Language in Change

Question 1. How important do you think it is to have a standard form

English?
Having a standard language can bring a lot of benefits, and it follows the
idea of prescriptivism. A standard language can give uniformity, if everyone
uses language the same way it can help to make communication easier
between people. Some features that help to create a standard language is
that anyone will be able to speak it, no matter where they live. So if English
was made standard it would advance communication because every word
would have a set meaning. Also if a language was made standard there
would be no variations in spelling or grammar, all books, schools, dictionaries
and media would be promoting the same use of language. The results of
everybody using a standard form would help to set an academic stand, for
example having one standard set would make business matters or legal
matters more clear, because if people are unable to express their views
through the use of language their views might just get lost. So once again a
universal accepted standard will help to advance the academic side. If a
language was made standard it would help to stop confusion. We only have
to look back to England, before the time English was being made Standard, it
would have been extremely difficult to communicate and have the ability to
interact with everybody especially if their standard of English was different to
the standard of English you were using. Thats why from the time of Alfred
the Great we can see language becoming more standard. So by having one
set standard of English it will stop the confusion that was present when
everybody had their own standard.
Question 2. How has Australian English developed? What differences occur
across the states and what do you think has caused these individual nuances
in accent or lexical formations? Providing examples identify what types of
change these represent?
Australian English is just another variety of the English language, and has
become the first language of majority of the people within Australia.
Australian English began to diverge from British English after the founding of
the colony of NSW. During 1788 it was recognized as being a different from
British English. Australian English arose from the vast variety of distinct
dialectal regions of the British Isles, many convicts were sent from all over
England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland brought there dialects with them. Also
during the 1850s many people migrated from around the world to come for
the gold rush, so the Australian English came from a type of standardization
between all the dialect and accents. There are some variety between the
states of Australia, for example there are slight dialects of English between
South Australia, Western Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland

and Tasmania, and these difference appear in vocabulary and phonology. The
main regional differences come down to the word usage, for example Victoria
say pusher, Western Australia say pusher and the rest of Australia says
stroller. Another example is in Victoria we use rubbish and rubbish truck, but
in NSW garbage and garbage truck are preferred. There is also some
difference in how vowels are pronounced, for example in SA the a in words
like dance, plant and answer more like a in father, whereas the rest of
Australia pronounce the a more like the a in mad. So the English spoken
within Australia vary greatly from the English spoken in other English
speaking countries like Britain or the USA, however the English used also
slightly difference between the states of Australia.