World Languages: Crash Course Linguistics #14
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Date: 2022-04-04
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Comments and reviews: 10
George
(1) Your -chain of villages- example is EXACTLY like how ring species work. The evolution of language is a close analog to biological evolution. (2) I worked with a man who escaped Vietnam when Saigon fell. When it was politically possible for him to return to visit, everyone thought he talked funny. He wasn't aware of having changed at all. Some of it could be decrease in language skills in a mostly-English environment but I bet some of it was what you said -- Vietnamese had changed in Vietnam whereas he had tried his best to keep talking the same. I would disagree that the explanation is that larger groups change FASTER, though they probably do (more people coming up with changes) -- it's that different groups will change in different DIRECTIONS (why wouldn't they, with nothing to coordinate them. (3) This may be a controversial idea, but what is a nation? I agree that there is NOT a one-to-one correspondence between COUNTRIES and languages. But some would argue that a NATION is DEFINED by a common language. This idea says that a country is a political construct, but a nation is cultural or social. It's been misused, as in demands for everyplace where the people speak German to be part of Germany (for the country to expand to equal the nation. Napoleon called himself not the Emperor of France but the Emperor of the French -- ruler of the people, not the geographic area. Again, I recognize that this is where nationalism comes in, and nationalism is dangerous. But if a nation is not the same as a country, what is it, and can it have more than one language?
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(1) Your -chain of villages- example is EXACTLY like how ring species work. The evolution of language is a close analog to biological evolution. (2) I worked with a man who escaped Vietnam when Saigon fell. When it was politically possible for him to return to visit, everyone thought he talked funny. He wasn't aware of having changed at all. Some of it could be decrease in language skills in a mostly-English environment but I bet some of it was what you said -- Vietnamese had changed in Vietnam whereas he had tried his best to keep talking the same. I would disagree that the explanation is that larger groups change FASTER, though they probably do (more people coming up with changes) -- it's that different groups will change in different DIRECTIONS (why wouldn't they, with nothing to coordinate them. (3) This may be a controversial idea, but what is a nation? I agree that there is NOT a one-to-one correspondence between COUNTRIES and languages. But some would argue that a NATION is DEFINED by a common language. This idea says that a country is a political construct, but a nation is cultural or social. It's been misused, as in demands for everyplace where the people speak German to be part of Germany (for the country to expand to equal the nation. Napoleon called himself not the Emperor of France but the Emperor of the French -- ruler of the people, not the geographic area. Again, I recognize that this is where nationalism comes in, and nationalism is dangerous. But if a nation is not the same as a country, what is it, and can it have more than one language?
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autarchprinceps
I love how people think preserving endangered languages or getting people to speak small member languages, is desirable. Language is a tool, used with the goal to be able to communicate. Obviously, one major factor in picking which language or dialect to learn and speak, if indeed you have a choice, is which one allows you to talk to the most people you would want to talk to.
I for one welcome the day all the unintelligible hill-billy dialects of my native tongue will die with the old people still insisting on speaking them. Not because of force against them, just because in the choice between speaking and understanding the standard variety, enabling one to speak to almost a hundred million people in my case, or the weird dialect only spoken by a few thousand people and maybe mutually intelligible with a few other related dialects, the generations after them chose standard willingly, especially with TV, Internet, traveling, telephone, etc. removing the regional barrier anyway, in both language and the culture behind it.
Preserve them for the curiosity of science, but in the real world as spoken and written languages go, consolidation is desirable and direly needed.
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I love how people think preserving endangered languages or getting people to speak small member languages, is desirable. Language is a tool, used with the goal to be able to communicate. Obviously, one major factor in picking which language or dialect to learn and speak, if indeed you have a choice, is which one allows you to talk to the most people you would want to talk to.
I for one welcome the day all the unintelligible hill-billy dialects of my native tongue will die with the old people still insisting on speaking them. Not because of force against them, just because in the choice between speaking and understanding the standard variety, enabling one to speak to almost a hundred million people in my case, or the weird dialect only spoken by a few thousand people and maybe mutually intelligible with a few other related dialects, the generations after them chose standard willingly, especially with TV, Internet, traveling, telephone, etc. removing the regional barrier anyway, in both language and the culture behind it.
Preserve them for the curiosity of science, but in the real world as spoken and written languages go, consolidation is desirable and direly needed.
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GrosBonAnge
I would have wished to see the terms -dialect- and -language- be completely taken out of this video as obsolete, they are not linguistic factors, they are solely terms from politics and a folk's notion of languages. When there is no clear-cut explanation of their differences then there is a flaw in the language theory behind it, and that is that every variety/languoid is a closed and complete language system on its own, no matter how close or distant it is to other systems. Just as there are no objective reasons for -colours- in the visible part of the light, they are just subjective impressions without justifiable borders between them. Dialect vs. language are purely political terms to stigmatise varieties as -only dialects-, having no need to give its speakers rights for that language, or calling them -even languages-, glorifying varieties as better than others.
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I would have wished to see the terms -dialect- and -language- be completely taken out of this video as obsolete, they are not linguistic factors, they are solely terms from politics and a folk's notion of languages. When there is no clear-cut explanation of their differences then there is a flaw in the language theory behind it, and that is that every variety/languoid is a closed and complete language system on its own, no matter how close or distant it is to other systems. Just as there are no objective reasons for -colours- in the visible part of the light, they are just subjective impressions without justifiable borders between them. Dialect vs. language are purely political terms to stigmatise varieties as -only dialects-, having no need to give its speakers rights for that language, or calling them -even languages-, glorifying varieties as better than others.
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education
I wish we had words between dialect and language to describe languages. Spanish and Italian, for example, fall somewhere between this gap. -
I know the video jokes about linguists measuring intelligibility, but do they actually have a way to do so? Having an accurate measure of intelligibility can help us more clearly define the spectrum of languages.
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I wish we had words between dialect and language to describe languages. Spanish and Italian, for example, fall somewhere between this gap. -
I know the video jokes about linguists measuring intelligibility, but do they actually have a way to do so? Having an accurate measure of intelligibility can help us more clearly define the spectrum of languages.
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Robyn
Just wanted to point out that there''s at least one example of a sign language that isn't primarily associated with Deaf communities, Plains Indian Sign Language, which has primarily been a language of trade and communication between people who don't share a spoken language.
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Just wanted to point out that there''s at least one example of a sign language that isn't primarily associated with Deaf communities, Plains Indian Sign Language, which has primarily been a language of trade and communication between people who don't share a spoken language.
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Simple
Great video! I did my master's degree in Teaching Chinese as a foreign language and there's always more to learn about learning (and teaching) languages! I encourage everyone to give it a try! Find a language you are interested in and do your best! You won't regret it!
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Great video! I did my master's degree in Teaching Chinese as a foreign language and there's always more to learn about learning (and teaching) languages! I encourage everyone to give it a try! Find a language you are interested in and do your best! You won't regret it!
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The
I have to admit that it's quite amazing to hear the mention of the residential school system. I'm a 2nd generation descendant of not attending those schools. Greta coverage of a topic not covered all the time. Thumbs up from this indigenous from canada
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I have to admit that it's quite amazing to hear the mention of the residential school system. I'm a 2nd generation descendant of not attending those schools. Greta coverage of a topic not covered all the time. Thumbs up from this indigenous from canada
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graefx
I remember the high-school French and Spanish teachers having a conversation with each other in their respective languages before class one day and they just sorta figured it out. Used it as an example of the similarity between romance languages.
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I remember the high-school French and Spanish teachers having a conversation with each other in their respective languages before class one day and they just sorta figured it out. Used it as an example of the similarity between romance languages.
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Dracarmen
1: 50 - the dialect chain example sounds exactly like the -ring species- example for the fuzzy definition of a biological species. In fact, this episode illustrates a lot of the parallels between cultural and biological evolution.
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1: 50 - the dialect chain example sounds exactly like the -ring species- example for the fuzzy definition of a biological species. In fact, this episode illustrates a lot of the parallels between cultural and biological evolution.
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education
Huh? India only officially recognises only 121 languages? I've never read that anywhere before.
I come from this small region in India called Northeast India and even in this region alone 220 languages are recognised. --
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Huh? India only officially recognises only 121 languages? I've never read that anywhere before.
I come from this small region in India called Northeast India and even in this region alone 220 languages are recognised. --
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