Acts of Identity: Creole-Based Approaches to Language and EthnicityWith every speech act all individuals perform, to a greater or less extent, an 'act of identity', revealing through their personal use of language their sense of social and ethnic solidarity or difference. At the same time people also have powerful (if unconscious) stereotypes about the norms and standards of their own language and those of others - often at variance with observable behaviour. The view of language use proposed here derives from the authors' extensive fieldwork in the Creole-speaking Caribbean and among West Indian communities in London, and is forcefully illustrated by the data they present, which include recorded conversations and stories. The authors re-examine such concepts as 'a language', 'correct usage', 'race' and 'ethnic groups' and clearly reveal the complex role of language in establishing relationships within regional and social communities and at the state or national level. |
Contents
Linguistically heterogeneous situations | 5 |
Data and questions to be answered | 13 |
Voyages of exploration and processes of colonization | 23 |
Disputed settlements and their outcome | 35 |
More recent aspects of political and cultural development | 67 |
Sample West Indian texts | 78 |
The grammar questionnaire for Jamaica St Vincent | 83 |
A short Anansi story from St Vincent | 90 |
Some further problems of variable quantification | 148 |
Towards a general theory of the evolution | 158 |
Linear continuum or multidimensional model? | 180 |
The question of linguistic description | 186 |
The universality of contact phenomena of diffusion | 200 |
The place of ethnicity in acts of identity | 207 |
The role of language in relation to concepts of ethnicity | 234 |
250 | |
Common terms and phrases
acts of identity African Anansi Anansi story Bajan Barbadian Barbados Belize City Belizean Benque Viejo Britain British Brother Anansi Brother Tiger Carib Cayo District century Chapter Chinese claimed Cluster coast code-switching colony colour concept Creole English Creole French creole languages cultural Curaçao dialect Dutch example extent factors focussing forms gaan genetic grammar Grenada groups Guatemala Guyana identify immigrant individual informants island Jamaican Creole Labov language linguistic linguistic behaviour linguistic systems London Jamaican Lucia mama Martinique Maya McEntegart meaning Miskito Coast Mixed mother multilingual Negro norms parents Patois phonological pidgin population Portuguese processes pronunciation race racial rules sample Sebba settlements slaves social sociolinguistic Spanish speak speakers spoke Standard English stereotypes Table Tabouret-Keller taiga talk trade Trinidad University usage variables variety verb vernacular Vincent vowel West Indian words