BACKGROUND TO A.A.V.E
A.A.V.E is a variety of American English mainly spoken by African Americans. According to the Creole hypothesis, “modern A.A.V.E is the result of a Creole derived from English and various West African languages” (McLucas 2003). Modern A.A.V.E, however, is experiencing decreolisation and becoming more like Standard American English.
BACKGROUND TO SCOTS
Scots is a unique regional variant of English. The boundary between England and Scotland hosts the most clearly defined dialect boundary in Britain. The complexity of defining Scots
is unparalleled in any other variety of English in Britain. Many Scots speakers strive for it to be recognised as a separate language. Standard English, however, is still the dominant “Language of power and public prestige” (Crystal 2002:328).
It may be more accurate to think of Standard English and Scots being linked on a continuum, such as the one below;
Mutually unintelligible Mutually intelligible
(Language) Scots (Dialect of English)
As the continuum shows, Scots could be considered as being neither a language nor a dialect, but something in between.
The description does not show that language varieties can be classified on such a continuum, and is therefore not an adequate method of distinction. It suggests that there is a clear distinction between language and dialect, when in fact, it is much more complex.
LEXIS
Both languages and dialects differ in their vocabulary. Languages consist mainly of vocabulary that is understood only by speakers of the same language. Dialects, on the other hand, consist of a large number of words that are familiar to speakers of other dialects of that language, and may also include lexical items restricted to use in that particular variety. Scots is a particularly interesting example of the latter.
A.A.V.E
A.A.V.E does not have a separate vocabulary to other varieties of American English. The level of understanding between A.A.V.E and other varieties of English suggests that A.A.V.E is a dialect of English, as opposed to a separate language.
As well as A.A.V.E sharing English vocabulary, some of its own words have affected the English lexicon. Some examples include Jazz, riff and jam. These words are derived from African American descent, and are present in the English lexicon due to the influence of popular music.
SCOTS
Similarly, Scots shares some lexical items with certain dialects of the North of England, including Newcastle. The fact that Scots shares some lexical items suggests it could be considered as being a dialect of English rather than a language, as speakers of some other varieties of English can understand it without having to learn these words systematically. Some examples include:
- Lass (Girl)
- Bairn (Child)
- Bonny (Beautiful)
(Eagle 2002)
Despite this, some lexical items are restricted to usage only by speakers of Scots. For example,
- Airt (Direction) Fash (Brother)
- Ay (Always) High-heid yin (Boss)
- Dominie (Teacher) Kirk (Church)
- Dreich (Dreary) Pinkie (Little finger)
- Cludgie (Toilet)
(Eagle 2002)
Many of the lexical items restricted to Scots are not at all similar to the English equivalent. In informal Scots speech, therefore, an outsider listening in to a conversation would probably find it quite difficult to understand much of what the speakers are saying. Similarly to learning different languages, the lexis would need to be learned in order to be able to understand it. The distinctiveness of the Scots lexicon, therefore, throws doubt on to whether or not it is actually a dialect or a separate language. After all, the description suggests if you can’t understand it, it is a different language. What happens when you can understand some, but not all of the lexis? This question refers back to being able to compare dialects on a continuum. In this case, it cannot be identified as one or the other, but as something in between.
GRAMMAR
A.A.V.E
A.A.V.E possesses some very distinctive grammatical features. It shares the same basic grammar as Standard American English; the differences are (in the most part) attempts to simplify this grammar. This simplification may have been necessary when A.A.V.E was created as a pidgin language to make it easier for speakers from various West African languages to understand.
Some of the most prominent grammatical features (Fromkin et al 2003: 460-61) are outlined below:
-
Loss of inflectional morphemes. For example, loss of the third person singular ~s suffix (She run vs. She runs). This also results in the absence of the ~s possessive ending e.g. John hat vs. John’s hat.
-
Verbs often used without standard endings. E.g. He been married vs. he has been married.
As described by Fromkin et al (2003: 460-61),
‘Morphological differences which are due to regularisation are among the most… diagnostic structures in American English’
This suggests that divergence from the basic grammar of a language is typical in many varieties, and therefore can be classed as a dialect. Such differences do not affect the ability of others to understand A.A.V.E enough to class it as a separate language.
SCOTS
A distinctive feature of Scot’s grammar is the pronoun variants:
- Thae (Those) Mines (Mine) Yous (You plural)
- Thir (These) They (These)
(Eagle 2002)
Although different from Standard English pronouns (bracketed), they are still intelligible to speakers of other varieties of English. Yous is a particularly interesting feature of Scots, in that this pronoun has different singular and plural forms. In the majority of other varieties of English, the pronoun you takes the same singular and plural form. The Scots yous, however, is gradually coming into more frequent use in Northern dialects of British English.
Scots does, however, have distinctive verb forms that are not in use (or at least, in common use) in other varieties of English:
- Gae (Go) Gaed (Went) Gone (Gone)
- Hing (Hang) Hang (Hanged) Hingin (Hung)
(Eagle 2002)
Speakers of Standard English may have difficulties understanding the above. Again, as with the lexical differences, it throws into question the level of understanding. Speakers of Cockney English may have much lower level of understanding of Scots grammar than those living in the north of England. Therefore, those living further south may be inclined to call Scots a separate language based on the criteria of mutual intelligibility. Northerners, however, may consider it a dialect.
CONCLUSION
Overall, although it appears adequate on a simplistic level, I do not think that the description provides a comprehensive enough distinction between language and dialect.
Firstly, it does not take into account the fact that languages and dialects can be displayed on a continuum. It assumes that variations are either languages or dialects and nothing in between, this is not the case, as illustrated above. It also only takes into account the linguistic factors. This is a problem because it is difficult to distinguish language and dialect on these alone. Other factors such as politics and geography should also be considered.
Finally, if the criterion of mutual intelligibility were enough to be able to distinguish language and dialect, there probably would not be so many studies into the differences between the two.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Crystal, David. 2002. The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. Cambridge University Press. Variation in Scotland , 328.
Eagle, Andy. June 2002. An introduction to modern Scots. [From <>] [Accessed November 2003].
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman, Nina Hyams. Thomson: Heinle. 7th ed 2002. (ed. Stephen Dalphin, Amanda Robinson, Lianne Ames). An introduction to language, African American Vernacular English, 460-61.
McLucas, Bryan. 2003. African American Vernacular English. [From <>] [Accessed November 2003].
