Attitudes towards change

This chapter discusses language worriers, those who fear that English is declining. It considers why such worries arise, and clarifies the notion of a ‘standard language’.

‘The language the world is crying out to learn is diseased in its own country,’ raged a letter-writer to a newspaper. Language worriers pop up repeatedly, fearful for the health of English. These linguachondriacs – language hypochondriacs – often claim that they are defending a language which is collapsing into ruin.

But English is not crumbling away, it is expanding. It is spoken in almost every country in the world, and more speakers are added annually.

So what is the problem? This chapter will consider first, why language worries arise. Second, it will try to clarify the notion of a ‘standard language’.

[]() A tradition of worry

Language worriers have always existed. ‘Tongues, like governments, have a natural tendency to degeneration,’ said Samuel Johnson, in the preface to his famous dictionary of the English language, first published in 1755. He at first hoped to halt this presumed decline. But by the time he had completed []()his work, he realized that ‘to enchain syllables’ was as pointless as trying ‘to lash the wind’.

Eighteenth-century worries were perhaps understandable. At that time, English was in a fairly fluid state, and was thought by many to need stabilizing. This anxiety about English coincided with admiration for Latin, which appeared to be fixed.

But who exactly should say what was, and what was not, good English? A number of church dignitaries thought they knew. In 1762, Robert Lowth, Bishop of London, complained that English ‘hath made no advances in Grammatical accuracy’ over the last 200 years, criticizing even ‘our best Authors’ as ‘guilty of palpable error in point of Grammar’. He himself tried to remedy this, by writing a grammar of English. Unfortunately, his prescriptions were based partly on Latin, partly on his own personal preferences. For example, he noted that a preposition at the end of sentences was something which ‘our language is strongly inclined to’, but claimed that it was ‘more graceful’ to avoid this – even though he himself did not always follow his own advice!

Lowth therefore was one of a long line of well-meaning but ignorant worriers who invented strange personal ‘rules’ for language, several of which became fossilized in school grammar books.

[]() Progress and decay fallacies

In the nineteenth century, pride in the British Empire led to a mistaken belief that the English language was superior to others. But views differed as to why.

According to one view, English had progressed further than other languages, which remained primitive. ‘What shall we say of the Fuegians, whose language is an inarticulate clucking? … Of the wild Veddahs of Ceylon, who have gutturals and grimaces instead of language?’ asked a prominent churchman, Dean Farrar, in 1865.

According to another view, God had once created all human []()languages equal, but some had slithered down from their former excellence. ‘Fearful indeed is the impress of degradation which is stamped on the language of the savage,’ ranted an influential archbishop of Dublin, Richard Chenevix Trench, condemning in particular a language which had supposedly lost its word for ‘supreme Divine Being’.

[]()Insight

This second view was more pernicious. It promoted three bizarre, wrong ideas: that language and morals are intertwined, that languages can disintegrate, and that constant vigilance is needed to prevent linguistic collapse.

Just as a lost nail is assumed to lead to a lost horseshoe, then a lost horse, then a lost rider, so generations of youngsters have been led to believe that they need to pay attention to linguistic details in order to preserve their language – even though such concern is pointless. Language behaves like a thermostat, and maintains its own patterns (Chapter 13).

[]() Proper behaviour

Further worries surfaced in the nineteenth century. The inhabitants of England – and also some parts of the USA – were convinced that a ‘proper way’ to behave existed. Etiquette books were published with firm precepts on day-to-day life, such as: ‘Don’t drink from your saucer,’ ‘Don’t wear diamonds in the morning,’ ‘Don’t conduct correspondence on postal-cards.’

Language was assumed to be part of this ‘proper behaviour’. A mish-mash of prohibitions was promoted: ‘Don’t say gents for gentlemen, nor pants for pantaloons. These are inexcusable vulgarisms,’ ‘Don’t use a plural pronoun when a singular is called for. “Every passenger must show their ticket” illustrates a prevalent error,’ ‘Don’t say “It is him”, say “It is he”,’ and so on.

A widespread illusion prevailed, that []()something called ‘correct’ English existed, and that this was in some way linked even to morals:

_Speech is a gift of God, … and the habit of speaking correct English … next to good morals, is one of the best things in the world_

Proclaimed a nineteenth-century manual used by schools.

Exactly what this ‘correct English’ consisted of was unclear. Those who believed in its existence tended to provide miscellaneous prohibitions against things you should not, in their opinion, say, as illustrated above.

[]() Standard English

In the twentieth century, a belief in ‘proper English’ persisted, linked to the notion of a ‘standard language’.

The word ‘standard’ is ambiguous. Sometimes, it means a value which has to be met, as when people talk about ‘keeping up standards’, or ‘reaching the required standard’. At other times, it refers to common practice, as in ‘the standard way to make tea is as follows …’.

[]()Insight

Often, these two meanings have been confused, as when a mid-nineteenth-century writer claimed that ‘the common standard dialect is that in which all marks of a particular place of birth and residence are lost’.

In practice, standard English was commonly assumed to be the language of Oxford, so-called ‘Oxford English’, and the big public schools. It therefore came to be thought of as ‘educated English’. Henry Wyld, in 1907, noted that ‘Standard English … is spoken by people of corresponding education and cultivation []()all over the country.’

As Henry Wyld pointed out, standard English refers primarily to written grammatical forms. These vary little from one area to another, even though speakers may differ in pronunciation and vocabulary. Standard English has never been an accent, and people with a Scottish, Welsh or Yorkshire accent are all likely to be using the same ‘standard English’.

‘Standard English’ is often thought of as British English. Yet these days, English has spread around the world. So it is more accurate to speak of standard British English, standard American English, standard Indian English, standard Singapore English, and so on. Each of these has developed its own agreed grammatical forms. In Indian English, for example, the word enjoy need not be followed by a noun. An ice-cream seller is likely to say: ‘Please enjoy’ to someone who buys one. But in both British and American English, it is more normal to say: ‘I hope you enjoy it.’

[]() Non-standard English

Of course, many people speak English that is not standard. A huge amount of attention – and anger – arose when so-called ‘Ebonics’, a type of black English, was accepted as usable in some California Schools. Amidst the furore, many lost sight of a few straightforward facts.

First, Ebonics is not a new language, it is just an unfashionable variety of English. Second, Ebonics is not in any way defective, just because it is not standard American English. Linguistically, nothing is wrong with it; its problems are social. Some features of it are more regular than the standard language. For example, the verb to be has been neatened up, and runs I be, you be, he be, we be, they be. Third, the most notable feature of Ebonics is its vocabulary – though this is recognizably English, as feel froggy ‘want to fight’, knock boots ‘have sex’. Fourth, confidence in using one variety of []()English – Ebonics – is likely to lead to a desire to become familiar with other varieties, including perhaps, more fashionable ones.

The overall message is that all varieties of English are equally ‘good’ in that they are full languages, not defective or damaged ones. But they are not all equally useful or appropriate. Ebonics may be fine for chatting with mates in California. But it might be a disadvantage in London, where people could find it hard to understand, just as speakers with a strong Cockney accent might find it difficult to make themselves understood in California.

[]()Insight

Ideally, all speakers would be familiar with a variety of accents and dialects so that they could fit in anywhere, just as globe-trotters anywhere need to be equipped with a quiverful of different languages.

[]()[]()THINGS TO REMEMBER

• []()In the eighteenth century, anxiety about English led to a desire to fix it permanently.

• []()The desire to fix English was based on admiration for Latin, which was wrongly assumed to have a fixed and permanent form.

• []()A long line of ignorant though well-meaning pedants, such as Bishop Lowth, tried to write grammars which they hoped would ‘fix’ the form of English.

• []()Lowth and others believed – wrongly–that language and morals are intertwined, that languages may disintegrate, and that constant vigilance is needed to prevent linguistic collapse.

• []()In the nineteenth century, a belief in ‘proper behaviour’ was prevalent, as seen by the number of etiquette books that were published. These included instructions about table manners, clothing, and day-to-day life, as well as precepts about language.

• []()In the twentieth century, the notion of proper language was linked to the idea of a standard language.

• []()The word ‘standard’ is ambiguous, in that sometimes it means ‘a value to be preserved’, while at other times it means ‘common practice’.

• []()All varieties of English are equally good, though they may not all be equally appropriate on a particular occasion.