Discuss which forms of colonization in different parts of the world influenced the expansion of English.

University Degree Education and Teaching

Introduction

Many years ago, English language consisted of a collection of dialects spoken mainly by monolinguals and only with the shores of a small island. (Cheshire, 1991,p1) However, it spread quickly throughout the world in the last few centuries and became established as the first language, or one of the languages, of many communities outside England. Colonial activity was one of the main reasons which led to the expansion of English in the world.

Thus, in my essay, I would like to discuss which forms of colonization in different parts of the world influenced the expansion of English. I would also discuss how these forms of colonization made the different varieties of English. I would try to compare the similarities and the differences of varieties of English from different forms of colonization. Furthermore, I would give some examples of different varieties of English such as vocabulary differences, pronunciation, including information on dialects to illustrate my points.

Meaning of Colonization.

Colonization was a Europe-wide phenomenon partly motivated by rivalries among European states. It means the establishment of communities of English speakers, sometimes forcibly, who maintained economic and cultural links with England and who positioned themselves in a relation of power with pre-existing inhabitants.(Dick Leith, 2003, P.180) Indeed, there is no single, universal colonial experience. Each colony provided a unique context politically, social and linguistically. A common sequence of events occurred in each colony where English emerged as a main language is original settlement by English speakers, then political incorporation and a nationalist reaction that might have led to independence at the end. (Dick Leith p. 181) Now, I would like to use the three main types of colonization beyond the British Isles to discuss their effect on English

Three main types of colonization and their effects on English

According to Dick Lieth(2003), the first type of English colony is like America or Australia- substantial settlement by first-language speakers of English displaced the precolonial population. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, many English Pilgrims sought for religious freedom, they liked to migrate to North America. Besides, there was a huge plantations developed in South America. As the labour for plantations were supplied by slaves who were transported from Africa, many people came form lowly social positions in England found themselves in a position of power in relation to the original precoloial populations. It attracted a lot of people from lower social status in England to migrate to South America. Therefore, English-speaking colonists in America settled in dense numbers and tended eventually to displace pre-colonial inhabitants.

The English settlement of Australia occurred later than that of America. Penal colonies on the south-east coast of Australia were founded in 1788. Many convicts from London and the south-east of English were freed and become small holders. They gradually distinguish themselves from the precolonial Aboriginal population. (Leith, 2003,p 201) ...

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The second type of colony is sparser colonial settlements maintained the pre-colonial population in subjection and allowed a proportion of them access to learning English as a second or additional language.(Lieth, 2003, p203)

In west Africa there were no substantial settlement by people from the British. They were administered by a small number of British officials. The population remained overwhelmingly African. The precolonial populations were not given any rights as far as the vote and compulsory education were concerned. These economic and political arrangements were justified by appealing to contemporary theories of racial difference. The pre-colonial populations considered to be at a lower stage of cultural and intellectual development than white Europeans. Only a small number of Pre-colonial populations can receive education in English. Thus a larger number using English-based pidgins in addition to the languages they already spoke. In fact, Hong Kong is also under this case of colonization. Thus, I would use the Hong Kong case to discuss its effects on the variety of English in the second part of my essay.

For the third type of colony is pre-colonial population replaced by new labor from elsewhere, principally West Africa. As the slaves trade was very common at that time. Human labour had therefore to be treated as a commodity. In order to avoid the slaves to plot rebellion, many black people of different language background from West Africa were bought and worked in the colonies. Jamaica is an obvious example. (Deith,2003,P208)

The slaves didn’t know what languages the pre-colonial population or the British officers spoke but they had some knowledge of a simplified language used between their mother tongue and the pre-colonial language or English. It resulted in the formation of English pidgins. Therefore, over the generations the African languages they spoke would have been abandoned. Once the English pidgins had been passed on to the children of the slaves, and used by them as a first language, it resulted in the development of creoles.

Linguistic Consequences of different types of colonization

As Wendy Chance points out that one of the linguistic consequences of colonization was the appearance of new varieties of English worldwide. Some of these remain local languages of relatively low social status. Others have become codified, standardized or adopted by newly independent states as an official or main language. Therefore, I would try to discuss how different types of colonization brought the different varieties of English.

For the first type of colonial activity, where Europeans largely displaced the precolonial populations, it might be supposed that in North America or Australia some dialect variation arose from contact with different indigenous languages. (Deith, 2003, P196) However, the influence of the original local languages on English was slight. It usually restricted to the adoption of words relating to the phenomena of new to the Europeans, such as local cultural practices, animals and geographical features. The settlers used English words in new senses to name aspects of their new environment. Creek, for instance, in England generally meant a saltwater inlet; gradually the colonists extended it to mean a freshwater stream. Similarly, bluff traditionally referred to a steep rise of land along the seashore, but in America it came to mean the steep bank of a river. (Dieth, 2003, P200)

Besides, it was rare for phonological or grammatical features of pre-colonial languages to be adopted into English. The main reason is that even the colonists provided the school and translated the bibles or books in their pre-colonial languages, but the native Americans or Australians might be reluctant to have their identities changed in this way.

Although the influence of the pre-colonial languages on English was slight, some internal differentiation still occurred. For example, the different economy of the southern area gradually pulled its culture and speech habits in a different direction from that of the north. So emerged one of the major southern speech. For instance, the English forms of see in the past tense were not leveled. Seed, as in ‘I seed’ is common in the south, whereas seen, as in ‘I seen’ is used in the north. (Deith , P.198)

As the second type of colony was administered by a small number of British officials, the pre-conlonial population treated English as a second or foreign language. Only a small proportion of pre-colonial population can receive English education. Thus, a variation of English called 'Pidgin English' or 'Broken English' occured. For instance, "I'm going" is "I de go", "I wont" is "I no", "what" is "wetin", and those are just a few examples of Pidgin English in Nigerian.

Besides, Hong Kong, being the colony of Britain at that time after the Opium War, Chinese Pidgin English was prevalent as a lingua franca for people of different linguistic backgrounds in Hong Kong. It has been stigmatized as a deteriorated version of English with bad grammar. Its vocabulary is based mainly on English, with a few words of Portuguese, Cantonese and even Hindi origin, but is not a dialect of English, nor is it a version of Chinese. Some of CPE words have acquired a much wider range of interpretation and usage. The verb catchee is such an example. (SHI, D. 1991) However, with the spread of English and the introduction of standard English into the education system, the use of Chinese Pidgin English declined after 1890. (Shi, 1991)

For the third type of colonization, the pre-colonial population replaced by new labor from elsewhere made an immense effect on the development of the English language. It gave rise not only to black English in the United States and the Caribbean, which as been an important influence on the speech of young English speakers worldwide, but also provided the context of language contact which led to the formation of English pidgins. But since pidgin had only been used for very simple kinds of interaction, its vocabulary and grammar would have been limited. So it would have needed extending and adapting. Once it had been passed on to the children of slaves, and used by them as a first language, it would have become a creole. (Leith, 2003, p208-209) An English creole possesses a very different grammar form –at the syntactic level it has more in common with creoles of other languages than with Standard English. It has called an English creole because its vocabulary has been based on that of English. However, creole may be formed from more than one language. Jamaican Creole also has words from Portuguese, Spanish, French, Hindi, Chinese and even Arawak, the language of the precolonial population who had been exterminated by the time English was first spoken in Jamaica. (Dick Leith p. 211) For example, “Malay Language” occurred mostly by inter-islands trading and interactions where people from various ethnic groups, languages and background meet. It was also brought by trading and missionary during Dutch colonization for more than 3 centuries. As a result, the speaking Malay has been creolized with many other European languages influences as well as local languages surroundings.

Thus, in the first kind of colonization, the varieties are mainly on vocabulary but less divergence in terms of their pronunciation and grammar as the settlers could introduce new words to describe the new environment and new features. In the second kind of colonization, English is still the official language because settlers adopt English language for political, economical and social control over the pre-colonial population. In these colonies, the varieties of English are relatively small when compared with the third kind of colonization. In the third kind of colonization, the varieties sometimes become their official language after they have developed their own distinctive phonological, lexical and idiomatic features such as in Jamaica.

Conclusion

In short, there is no argued that colonial activity has constributed a major reason of the rise and spread of the English language over the world. However, due to the colonization, English has emerged to different varieties in different areas of the world in the last few centuries. Varieties have been formed by the contact of English with other languages from the settlers. After the settlers have communicated with those non-English speakers, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation will be varied when those non-English speakers may use their original language to learn English. Therefore, different colonies will have their own characteristics of these varieties.