Attitudes to different accents of English in African communities in the UK and Germany, SOAS
Channel: SOAS University of London
Date: 2015-03-09

http://www.soas.ac.uk/linguistics/
This Linguistics seminar titled "Attitudes to different accents of English in African communities in the UK and Germany" was given by Johanna Hartmann at SOAS, University of London on 9th December 2014.

More about this event: http://bit.ly/1MncV6t
This talk concentrates on attitudes towards different varieties of English among Kenyans and Nigerians in the UK and Germany. The ‘inner’ and ‘expanding circles’ (Kachru 1985) of English have received a fair amount of attention in attitude research (e.g. Bayard et al. 2001 on New Zealand, Australia and America, McKenzie 2008 on Japan), whereas only a small number of studies have focussed on attitudes towards varieties of English in countries in the so-called ‘outer circle’ (Kachru 1985) or in diasporic communities with an outer circle background (e.g. Kioko & Muthwii 2003 on Kenya, Mutonya 2009 on Africans in the US). These settings and communities constitute particularly interesting environments for the study of attitudes towards different Englishes as a number of varieties usually interact and compete in highly complex linguistic ecologies. The polycentricity of English becomes particularly pronounced in a globalized diaspora context, where mobile speakers naturally come into contact with a number of Englishes from diverse backgrounds. Blommaert suggests that “a sociolinguistics of globalization is perforce a sociolinguistics of mobility” (2010: 28), and a study of the language attitudes of mobile outer circle speakers can throw light on the sociolinguistic developments in a diverse globalized environment.

Data for the project is collected in Nigerian and Kenyan communities in Germany and the UK. In a questionnaire study, vocal stimuli representing varieties of English from seven countries and two different levels of formality were used. An open-ended questionnaire was distributed to establish first tendencies and to elicit evaluative adjectives for an ensuing rating-scale questionnaire distributed among Kenyans and Nigerians in Germany and the UK. In addition, conversational interviews were conducted to obtain metalinguistic information.

First results show that the respondents judge more than one variety positively and that their evaluations depend on the context. British English is evaluated particularly positively in newscasts, and the respondents’ respective home country varieties are valued fairly highly. In addition, further varieties receive positive evaluations. The analysis shows that the distinction between exo- and endonormativity (Ammon 1989) is not sufficient to describe language attitudes in this globalized context of mobile speakers, and consequently, an expansion of the current terminology is suggested.