By Dr Laila Abdel Aal Alghalban
Over the last few weeks I have been taken aback by a series of incidents and news stories that reflect the hectic, widespread change and evolution the English language has been undergoing in its heartlands and worldwide. Anyone living a couple of decades ago would struggle to believe that.
Why double standards?
Do you remember how many times you lost marks for simply forgetting the -s in present simple tense, using a regular form of an irregular verb such as ‘sing’ – singed- singed”, or not placing an article before river names like “Nile”? Of course, you do! Unfortunately, such “horrible errors” may cost students a lot of marks and, hence, opportunities to join the university of dreams.
This term, I have taught a dialectology course to undergraduate students. One of the core references I have nurtured special interest in is “An Atlas of English Dialects: Region and Dialect” by J.D.A Widdowson & Clive Upton. The Atlas is based on data collected from a Survey of English Dialects (SED) that documents dialectal variations in English, and provides maps for lexical, phonological and grammatical variations.
Flicking passionately through the pages, I always come across mind-blowing dialectal variations. Here are some examples. Hisself/ Hissel/ Hisself (Himself), we bin/ we am/ we be/ us be (we are), catched (catch), “give it me”, “I might could”, “he come yesterday”, “Jack have a car”, “the girl what do it is over there,” “he spoke very clear”, “Can you stay there while I came back”, meaning until, “He gan to the office today”, “a week agone”, “they goes”, “with us (me)”, “meself (myself)”, “get out on (of) it”, “I seen/ seed/ see (saw)”, “who to (to whom)”, “to learn (teach) a dog”, “to ax (ask)”, “five-and-twenty (twenty five)”, “one-and- twenty (twenty one)”, “us (we), “we was/wern (we were)”, “it’s much worser (worse)”, among others.
Historical background
Tracing these so-called errors to their origins reveals something surprising: each dialect is a system on its own. For example, Hisself follows the pattern of myself, yourself, ourselves; it is quite logical. Hisself is an example of prioritising consistency and regularisation over tradition and prestige in some dialects. Most probably, some dialects, including standard English, broke the pattern and opted for himself to avoid having two successive ss, for ease of pronunciation. Catched follows the rule that hundreds of English verbs obey; children also acquire it first, as it is one of the regular rules of the system. Later on, children switch off the “catched” parametre when they realise that the surrounding speaking data they hear break the pattern for caught, according to Chomsky’s Principles and Parametres theory of language acquisition. Concerning “The girl what did it”, In Old English, ‘what’ was a relative pronoun; it persists in dialects as a linguistic fossil. “I come yesterday” uses a bare verb in all verb forms (levelling verb forms) for the sake of consistency, regularisation, simplification, and identity marking.
As I am thumping through the maps and the detailed diachronic and synchronic commentary on each map, I said to myself: “This is unfair,”. Instantly, a question popped up: “Why should we punish our students for these ‘mistakes’ while accepting or tolerating the same forms when used by native speakers in their regional dialects?”
Different judgments
Some people would argue that native speakers do not sit for exams in their regional, substandard dialects. True. But the question remains: why are the English dialects treated with respect while a nonnative’s which has similar “mistakes” is regarded poor, underdeveloped, and treated as an error, a sort of mother language transfer, an imperfect, less acceptable interlanguage, a deficit, and a disadvantage? Actually, native speakers in northern England or Plymouth sitting for a standardised exam would lose marks if they use any of the regional (substandard) forms mentioned above, just like any nonnative speaker elsewhere in the world. Thus, it is not a matter of native vs. nonnative speakerism; it is standard vs. nonstandard English. Native speakerism is not fair: same exam, but different judgments.
Unfair advantage?
I recently came across an online discussion asking: “Do native English speakers have an unfair advantage globally?” Let’s discuss some of the responses. “Not many of us are bilingual for one. We seem to lack compassion and empathy for almost any other language being spoken inside of our country,” admitted one native speaker. Another commenter justified: “because people tend to be keen to practice their English with you. You have to be stubborn to persevere.” A third one acknowledges the native speakerism myth saying “In some countries, native speakers of English who teach English are paid more than locals who can teach (and spell) better than native speakers.” Finally, a fourth commenter identified the Netherlands as a case in point, nothing: “The whole country of the Netherlands has a higher mastery of English than the native speaker that’s running the biggest English native populated country.”
These comments echo the core ideological pillars of the discourse on native-speakerism: economic unfairness, monolingual disadvantage, and native English weaponisation. In line with this, Dr. Dominic Watt, Professor of sociolinguistics at the University of York in the UK told the BBC: “It’s not necessarily in your interest to be a native speaker anymore.”
Native speakers relearning their own tongue
There has been a growing tendency among native speakers of English to adapt their language to fit into global contexts by by eliminating slangs, idioms and, unique cultural items that may not sound understandable to nonnative speakers, slowing down speaking rate to make it easier for nonnatives to stay engaged, and making their speech sound like a written language.
ELF paradigm
ELF champions a significant paradigm shift; giving birth to new rules for multiple standards, prioritising intelligibility over accuracy, plurality over supremacy, flexibility over rigidity, and democratising over colonising. From the perspective of ELF, the third-person’-s’ in “he save money”, adds nothing, as the subject ‘he’ already marks the third person.
Since the course kicked off, students have been stunned by the amazing diversity of English dialects. They learn that standard English is just a variety imposed by the elite. Like any other dialects, standard English displays forms contradicting with logic; it is not a perfect one. Students are told to master it for the contexts where it is required, and learn that they are part of the majority, of the two billion nonnative speakers of English; they have the upper hand.
Finally, for teachers, next time students use “I seen or we was”, “ five-and-twenty”, “it’s much worser” or “ to learn a dog instead of to teach”, remember that there are native speakers in Yorkshire, Scotland, and the US, respectively, happily, charmingly and proudly saying the same. Wait! Don’t rush for the red pen! Ask yourself, is it meaningful? If yes, that’s okay! Intelligibility will be soon the new standard! But for the time being, help students to excel in the current “standard” English, with a new perspective!
Dr Laila Abdel Aal Alghalban
Professor of Linguistics
Faculty of Arts
Kafr el-sheikh University
Email: [email protected]
