Language in Change

Question 1. How important do you think it is to have a “standard” form English?

Having a standard language can bring a lot of benefits, and it follows the idea of prescriptivism. A standard language can give uniformity, if everyone uses language the same way it can help to make communication easier between people. Some features that help to create a standard language is that anyone will be able to speak it, no matter where they live. So if English was made standard it would advance communication because every word would have a set meaning. Also if a language was made standard there would be no variations in spelling or grammar, all books, schools, dictionaries and media would be promoting the same use of language. The results of everybody using a standard form would help to set an academic stand, for example having one standard set would make business matters or legal matters more clear, because if people are unable to express their views through the use of language their views might just get lost. So once again a universal accepted standard will help to advance the academic side. If a language was made standard it would help to stop confusion. We only have to look back to England, before the time English was being made Standard, it would have been extremely difficult to communicate and have the ability to interact with everybody especially if their standard of English was different to the standard of English you were using. That’s why from the time of Alfred the Great we can see language becoming more standard. So by having one set standard of English it will stop the confusion that was present when everybody had their own standard.

Question 2. How has Australian English developed? What differences occur across the states and what do you think has caused these individual nuances in accent or lexical formations? Providing examples identify what types of change these represent?

Australian English is just another variety of the English language, and has become the first language of majority of the people within Australia. Australian English began to diverge from British English after the founding of the colony of NSW. During 1788 it was recognized as being a different from British English. Australian English arose from the vast variety of distinct dialectal regions of the British Isles, many convicts were sent from all over England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland brought there dialects with them. Also during the 1850’s many people migrated from around the world to come for the gold rush, so the Australian English came from a type of standardization between all the dialect and accents. There are some variety between the states of Australia, for example there are slight dialects of English between South Australia, Western Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and Tasmania, and these difference appear in vocabulary and phonology.