but that now encompasses educated urban pronunciations from the different speech communities in the southeast. This artificial accent is calledsotaque neutro. 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/) and therhotic consonant spelled⟨r⟩ is pronounced[h] in the same situation (whereas inSão Paulo this is usually analveolar flap ortrill).
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].[66]
Four standard variants of thepluricentric Serbo-Croatian are spoken inBosnia and Herzegovina,Croatia,Montenegro, andSerbia.[16][67] They all have thesame dialect basis (Štokavian).[53][68][69] These variants do differ slightly, as is the case with other pluricentric languages,[53][70] but not to a degree that would justify considering them asdifferent languages. The differences between the variants do not hinder mutual intelligibility and do not undermine the integrity of the system as a whole.[71][72][73] Compared to the differences between the variants of English, German, French, Spanish, or Portuguese, the distinctions between the variants of Serbo-Croatian are less significant.[74][75]Nonetheless, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro have all named the language differently in their constitutions.[76]
InSomalia,Northern Somali (or North-Central Somali) forms the basis forStandard Somali,[77] particularly theMudug dialect of the northernDarod clan. Northern Central Somali has frequently been used by famousSomali poets as well as the political elite, and thus has the most prestige among other Somali dialects.[78]
^Eachach (2012), p. 2: "Rinneadh iarracht ar leith san athbhreithniú seo foirmeacha agus leaganacha atá ar fáil go tréan sa chaint sna mórchanúintí a áireamh sa Chaighdeán Oifigiúil Athbhreithnithe sa tslí is go mbraithfeadh an gnáthchainteoir mórchanúna go bhfuil na príomhghnéithe den chanúint sin aitheanta sa Chaighdeán Oifigiúil agus, mar sin, gur gaire don ghnáthchaint an Caighdeán Oifigiúil anois ná mar a bhíodh."
^Eachach (2012), p. 7: "Triaileadh, mar shampla, aitheantas a thabhairt don leathnú atá ag teacht ar úsáid fhoirm an ainmnigh in ionad an ghinidigh sa chaint."
^Coletti (2011), p. 318, quote="L'italiano di oggi ha ancora in gran parte la stessa grammatica e usa ancora lo stesso lessico del fiorentino letterario del Trecento."
Ammon, Ulrich (2004). "Standard variety". In Ammon, Ulrich; Dittmar, Norbert; Mattheier, Klaus J.; Trudgill, Peter (eds.).Sociolinguistics. Vol. 1. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 273–283.ISBN978-3-11-014189-4.
Auer, Peter (2011). "Dialect vs. standard: a typology of scenarios in Europe". In Kortmann, Bernd; van der Auwera, Johan (eds.).The languages and linguistics of Europe : a comprehensive guide. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 485–500.ISBN978-3-11-022025-4.
Baugh, Albert C.; Cable, Thomas (2002).A History of the English Language (5th ed.). London: Routledge.ISBN978-0-415-28098-3.
Bex, Tony (2008). "'Standard' English, Discourse Grammars and English Language Teaching". In Locher, M. A.; Strässler, J. (eds.).Standards and Norms in the English Language. De Gruyter. pp. 221–238.
Blum, Daniel (2002).Sprache und Politik: Sprachpolitik und Sprachnationalismus in der Republik Indien und dem sozialistischen Jugoslawien (1945-1991) [Language and Policy: Language Policy and Linguistic Nationalism in the Republic of India and the Socialist Yugoslavia (1945-1991)]. Beiträge zur Südasienforschung (in German). Vol. 192. Würzburg: Ergon.ISBN3-89913-253-X.OCLC51961066.
Carter, Ronald (1999). "Standard Grammars, Spoken Grammars: Some Educational Implications.". In Bex, Tony; Watts, R.J. (eds.).Standard English: The Widening Debate. Routledge. pp. 149–166.
Charity Hudley, Anne H.; Mallinson, Christine (2011).Understanding English Language Variation in U.S. Schools. New York: Teachers College Press.ISBN9780807774021.
Clyne, Michael G., ed. (1992).Pluricentric Languages: Differing Norms in Different Nations. Contributions to the sociology of language. Vol. 62. Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter.ISBN3-11-012855-1.
Coletti, Vittorio (2011)."Storia della lingua". Istituto della Enciclopedia italiana. Retrieved10 October 2015.
Dalby, Andrew (1998).Dictionary of languages: the definitive reference to more than 400 languages. Columbia University Press.
Davila, Bethany (2016). "The Inevitability of 'Standard' English: Discursive Constructions of Standard Language Ideologies".Written Communication.33 (2):127–148.doi:10.1177/0741088316632186.S2CID147594600.
Dunaj, Bogusław (1989).Język mieszkańców Krakowa, część I (in Polish). Warszawa-Kraków. p. 134.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Gröschel, Bernhard (2009).Das Serbokroatische zwischen Linguistik und Politik: mit einer Bibliographie zum postjugoslavischen Sprachenstreit [Serbo-Croatian Between Linguistics and Politics: With a Bibliography of the Post-Yugoslav Language Dispute]. Lincom Studies in Slavic Linguistics (in German). Vol. 34. Munich: Lincom Europa.ISBN978-3-929075-79-3.LCCN2009473660.OCLC428012015.OL15295665W.
Horrocks, Geoffrey (1997).Greek: A History of the Language and its Speakers (1st ed.). London: Longman.ISBN9780582307094.
Inoue, M. (2006). "Standardization". In Brown, Keith (ed.).Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Vol. 12 (2nd ed.). Elsevier. pp. 121–127.ISBN978-0-08-044299-0.
Kafadar, Enisa (2009). "Bosnisch, Kroatisch, Serbisch – Wie spricht man eigentlich in Bosnien-Herzegowina?" [Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian – How do people really speak in Bosnia-Herzegovina?]. In Henn-Memmesheimer, Beate; Franz, Joachim (eds.).Die Ordnung des Standard und die Differenzierung der Diskurse; Teil 1 (in German). Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. pp. 95–106.ISBN9783631599174.OCLC699514676. Retrieved9 May 2013.
Kloss, Heinz (1967). "'Abstand languages' and 'ausbau languages'".Anthropological Linguistics.9 (7):29–41.JSTOR30029461.
Kordić, Snježana (2004)."Pro und kontra: "Serbokroatisch" heute" [Pro and contra: "Serbo-Croatian" nowadays](PDF). In Krause, Marion; Sappok, Christian (eds.).Slavistische Linguistik 2002: Referate des XXVIII. Konstanzer Slavistischen Arbeitstreffens, Bochum 10.-12. September 2002. Slavistishe Beiträge; vol. 434 (in German). Munich: Otto Sagner. pp. 97–148.ISBN3-87690-885-X.OCLC56198470.SSRN3434516.CROSBI 430499.Archived(PDF) from the original on 4 August 2012. Retrieved6 June 2015.
Kristophson, Jürgen (2000). "Vom Widersinn der Dialektologie: Gedanken zum Štokavischen" [Dialectological Nonsense: Thoughts on Shtokavian].Zeitschrift für Balkanologie (in German).36 (2).ISSN0044-2356.ZDB-ID201058-6.
Lepschy, Anna Laura; Lepschy, Giulio C. (1988).The Italian language today (2nd ed.). New York: New Amsterdam. p. 260.ISBN978-0-941533-22-5.OCLC17650220.
Maiden, Martin (2014).A Linguistic History of Italian. Taylor & Francis. p. 318.ISBN9781317899273.
Methadžović, Almir (10 April 2015)."Naučnoznanstvena-znanstvenonaučna istina" [Scientific truth] (in Serbo-Croatian). Mostar: Tačno.net.Archived from the original on 16 April 2015. Retrieved12 February 2016.
McArthur, Tom; McArthur, Feri (1992).The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford University Press.ISBN9780192141835.
Milroy, James (2007). "The Ideology of the Standard Language". In Llamas, Carmen; Mullany, Louise; Stockwell, Peter (eds.).The Routledge Companion to Sociolinguistics. London: Routledge. pp. 133–13.ISBN978-0203441497.OCLC76969042.
Milroy, James; Milroy, Lesley (2012).Authority in Language: Investigating Standard English' (4th ed.). New York: Routledge.ISBN978-0-415-69683-8.
Palmer, L.R. (1988).The Latin Language. University of Oklahoma.ISBN0-8061-2136-X.
Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1999).The Concise Oxford English Dictionary (10th ed.).
Pohl, Hans-Dieter (1996). "Serbokroatisch - Rückblick und Ausblick" [Serbo-Croatian – Looking backward and forward]. In Ohnheiser, Ingeborg (ed.).Wechselbeziehungen zwischen slawischen Sprachen, Literaturen und Kulturen in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart: Akten der Tagung aus Anlaß des 25jährigen Bestehens des Instituts für Slawistik an der Universität Innsbruck, Innsbruck, 25. - 27. Mai 1995. Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Kulturwissenschaft, Slavica aenipontana (in German). Vol. 4. Innsbruck: Non Lieu. pp. 205–221.OCLC243829127.
Richards, Jack Croft; Schmidt, Richard W. (2010).Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics. Pearson Education Limited.ISBN978-1-4082-0460-3.
Saeed, John (1999).Somali. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.ISBN1-55619-224-X.
Silverstein, Michael (1996). "Monoglot 'Standard' in America: Standardization and Metaphors of Linguistic Hegemony". In Brennis, Donald; Macaulay, Ronald H.S (eds.).The Matrix of Language. Routledge. pp. 284–306.
Starčević, Anđel (2016). "Govorimo hrvatski ili 'hrvatski': standardni dijalekt i jezične ideologije u institucionalnom diskursu".Suvremena Lingvistika (in Serbo-Croatian).81. University of Zagreb:67–103.
Сулейменова, Элеонора Д. (2006).Словарь социолингвистических терминов (in Russian). Moscow: Российская академия наук. Институт языкознания. Российская академия лингвистических наук.
Trudgill, Peter (1992). "Ausbau sociolinguistics and the perception of language status in contemporary Europe".International Journal of Applied Linguistics.2 (2):167–177.doi:10.1111/j.1473-4192.1992.tb00031.x.
Trudgill, Peter (2004). "Glocalisation and the Ausbau sociolinguistics of modern Europe". In Anna Duszak, Urszula Okulska (ed.).Speaking from the margin: global English from a European perspective. Frankfurt: Peter Lang. pp. 35–49.ISBN9783631526637.
Trudgill, Peter (2006). "Standard and Dialect Vocabulary". In Brown, Keith (ed.).Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Vol. 12 (2nd ed.). Elsevier. pp. 119–121.ISBN978-0-08-044299-0.
Ammon, Ulrich (1995).Die deutsche Sprache in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz: das Problem der nationalen Varietäten [German Language in Germany, Austria and Switzerland: The Problem of National Varieties] (in German). Berlin & New York: Walter de Gruyter.OCLC33981055.
Joseph, John E. (1987).Eloquence and Power: The Rise of Language Standards and Standard Languages. New York: Blackwell.ISBN978-1-55786-001-9.
Kloss, Heinz (1976). "Abstandsprachen und Ausbausprachen" [Abstand-languages and Ausbau-languages]. In Göschel, Joachim; Nail, Norbert; van der Elst, Gaston (eds.).Zur Theorie des Dialekts: Aufsätze aus 100 Jahren Forschung. Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik, Beihefte, n.F., Heft 16. Wiesbaden: F. Steiner. pp. 301–322.OCLC2598722.
