1. Sociolinguistics: what do sociolinguists study?

2. Bilingualism and second language learning.

3. Patterns and Mechanisms in Bilingual Language Development:
 Childhood bilingualism
 Adult bilingualism
4. Native language influence and dominance.
5. Communicative competence: speech event, speech community, diversity,
appropriateness.
6. Correctness and purism
7. The Appropriateness Model of linguistic variation
8. Standard variety.
9. Spoken and written language.
10.Multilingualism.

Main reference book:

Berns, M. (2010) Concise encyclopedia of applied linguistics. Elsevier Ltd. PP. 411-
433

Additional reference books:

Беликов, В. И. Социолингвистика : учебник для бакалавриата и магистратуры /

В. И. Беликов, Л. П. Крысин. — 2-е изд., перераб. и доп. — Москва :
Издательство Юрайт, 2017. — 337 с.
Holmes, J. (2013) An Introduction to sociolinguistics. London and New York:
Routledge
Practical assignment:
Get ready for a discussion concerning a bilingual/multilinguial situation in a chosen
country (Canada, Belgium, Switzerland, South Africa, Singapore etc)

1) Sociolinguistics is the descriptive study of the effect of any and all aspects of society, including
cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the way language is used, and society's effect on
language. It differs from sociology of language, which focuses on the effect of language on society.
Sociolinguistics overlaps considerably with pragmatics and is closely related to linguistic
anthropology.
“Sociolinguists study the relationship between language and society. They are interested in
explaining why we speak differently in different social contexts, and they are concerned with
identifying the social functions of language and the ways it is used to convey social meaning.

2)
Bilingualism and Second Language Learning
Key ConceptsBefore discussing language development among bilin-guals, it is crucial to give an
overview of key funda-mental concepts concerning language development inchildren and adults.
Also, it should be mentioned thatthe term ‘second language learning’ is used in a widersense to
include the learning of any additional lan-guage during a period ranging from childhood
toadulthood. An additional language may be a lan-guage of the country or spoken outside the
country(i.e. foreign language).Acquisition vs. LearningA child’s process of learning languages is
differentfrom an adult’s process. A child can learn any lan-guage relatively effortlessly, while the
same taskbecomes rather challenging for adults. For this rea-son, some second language
researchers (Krashen,1985) distinguish between two types of mechanismsin language
development: a subconscious processresulting in tacit knowledge of the language
(i.e.,‘language acquisition’), and a more conscious process(i.e., ‘language learning’). While children
go throughthe former process, adults undergo the latter in theirquest to become bilingual.The
Critical Period Hypothesis and ItsBiological BasisIn addition to degree of effort, it has been
frequentlyobserved that even very proficient bilinguals fall shortof being perfect bilinguals. In spite
of the completemastery of syntax, their speech is marked by traces ofthe first language accent.
Similarly, it is also shownthat in spite of considerable effort and motivation, theultimate
attainment of some grammatical structuresby adults is seldom achieved. To explain these
andother differences in language acquisition and recoveryfrom aphasia Lenneberg (1967)
proposed the ‘‘criticalperiod hypothesis,’’ which is sensitive to age. Thishypothesis claims that
there is a period in the matura-tion of human organism, lasting from two years topuberty, in
which nearly effortless and completelanguage acquisition is possible. Afterwards,
thishypothesis notes, language learning requires moreeffort and motivation, largely because
of a loss ofbrain plasticity resulting in the completion of thelateralization of the language
function in the lefthemisphere. Recent research claims have additionallyshown that there are
different critical periods fordifferent grammatical structures of language. Sincethe accent
(phonetics and phonology) of a secondlanguage is the most difficult to attain, the
criticalperiod for phonetics and phonology (approximatelyfrom five to seven years) is earlier
than that formorphology and syntax. See Johnson and Newport(1991) and Bhatia and Ritchie
(1999) for details.Access to Universal Grammar (UG)Children are born to acquire human
languages. Re-gardless of gender, race, ethnicity, or nationality,every normal child is capable
at birth of acquiringany human language. In theoretical studies followingfrom the Chomskyan
mentalistic framework, this in-nate ability is termed the access to universal grammar(UG). In this
case, a child has full access to universalgrammar, whereas an adult has either limited or noaccess.
These and other universal principles of gram-matical structures and principles of learning
largelylead a child’s language development. The role of pa-rental input then becomes to trigger an
appropriatevalue for innately given or set parameters, specific tothe language to which the child is
exposed. One suchparameter, called the ‘head parameter,’ describes413
how a child does not have to even learn the specificword order of his/her language, but only
has tochoose between already specified values – head-initial or head-final – based on the
nature of theinput language. Children begin to learn to set para-metric values even from the
one-word stage.A Japanese child learns to choose the head-final sys-tem, whereas an English-
speaking child chooses thehead-initial value. These principles are generally refer-eed to as a
child’s language acquisition device (LAD).Input and Learning Environment: Natural vs.Unnatural
SettingsUsually children become bilinguals or multilingual ina natural way. A normal child can
become a fluentbilingual by the age of five, for instance, without anyformal training. In the
process of acquiring a lan-guage, the role of input (motherese, etc.) or imitationis important
but limited. Children do not learn alanguage by mindlessly imitating the input providedby
mothers or caretakers. That is, while the role ofparental input cannot be ruled out, language
acquisi-tion studies show that neither motherese nor imita-tion plays a significant role in a
child’s languagedevelopment. Instead, this burden is carried by thechild himself/herself.
Research on child-language ac-quisition reveals that the child learns the language byusing the ‘rule
formulation strategy.’ For instance, anEnglish-speaking child learns on his/her own that bythe
addition of the inflection ‘-ed’ to a verbal stem,one generates the corresponding past tense form
ofthe verb. In this process, the child over-generalizesand produces utterances such as ‘I go-ed’
[go-PAST].Even after being corrected [i.e. provided negativeevidence] by the mother or
caretaker that the childmeant ‘I went’ [go.PAST], the child still does notreject the rule s/he
has formulated in his or her mindand which s/he still produces in utterances such as ‘Iwent-ed’
[go.PAST-PAST]. The role of the adult isthus to prevent the child’s grammar from overgener-
alization. In other words, the child has an innatecapacity to acquire languages in an
environmentwhich is termed a ‘natural’ environment, whereas,by contrast, adults and school-
age children learn lan-guage in formal settings such as schools and collegesthrough a formal
instructional method.
Defining and Measuring BilingualismWhat is bilingualism and who is bilingual? Definingand
measuring bilingualism is a very complextask due to the number and types of input
condi-tions, biological, socio-psychological, and othernon-linguistic factors that can lead to
a varyingdegree of bilingual competencies. In short, there isno widely-accepted definition
or measures ofbilinguals.Instead, a rich range of scales, dichotomies, andcategories are
employed to characterize bilinguals. Ifa bilingual can understand but cannot speak a
secondlanguage, such an individual is called a receptivebilingual, whereas a productive
bilingual demon-strates a spoken proficiency in two languages. Ifthe second language is
acquired in a natural settingbefore the age of five that individual is termedan early bilingual,
in contrast with a late bilingualwho learns his second language after the age of fiveeither in
home or in schools. Labels such as fluent vs.non-fluent, functional vs. non-functional,
balancedvs. unbalanced, primary vs. secondary, and partialvs. complete refer, either to a
varying command indifferent types of language proficiency (e.g., spoken,listening, writing, etc.),
or an asymmetrical relation-ship (dominance) between two languages. A com-pound vs.
coordinate bilingual refers to the way twolanguages are processed in the brain. The list is by
nomeans exhaustive. Other major distinctions suchas simultaneous vs. sequential are
discussed in thenext section. Similarly, bilingualism can be viewedfrom individual, societal
(attitudes towards bilingual-ism), and political (i.e., government policies towardbilingualism)
perspectives.In general, a bilingual person demonstrates manycomplex attributes rarely seen in a
monolingual per-son. For that reason, a bilingual is not equivalent totwo monolinguals, but
something entirely different.This working definition of bilingualism is offered byBloomfield (1933),
who claimed that a bilingual isone who has a native-like control of two languages,i.e., a
balanced bilingual (see Grosjean 1982 orEdwards, 2004 for more details).
3)
Patterns and Mechanisms in BilinglualLanguage DevelopmentProviding either a natural
environment or inputs inmonolingual/dominant language speech communitiesis not a challenging
task. The same is also true forthose societies where social and political systems areconducive to
bilingualism. For instance, in India,where bilingualism is viewed as natural, approvedby
society, and further nurtured by government lan-guage policies, linguistic groups and communities
donot need to take any special measures to assure thattheir children receive input from two
languages. Insharp contrast, in societies where bilingualism is notvalued or where the language of
a minority is distinct,it becomes imperative for families to plan meaningfulstrategies to ensure the
smooth exposure to the familylanguage. One such strategy that families employ in414Bilingualism
and Second Language Learning
this second setting, described by Bhatia and Ritchie(1999) as ‘‘discourse allocation,’’ restricts the
use ofone language to one social agent or social setting andthe other language to other social
situations. Thevarious manifestations of such strategies are the fol-lowing: (a) one-parent/one-
language (e.g., the child’smother speaks one language and, the child’s fatherspeaks the other.
This strategy was employed byLeopold (1939–1949) in his classic study of bilinguallanguage
development of his daughter, Hildegard;(b) one-place/one-language (e.g. speaking one lan-
guage in the kitchen and the other elsewhere); (c) alanguage/time approach; and (d) a topic-
related ap-proach. Although the discourse allocation approachis better than providing no input
and thus raising amonolingual child, it leads to different patterns inbilingual language
development than developing bi-lingualism in a natural setting. For instance, duringthe early
stages of Hildegard’s bilingualism, she de-veloped a rule that fathers speak German
andmothers speak in English.Childhood BilingualismOther factors such as age and amount of
exposure tothe two languages also result in differences in thepattern of childhood
bilingualism. The distinctionbetween simultaneous and sequential bilinguals inresearch on
bilingual language acquisition is basedon age and the degree of exposure to two
languages.When the child is exposed to two languages to moreor less the same degree from birth
onward, the pat-tern of language development is referred to as simul-taneous, whereas
sequential bilingualism describesthe attainment of one language first and the secondlanguage
later, preferably before the age of seven.Similarly, the term late bilingual is used for
thosesequential bilinguals who acquire their second lan-guage at a relatively younger age than
adults learninga second language. Although there is unanimousagreement among researchers
about the validity ofthe simultaneous and sequential bilinguals, there isno consensus among
scholars about the exact line ofdemarcation between the two. See McLaughlin(1984) and De
Houwer (1995) for either theoreticalor methodological grounds.One of the most intriguing aspects
of the childhoodbilingualism is how children learn to separate the twolanguages, particularly in a
natural setting (i.e., asimultaneous bilingual) in initial stages. After all,when parents provide
input, they do not tag orprime their input with a language identificationlabel. Even if
parents go to the absurd length ofidentifying the language of each word or sentencethey
use, these labels are semantically empty forchildren. Furthermore, bilingual parents
unwittinglymake the task of separating the two languages evenharder for children because of their
normal tendencyto mix two languages. In short, a child is providedwith three distinct types of
linguistic inputs: two lan-guages, each in an unmixed/pure form, and one witha mixture of two
languages. Given this state of affairs,how does the child learn to separate the two lan-guages
in question? This task is not challenging fora monolingual child because only one language
servesas a source of input. The two hypotheses which at-tempt to shed light on this question are
the unitarysystem hypothesis and the dual system hypothesis.According the unitary system
hypothesis (Volterraand Taeschner, 1978), the child undergoes threestages before s/he is able
to separate two input lan-guages. During the first two stages, the child experi-ences confusion.
During the first stage, s/he is unableto distinguish the two lexicons and grammars of thelinguistic
systems. At this stage, they have a singlelexicon made up of items drawn from the lexiconsof
both languages. Hence, no translational equiva-lents or synonyms are found in their
vocabulary.Volterra and Taeschner claim that their two bilingualsubjects at the ages of 1 year 10
months and 1 year6 months had a hybrid list of 137 words with notranslational equivalents.
During the second stage,the child slowly learns to separate the two lexicons,but is still unable
to separate the grammatical sys-tems. Cross-linguistic synonyms emerge, but the childapplies
the same set of syntactic rules to both lan-guages. It is only during the third stage that the
childbecomes capable of separating the two sets of voca-bularies and grammars. Findings of
recent researchreveal that the unitary system hypothesis cannot sus-tain the scrutiny of the
succeeding research and theevidence motivating the three stages of bilingual lan-guage
development is full of shortcomings and con-tradictions both on methodological and
empiricalgrounds.The dual system hypothesis states that bilingualchildren, based on their
access to Universal Grammarand language specific parameter setting, have thecapacity of
separating the two grammars and lexicalsystems right from the beginning. A wide variety ofcross-
linguistic studies (e.g., different input condi-tions – one parent/one language and mixed
inputcondition; and different word order types) lends sup-port to this hypothesis. For instance,
in a studydevoted to the language development of a Hindi-English bilingual child, it is clear
that at age 2, thechild is capable of developing two distinct lexiconsusing a syllabification strategy.
At the age of 1 year 7months, two different word orders develop – SVO[subject-verb-object]
for English and SOV for Hindi.Bilingualism and Second Language Learning415
For a more detailed treatment of the shortcomings ofthe unitary system hypothesis and the
strengths of thedual system hypothesis, see Bhatia and Ritchie 1999:591–614.Another fascinating
feature of bilingual speech isthat, not only are bilinguals capable of keeping thetwo
linguistic systems separate, but they often mixthem either within a sentence or inter-
sententially.This behavior is often termed ‘code-mixing’ or ‘code-switching’ in sociolinguistic
literature. Dependingupon the theoretical and empirical objectives of theirresearch, some
researchers do not distinguishbetween the two terms and use them interchangeably;for those
researchers who distinguish between thetwo, the code-mixing refers to intra-sentential
mixingwhile the term code-switching refers to the intersen-tential mixing in bilinguals. Both
bilingual childrenas well as adults show this behavior. What explainsthis behavior of language
mixing? Earlier researchattempted to explain it in terms of the language defi-ciency hypothesis:
it was claimed that bilinguals ingeneral and children in particular have language gaps.As claimed
by the unitary system hypothesis the lackof synonyms compels them to mix the two
lexicalsystems during stage I. Similarly, stage II yields themixing of two language systems due to
confusion. Inother words, the lack of proficiency in either onelanguage (i.e., the absence of
balanced bilingualism)or both languages (i.e., semi-bilingualism) leads tomixing.The language
augmentation hypothesis is capableof offering deeper insights into the bilingual mixingbehavior.
As it has been shown earlier in the discus-sion of the dual system hypothesis, children do not
gothrough the initial stages of treating the two linguisticsystems as if they were one system,
but begin todistinguish them immediately. The consideration ofoptimization leads bilinguals to
mix language with anaim to get maximum mileage from the two linguisticsystems at their disposal.
An analogy drawn from thebeverage industry further explains this point. Theseparation of
juices (e.g., apple vs. orange juice) ren-ders two distinct tastes. However, if one mixes thetwo
juices, the result is a new taste, a distinct from thetwo pure juices. The same is true of
bilingual lan-guage mixing. Research on the linguistic and socio-linguistic motivations for
language mixing both inchildren and adults shows that such considerationsas semantic
domains and semantic complexity (anitem less complex or salient in one language),
stylisticeffects, clarification, elaboration, relief strategy (i.e.,a linguistic item is temporarily
unavailable in onelanguage), interlocutor’s identification, discoursestrategies of
participants/topics, addressee’s perceivedlinguistic capability and speaker’s own
linguisticability, and other complex socio-psychological rea-sons, such as attitudes, societal
values, and personali-ty, prompt bilinguals to mix two languages. The listof motivations is by no
means exhaustive (see Bhatiaand Ritchie, 1996, for more details).Adult Bilingualism: Second
Language LearningIn contrast to sequential childhood bilingualism,adults who learn a second
language after they havelearned their mother tongue experience the learningof a second
language as a laborious and conscioustask. As pointed out earlier, unlike children who areable
to universally and uniformly acquire native com-petency in their mother tongue, adults rarely
achievenative-like competency in their second language.Depending on the level of their
motivation and hardwork, adults can learn a second language with vary-ing degrees of
competence. However, there comes apoint during the second language learning that eventhe
most talented learner cannot bypass the stage of‘fossilization.’ This stage is marked with second
lan-guage errors which no amount of training can cor-rect. For these reasons, second language
(L2) learningis viewed as fundamentally different from first lan-guage (L1) acquisition. The
hypothesis which aims ataccounting for these differences between the childand the adult
language is termed the fundamentaldifference hypothesis.In spite of the asymmetrical relation
between L1and L2 learning, one should not draw a conclusionthat there is nothing in common
between the two.What is common between L1 and L2 learners is thatboth undergo stages of
language development. Inother words, like L1 learners, in the process of gram-mar construction,
L2 learners undergo stages ofdevelopment: the intermediate stages of grammardevelopment
between the initial stage and the ulti-mate stage are termed interlanguage grammars. Takethe
case of the development of negation in EnglishL1 and L2 learners. The grammar of negation
inL2 learners of English shows the same stages ofdevelopment as in L1 English learners –
Stage I: thesentence-initial placement of negation; Stage II: pre-verbal placement of negation with
no auxiliary verb;and Stage III: preverbal placement of negation withan appropriate auxiliary verb
4)
Native Language Influence and DominanceAn important way in which L2 learning is differentfrom
L1 learning is the influence of the mother tongueon second-language learning. The mother tongue
orL1 plays an important role in the process of L2 acqui-sition. Research on grammatical errors of
L2 showsthat L2 learners transfer the grammatical rules –phonetic, phonological,
morphological, and syntactic416Bilingualism and Second Language Learning
rules – of L1 to their second language. An English-speaking learner of Hindi has difficulties in
hearingand producing a four-way contrast between Hindiaspiration and voicing contrast (i.e.,
unvoiced unas-pirates, unvoiced aspirates, voiced unaspirates, andvoiced aspirates).It would be
a gross simplification to claim that L2learners transfer all grammatical features of L1 to L2.Adult
learners possess a relatively higher level of logi-cal and cognitive ability than do children;
therefore,these qualities color their second language learning.For instance, English-speaking
learners of Hindi willnot translatethere in these sentences:1. There is a chair in the room2. The
chair is over therein an identical way (i.e. by choosing the remote loca-tive adverb in both cases).
Similarly, it would be anoversimplification to claim that childhood bilingual-ism is free from the
dominance relationship betweenthe two languages. Not only does the mother tongueinfluence
second language acquisition in children, italso affects their school achievement.
5)
Communicative CompetenceT M Lillis, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UKß2006 Elsevier Ltd.
All rights reserved.The phrase ‘communicative competence’ was intro-duced by the North
American linguist and an-thropologist, Dell Hymes, in the late 1960s(Hymes, 1962/1968,
1971). He used it to reflectthe following key positions on knowledge and useof
language:.The ability to use a language well involves knowing(either explicitly or implicitly) how to
use languageappropriately in any given context..The ability to speak and understand language is
notbased solely on grammatical knowledge..What counts as appropriate language
variesaccording to context and may involve a range ofmodes – for example, speaking, writing,
singing,whistling, drumming..Learning what counts as appropriate languageoccurs through a
process of socialization into par-ticular ways of using language through participa-tion in particular
communities.Hymes’s juxtaposition of the word ‘communica-tive’ with ‘competence’ stood in
sharp contrast atthe time with Noam Chomsky’s influential use ofthe term ‘linguistic
competence,’ which Chomskyused to refer to a native speaker’s implicit knowledgeof the
grammatical rules governing her/his language(Chomsky, 1957, 1965). Such knowledge,
Chomskyargued, enables speakers to create new and grammat-ically correct sentences and
accounts for the fact thatspeakers are able to recognize grammatically incor-rect as well as correct
sentences such as, in EnglishShe book the read, or in Spanishplaza yo a la voy(‘square I am going
to’). While accepting the impor-tance of grammatical knowledge, Hymes arguedthat in order
to communicate effectively, speakershad to know not only what was
grammaticallycorrect/incorrect, but what was communicativelyappropriate in any given context.
A speaker thereforemust possess more than just grammatical knowledge;for example, a
multilingual speaker in a multilingualcontext knows which language to use in which con-text and
users of a language where there are bothformal and informal forms of address know when
touse which, such asvous(formal) andtu(informal) inFrench. Hymes famously stated that a child
who pro-duced language without due regard for the socialcontext would be a monster (1974b:
75).The emphasis that Hymes placed on appropriate-ness according to context, in his use of
the termcompetence, challenged Chomsky’s view about whatexactly counts as knowledge of a
language – knowl-edge of conventions of use in addition to knowledge ofgrammatical rules. In
addition, and more fundamen-tally, Hymes problematized the dichotomy advancedby Chomsky
between ‘competence’ and ‘performance’and the related claim about what the study of linguis-
tics proper should be. Chomsky’s interest was in theuniversal psycholinguistics of language, the
humancapacity for generating the syntactic rules of lan-guage. His interest in knowledge,
captured in hisuse of ‘competence,’ was therefore at an ideal orabstract level rather than
in any actual knowledgethat any one speaker or group of speakers might pos-sess. For Chomsky,
the focus of linguistics as a disci-pline should be on understanding and describing thegeneral and
abstract principles that make the humancapacity for language possible. In contrast, ‘perfor-
mance’ or actual utterances – that is, what peopleactually say and hear with all the errors,
false starts,unfinished sentences – could add little to an under-standing of the principles
underlying language useand was therefore not deemed to be a relevant focusof linguistic
study.Hymes acknowledged the value of the moreabstract and idealized approach that
Chomsky advo-cated, not least because such a universalistic ap-proach challenged any
theories of language based ongenetic differences or notions of racial hierarchy(Hymes, 1971:
4). However, he argued that therewere other important dimensions to the study of lan-guage
that should not be so readily excluded fromlinguistics as a scientific field. Hymes’s own
interestin language was in large part driven by a concern forlanguage questions arising in real life
contexts, suchas why children from economically advantaged anddisadvantaged social
backgrounds differ in the lan-guage they use. Chomsky’s and Hymes’s differentaims for
developing language theory are nowheremore clearly evident than in Hymes’s comment
onChomksy’s (1965: 3) now famous statement, onthe purpose of linguistic theory: ‘‘Linguistic
theory isconcerned primarily with an ideal speaker-listener, ina completely homogenous speech-
community, whoknows its language perfectly....’’ Hymes (1971: 4) com-ments: ‘‘The theoretical
notion of the ideal speaker-listener is unilluminating from the standpoint
ofthechildrenweseektounderstandandtohelp.’’Hymes was highly critical of a theory that ex-
plicitly set out to ignore the impact of social con-text on how language is used and
hence thecompetence/performance dichotomy set up byChomsky (echoing in some
ways thelangueand420
paroledistinction made by Saussure, 1916). At aspecific level, his key reasons for challenging
such adichotomy can be summarized as follows (based onHymes, 1962/1968; 1971; 1974b):.The
dichotomy itself is problematic. It presupposesthat knowledge can be understood without refer-
ence to use, yet analyzing actual use of language iskey to exploring underlying principles for such
use.Hymes argued that ‘‘performance data’’ should beconsidered a legitimate focus for
linguistic studyboth in its own right and as data that reflectsknowledge underlying any
performance..The dichotomy is built on a series of abstrac-tions: ideal speaker-listener,
homogenous speech-community, perfect knowledge of language..Chomsky’s notion of speaker-
listener does notacknowledge or account for the differences in re-ception competence and
production competenceevident in many contexts, as in children fromsome social
backgrounds understanding formalschool language yet not producing it..What counts as
knowledge of language is reducedto only one aspect of knowledge, namely grammat-ical
knowledge, when there are clearly otheraspects to knowledge of language that are impor-
tant, such as when to use which language, or vari-eties of languages, and in which contexts..Within
an approach that focuses on compe-tence as idealized knowledge, it is the abstract sys-tem
of language that becomes the focus rather thanspeakers’/groups of speakers’ use of
language..Given the focus on knowledge as a set of abstractrules underlying use, actual use is
relegated to onlya marginal position in the scientific study of lan-guage.Hymes (1972a: 282) offers
communicative compe-tence as a more general and superordinate term toencompass the
language capabilities of the individualthat include both knowledge and use: ‘‘competence
isdependent upon both (tacit) knowledge and (abilityfor) use.’’While Hymes argued against the
foundationaldichotomy between competence and performanceproposed by Chomsky, he
was not dismissingthe value of the distinction entirely. Hymes refers tocommunicative
competence as ‘‘abilities in a broadsense’’ of how to use language, whereas performanceis
always a specific use of language that reflects someof that competence (2003: 321). Thus any
specificperformance may partially reflect the nature ofthe conventions governing an
individual or a com-munity’s knowledge of language. In setting up aframework for
developing an adequate theory oflanguage, Hymes argued that both what is
known(competence) and what is actually done (perfor-mance) must be taken into account.
Such a frame-work involves exploring and accounting for thefollowing:1. Whether (and to
what degree) something isformally possible2. Whether (and to what degree) something
isfeasible3. Whether (and to what degree) something isappropriate4. Whether (and to
what degree) something is infact done, actually performed (Hymes 1972a:284–
286).Questions 3 and 4 are central to the socially orientedapproach to the study of language
advocated by Hymes.In contrast to Chomsky and his claim to linguistics asa subfield of psychology
and philosophy, Hymes seeksto claim a space for the study of language within‘‘a science of
social man’’ (Hymes, 1971: 6).

Speech Event This is a category (after Jakobson, 1960) that reflectsthe idea that all interaction is
embedded in sociocul-tural contexts and is governed by conventionsemerging from those
contexts. Examples of speechevents are interviews, buying and selling goods in ashop, sermons,
lectures, and informal conversation.The speech event involves a number of core compo-nents
identified by Hymes, which are signaled in hismnemonic device SPEAKING. [SeeTable 1].
Speech Community While the term speech community was not coined byHymes (the most
notable earlier use being that ofBloomfield, 1933), Hymes’s elaboration of the termcertainly
contributed to its prominence in sociolin-guistic approaches to the study of language.The
acquisition of communicative competencetakes place within speech communities: speech com-
munities are constituted not just by a shared varietyor language, but shared sets of norms and
conven-tions about how those varieties can and should beused. Through everyday interaction
with others in aspeech community, a child learns how to use languageappropriately, that is,
according to the norms ofany given speech community. Some events inevitablyinvolve people
from different speech communities,which may create tensions: as in for example
schoolclassrooms where participants share a common lan-guage but may not be members of the
same speechcommunity (Hymes, 1972c).
Diversity Acknowledgement of diversity and variety between andacross language use, in
communities and individuals, is a basic position in Hymes’s work and is a central tenetin
sociolinguistics. Such diversity manifests itself incountless ways: the very existence of language
varieties,both as languages and varieties within languages; therange of conventions governing the
use of such varietiesin different contexts (such differences have been docu-mented in relation,
notably, to social class, ethnic group,gender); the different values attached to particularusages
(for example, the values attached in differentcommunities to such phenomena as silence,
eloquence,and interruptions).Privileging diversity as a universal of languageshifts the emphasis
away from any differential statusattached to varieties, or the notion that differencesignals
deficiency in any way. All varieties are seenas equally valid, although some are acknowledged tobe
more appropriate in particular contexts.
Appropriateness This is a key presupposition to the notion of commu-nicative competence and is a
central notion in socio-linguistics. As discussed, communicative competencepresupposes the
following; that a language user’sknowledge – competence – is more than just gram-mar-based;
that knowledge of language requiresknowledge of the appropriate social
conventionsgoverning what and how something can be said, towhom and in what contexts.
Appropriateness thusinvolves both linguistic and cultural knowledge(Hymes, 1971:
14).Within sociolinguistics, a focus on appropriatenessof language use is said to indicate a
descriptive(how language is used) rather than a prescriptive (howlanguage should be used)
approach to languagediversity.
6)
Definitions: Correctness and PurismThe common assumption that school constitutesone
sociolinguistic domain – a domain usually domi-nated by the standard variety of a language –
istoo simplistic. School consists of various communi-cative situations, e.g., playtimes,
conversations be-tween teacher and pupil outside the classroom,teacher–teacher
communication. On the other hand,language education in the sense of the explicit teach-ing of
language takes place almost exclusively in theclassroom. In this context, the point of reference
fordetermining whether linguistic usage is ‘correct’ ornot is usually, but not always, a
standard variety.In societies where there is a standardized prestigevariety this nearly always
has a privileged positionin the classroom, i.e., it is the variety which is notonly used as the
medium of teaching, but is also anobject of teaching: in Britain or the United States,for
instance, in classes devoted to English, it is thenorms of Standard English which are transmitted
topupils, and the texts discussed in these classes aremainly in Standard English. Deviations
(real or per-ceived) from this pattern tend to be seized uponby certain sectors of society and
presented in a nega-tive light, for example in the media (cf. Cameron,1995: 101).Purism is
rooted in the notion that languages orlinguistic varieties are entities which are
clearlydemarcated from each other and consist of closedsets of linguistic items, so that
elements that do not‘belong’ to that variety and which might ‘contami-nate’ it or make it
‘impure’ are easily identified andcan be avoided. Purism is often, but not always, di-rected at
words or linguistic features of foreign origin(cf. Trask, 1999: 254). It can, however, also be di-
rected against elements which are not foreign, but arenevertheless seen as undesirable; for
example, puristsmay try to remove regional dialectal features from astandard variety or may try to
discourage the use ofinnovations, such asaggravatewith the meaning‘annoy’ (appealing to
etymology, they would arguethataggravateshould only be used in the sense of‘to make
worse’). Another target of their activitiesmay be words or constructions from specialist regis-
ters when used outside those registers, e.g. in Germantechnical registers, mass nouns such
asDruck(‘pres-sure’) can form plurals, whereas this has tradition-ally not been the case in
non-technical language.A tendency for this construction to spread to generalregisters has often
been the subject of negative com-ments, e.g., in newspaper glosses. Purism is often asso-ciated
with the codification, cultivation, and planningof standard languages, but this doesn’t mean
thatpurism is never directed at non-standard varieties.In German-speaking Switzerland, for
example, wherethe local dialects enjoy a high level of prestige, butwhere attitudes towards
Swiss Standard German arerather ambivalent, purists have been known to attackstandard features
borrowed into the local dialects.Purism is a strategy employed to achieve a varietyof ends.
Sometimes foreign words are rejected be-cause it is claimed that they are not
comprehensibleto all and could exclude sections of the populationfrom certain discourses; at
other times they arerejected solely because of their foreignness, whichmay be seen as
detrimental to the ‘character’ ofa particular nation as reflected in its language (cf.Townson,
1992: 80–110).As was said above, purism is very much linked tothe cultivation of a standard
variety. One of the thingsthat lends prestige to a standard variety is the beliefthat it can fulfill any
function demanded of it by itsspeakers. If it is perceived as being able to fulfillcertain
functions only by ‘borrowing’ elements fromother varieties, then this detracts from its
status.Another important role ascribed to a standard varietyis that it is supraregional and has a
wide com-municative radius: many nonstandard words or con-structions are perceived as
being restricted incommunicative radius and it is therefore felt thatthey must not be
allowed into the standard variety.In reality, it is often the case that the lack of intelligi-bility of
nonstandard variants is socially constructedand not rooted in any objective linguistic
distancebetween those variants and the standard variety.There are various instances of
speakers of very similarvarieties claiming that they could not understand eachother, with speakers
of the more prestigious varietiesusually more likely to claim not to understand othervarieties
thanvice versa(e.g., Wolff, 1959: 35–39).As we have already said, language education inthe
classroom is closely linked with standard vari-eties, so the link with correctness and purism
isclear. Deborah Cameron makes it explicit when sheclaims – for Britain – that ‘‘one of the
functions thatconservatives allot to grammar teaching specificallyis the preservation of a ‘pure’
and unified standardEnglish variety whose purity is continually threatenedjust because it is not
native to most speakers ofEnglish’’ (Cameron, 1995: 110). That this is notrestricted to
Britain is clear when Steven Pinker, aCanadian based in the United States, lists English427
teachers amongst what he calls ‘‘the legislators of‘correct English’ ’’ (Pinker, 1994: 372), and
RosinaLippi-Green writes, ‘‘The primary educational goalin our schools brings together the
acquisition ofliteracy with acceptance and acknowledgement of aStandard U.S. English’’ (Lippi-
Green, 1997: 104).
7)
The Appropriateness Model ofLinguistic VariationCorrectness and purism come into play not only
inrelation to particular individual linguistic features(e.g.ain’tvs.haven’t,less itemsvs.fewer items)
butalso in relation to the use of different varieties indifferent situations or for different
speech acts, e.g.,for writing an essay or for making an oral presenta-tion. There are people who
believe that variation isa problemper se, since speakers of nonstandard vari-eties will always be
liable to making interferencemistakes when they acquire the standard variety, es-pecially in
speech. In the view of these people, theonly way to acquire a ‘correct’ or ‘pure’ form of
thestandard (which is, of course, seen as an eminentlydesirable thing) is to eliminate the
nonstandard vari-eties. In the 1970s, this was argued for Germany andit has often been argued
with reference to minoritylanguages in order to promote the learning of themajority language
(the demise of the Celtic languageshas often been encouraged for this reason). A morecommon
view today, especially amongst academiclinguists, is that varieties of a language differ
fromeach other and are therefore not all equally appropri-ate for the same purposes and
situations. This model,known as the appropriateness model, is based on thedifference theory of
linguistic variation. The differencetheory (unlike the deficit theory) assumes the function-al
equivalence of all varieties of a language, whilstaccepting that they are differently evaluated
by society.This model seems to offer teachers a way ofresponding more positively to the
variation they inev-itably come across every day since they don’t haveto pass absolute
judgments of correctness or incorrect-ness on their pupils’ usage. They can now say, ‘‘Youcan say
that at home, but not in the classroom’’ ratherthan saying, ‘‘Don’t say that, it’s wrong.’’ The differ-
ence theory and the appropriateness model have cer-tainly had an effect on policy makers in
variouscountries, e.g. in Germany and Britain. The CoxReport (1989) on the teaching of English
in primaryschools in England and Wales, commissioned by theConservative government of the
time, made the pointthat Standard English should not be confused with‘proper,’ ‘good,’ or
‘correct’ English. This reflects theview that other varieties of English may be seen asbetter or
more proper (i.e., more appropriate) in somesituations than Standard English; the status of
thelatter is relativized: ‘‘The combination of the status ofStandard English as a social dialect
and its use forparticular purposes...poses the most sensitive pro-blems for teachers. They have
the responsibility toteach its use for those particular purposes, while beingsensitive to its impact
on personal and social identity’’(DES, 1989: 14–15). Whilst not saying that the stan-dard variety of
English is better than other varieties,the Cox Report still puts a great deal of emphasis onStandard
English (written and spoken), and on therequirement that it be used in a range of
situations.Although the appropriateness model is popularwith academic linguists, it does not
appeal to allpolicy makers, especially those of a conservativebent, since it implies that there
are no absolute valuesand standards of correctness. Another tenet of aca-demic linguistics – that
all varieties are rule governed,even if those rules are not codified or promoted byinstitutions such
as the media or schools – is highlysuspect to some policy makers since it takes awaythe
notion of an external authority and makes itmore difficult to apply uniform rules of
‘correctness’(cf. Cameron, 1995: 97–98). There is a great deal ofresistance to the fact that
nonstandard varieties havea ‘grammar,’ although it is rarely written down. Thissituation is not
helped by the fact that there is a dearthof systematic descriptions of nonstandard varietiesof
English. It is not easy, for instance, for a teacherin the United States to find out that, in Black
EnglishVernacular (BEV), invariantbeis not simply theequivalent of inflectedbein Standard U.S.
English,but has a more specific distribution; e.g.,He bebusy right nowdoes mean the same
thing asHe is busyright now, but Standard U.S. EnglishHe is busy all thetimecan only be rendered
asHe busy all the timein BEV (with zero copula, but not with invariantbe).Of course, the
resistance to pluralism in the linguisticsphere is often accompanied by a resistance to plural-ism in
other fields, and the former is often the butt ofparticularly fierce criticism because it is seen as
notonly reflecting but positively encouraging culturaland ideological fragmentation.Despite
some opposition over the years, propo-nents of the appropriateness model seem to
havebeen quite successful in influencing school curricula.For example, in Germany (where each
federal state isresponsible for its own curriculum), most curricularefer to the fact that pupils
should be taught to usedifferent varieties of German in an ‘appropriate’ fash-ion (cf. Davies,
2000a; Davies, 2000b; Davies, 2001).Richard Hudson also points out that the
NationalCurriculum for English in England and Wales acceptsthe importance of oracy, as well as
literacy. Further-more, references to ‘genre’ in the curriculum reflect428Correctness and Purism
an acceptance that many varieties exist and are‘valid.’ (cf. ‘Relevent Websites’). In Wales,
whereWelsh, which is spoken by about 20% of the popula-tion, is compulsory in schools up to the
age of 16,stress is put on the use of appropriate registers;e.g., different forms are required
when creating ascript for a drama and when writing an official letter(Robat Powell, Head of
National Foundation forEducational Research Welsh Unit, personal corre-spondence).While
the appropriateness model has been widelyaccepted by policy makers, calls by academic
linguistsfor a critical approach to the domain distribution ofdifferent varieties and the social
evaluation underpin-ning it have not found the same echo. The traditionaldistribution of
standard and nonstandard varietiesacross public and private domains or formal andinformal
ones, has, on the whole, been accepted rath-er than challenged within that model, with the
resultthat the dominant position of the standard variety hashardly been affected. Research in
Germany (Davies,2000b) has shown that neither teachers nor the curri-cula show any enthusiasm
for extending the permit-ted domains of nonstandard varieties. In theory atleast, the
privileged status of the standard languagein the classroom is not questioned by the
practitionersany more than by the theorists.In Britain and the United States, there have oftenbeen
perceptions that teachers are trying to replaceStandard English with nonstandard varieties, or
arenot concerned enough about correctness. The Britishheir apparent, Prince Charles, is one
member of thepublic who worries about the state of language edu-cation in British schools: ‘‘All
the letters sent from myoffice I have to correct myself, and that is becauseEnglish is taught so
bloody badly [...]. The way schoolsare operating is not right. I do not believe English isbeing taught
properly’’ (quoted in Cameron, 1995:94). In California, when the Oakland School Boardresolved
in 1996 that language education should re-spect and take into account the vernacular of most ofits
pupils, namely Ebonics (another name for BEV),there was an extremely hostile reaction from the
gen-eral public, but this was fueled by the misleadingreports in the media that the schools in
this districtwere intending to teach Ebonics and/or use it as themedium of instruction (information
about this issuecan be seen at the web site of the Linguistic Societyof America). In reality, when
nonstandard varietiesare allowed into the classroom, it is usually inorder to create a bridge
between the home or thepeer group and the classroom. The ultimate aim formost teachers is
the expansion of the linguistic rangeof their pupils through the acquisition of the standardvariety.
This is reflected in the resolution of theLinguistic Society of America on the
Oakland‘Ebonics’ issue: ‘‘There is evidence from Sweden, theUnited States, and other countries
that speakers ofother varieties can be aided in their learning of thestandard variety by
pedagogical approaches whichrecognize the legitimacy of the other varieties of alanguage.’’
8)
What is a Standard Variety?So far we have used the term ‘standard variety’as though it were
so well known that it needed nodefinition; however, if the curricula use the standardvariety as
their point of reference then teachers haveto know exactly what the standard variety is, and
thismay not be as self-evident as one would assume, evenfor a language where a standard
prestige variety hasbeen recognized for many centuries, e.g., English inBritain. Some standard
varieties are highly codified:for example, the national variety of German usedin Germany has a
whole range of reference works inwhich speakers can look up rules for ‘correct’ use ofphonology,
orthography, grammar, and lexis. Theseworks are produced by commercial publishers (thebest
known is Duden-Verlag, based in Mannheim)rather than by a state institution (like, for
example,theO ̈sterreichische Wo ̈rterbuchin Austria), but arestill perceived by many users as
officially binding.Indeed, up until the spelling reform a few years ago,theDuden
Rechtschreibung(the orthography dictio-nary) did have the authority of the education minis-tries
of all the federal states behind it. The variousnational varieties of English are not codified to
thisdegree and the norms are more in the nature of con-ventions that have emerged in practice
rather thancodified rules (cf. Durrell, 1999: 290). In the UnitedStates, there are competing
perceptions of whatconstitutes spoken Standard U.S. English and whereit is to be found (cf.
Hartley and Preston, 1999).Speakers from Michigan and California seem to beespecially sure
that the varieties they use representpure, Standard U.S. English, even when there
arenonstandard features in these varieties (as judged bythe informants themselves) (Fought,
2002; Niedzielskiand Preston, 1999). It is sometimes claimed that ‘net-work American’ is Standard
U.S. English: this is a main-stream accent, based on the leveled dialects of thenorthern
Midwest, with the most marked local featuresbeing avoided (Milroy and Milroy, 1999: 150–
151).When it comes to British English there seems tobe agreement amongst linguists that it is
quite diffi-cult to describe the rules of Standard English unlessone restricts oneself to the written
realization only.It is accepted that the spoken variety cannot be stan-dardized to the same degree,
and that even speakersCorrectness and Purism429
who avoid the use of locally or regionally markednonstandard grammar and vocabulary will
nearlyalways still have a regional accent (cf. Milroy andMilroy, 1999: 18–19). It is clear from
the precedingthat academic linguists conceive of Standard Englishas being realized in a spoken
and written form,although policy makers (or even norm makers) fre-quently fail to draw such a
distinction (cf. Lippi-Green, 1997: 107) and often see differences fromwriting as deviations
from a written norm ratherthan judging them on their own terms.A problem for teachers is that
the curricula whichthey are expected to follow often give no clear guid-ance as to what is to be
taught under the guise ofStandard English, German, Welsh, etc. For teachersof Welsh in Wales
the situation is as follows: there are‘‘no instructions or guidelines concerning the gram-matical and
syntactic forms to be used, except for abook of terms where there are lists of ‘technical’words
classed according to subject...Every typeof Welsh is accepted at present’’ (Derec
Stockley,Examinations Officer of the Welsh Joint EducationCommittee, which sets exams in
Welsh as well asother subjects, quoted in Jones, 1998: 282). Thelack of explicit guidelines in
the curriculum is perhapsnot such a problem in a country such as Germanywhere there is a
codex (although the fact that a codexexists does not necessarily mean that the teachersare
familiar with its content; cf. Davies, 2000b); inthis case it is, however, potentially problematic
thatthe codex almost exclusively contains the rules for aformal register of German (Durrell, 1999:
302–303)and makes few concessions to spoken usages, eventhose common amongst
educated speakers in formalsituations (Ja ̈ger, 1980: 376).Even if the curricula of teacher training
colleges areto accept that their trainees need to acquire knowl-edge of the systematic differences
between the non-standard varieties which the majority of their pupilswill speak and the standard
variety, the informationis often simply not available, or is not particularlyuseful. As we saw
above, not all language commu-nities possess full descriptions of their written andspoken
standard varieties, but the problem is evenmore acute for nonstandard varieties, and there is
apressing need for more research in order to have up-to-date and detailed descriptions of
nonstandard fea-tures at all levels of language. Jenny Cheshire (1982:53) found that teachers of
English who lacked aware-ness of the systematic differences between StandardEnglish and the
nonstandard dialect of their pupilstended to mark inconsistently, thereby confusing thepupils. In
Germany, between 1977 and 1981, arange of books presenting contrastive analyses
ofStandard German and regional nonstandard dialectswas published (Dialekt-Hochsprache
kontrastiv),aimed at teachers to help them to teach StandardGerman to their pupils.
Unfortunately, these wereof limited use since the analyses were based on acomparison
between formal Standard German andtraditional dialect, whereas most of the
children,especially in urban areas, spoke an intermediateform at home (cf. Barbour, 1987).The
lack of detailed descriptions of different lin-guistic varieties is also a problem in the United
States,where standardized language tests are often used tohelp determine the kind of
education most appro-priate to a child encountering problems at school(Milroy and Milroy,
1999: 143). If the correctnessof a child’s answer is measured solely against oneStandard
English form and if every deviation fromthat form is marked as wrong, regardless of whetherit
is part of the child’s vernacular or not, then theresults are going to be badly skewed and
unhelpful,and may well lead to underestimation of the child’sreal level of linguistic skills. An
example is the con-trast between /f/ and /y/(fin/thin). Not all dialects ofEnglish have minimal pairs
based on this distinction,so a child who speaks one of those dialects is morelikely to filter out the
auditory information s/he needsin order to perceive the contrast than is a child whosedialect
makes a phonemic contrast between the twosounds. This is comparable to a native speaker
ofStandard British English who has to practice hearingthe difference betweenwurdeandwu ̈rdein
Germansince his/her dialect doesn’t have front roundedvowels. In the United States, speakers
of nonstandardvarieties score very much lower on language teststhan do speakers of the
standard variety, suggestingthat there is a bias in the test material and that testsdo not always
allow a clear distinction to be madebetween children who have underdeveloped languageskills
and those who may not have mastered the stan-dard variety, but who are perfectly fluent in
theirvernacular (Milroy and Milroy, 1999: 143)

9) Spoken and Written LanguageAs we saw above, there is often a tendency to equatethe standard
variety of a language with the formalwritten registers of that language. This may make ateacher’s
life easier to some extent, since the writtenrealization of the standard variety is normally rela-
tively fixed and invariant, and this provides an au-thoritative norm against which to measure a
child’sperformance. However, if we measure children’s oralperformances against the norms of
written languagethey are always going to be found wanting, even thosewho come from homes
where a standard-like varietyis spoken. Even these children have to learn the rules430Correctness
and Purism
of written Standard English or French or German,etc.; they cannot simply write as they
speak sinceno variety of speech is exactly the same as writtenlanguage. Teachers need to be
able to differentiatebetween errors in written work that are due to inter-ference from regional
nonstandard dialects and thosethat are due to interference from informal colloquialvarieties. This
is not an easy task: not only is it thecase, as we have already seen, that spoken StandardEnglish is
not easy to define, but, as Cheshire pointsout, ‘‘the grammatical structure of spoken
Englishgenerally is far from being well understood’’(Cheshire, 1999: 129). The syntax of
spoken lan-guage is very different from that of writing, and con-structions that appear to be
redundant or ill formedaccording to the norms of writing play importantroles in structuring
spoken discourse.One reason why children need to learn to distin-guish between the
requirements of speech and writingis that the latter, since it is relatively context free,cannot
tolerate as much ambiguity or vagueness asthe former. Uniformity is also useful in writing sinceit
helps to ensure that the text will be understood overa wide area and by a wide range of people.
The samedegree of explicitness is not necessary in speech, al-though teachers often act as if it
were, e.g., by askingchildren to answer in full sentences, when this is quiteunusual in normal
interaction. In highly literate socie-ties like the United States, Britain, or Germany theretends to
be an assumption that clear and effectivecommunication can only take place in a
standardvariety, and then in its most formal realization (usu-ally the realization closest to writing).
People oftenfind it difficult to accept that clear and effective com-munication can take place in a
nonstandard variety,and it is clear that, in certain situations or with certaininterlocutors,
communication will not be as effectivein a nonstandard variety since the listeners will beso
distracted by the nonprestigious form that theymay not pay the necessary attention to the
content ofthe message. However, this is related to social valuejudgments and is not inherently
a property of the non-standard varieties themselves; e.g., not pronouncingorthographichin
words likehatmay be seen as incor-rect and judged negatively in certain (influential) sectorsof
British society, but the same phenomenon in Spanishis part of the standard norm
(haber,honor,etc.)
10)
MultilingualismAnother major issue that is connected with correct-ness and/or purism is the role
of languages other thanthe dominant or official national or state languagesin the classroom. In
Britain, for example, about 10%of schoolchildren speak English as an additionallanguage (EAL).
Many of these children were bornin Britain or have been living here for a long time. Theprevailing
trend is to teach them in mainstream class-rooms. Even those children who have recently
movedto Britain are taught in mainstream classrooms, butthey also receive some support from
specialist EALteachers. In recent years there has been increasingdiscussion about the
necessity of integrating immi-grants to Britain, and the role of language education(i.e., learning
English) in this process has been hotlydebated, although as yet there is no need to pass alanguage
test before being able to obtain British citi-zenship. There is some pressure for classrooms
tobecome spaces in which only English may be spoken,since there is a perception that English
is not usedenough in other, more private domains (seeFigure 1).A similar movement has been
obvious in the UnitedStates for some years: the U.S. English organizationwants to outlaw the
use of languages other thanEnglish in public domains. Superficially, such move-ments seem to
have something in common withschools devoted to the maintenance or revitalizationof
minority or endangered languages; for example,in Welsh-medium schools in Wales and in
French-medium schools where French is the minority lan-guage (e.g., in the Canadian
province of Ontario)great efforts are made to try to ensure that onlyWelsh or French is
spoken at school. Whether thestrategy is necessary in the case of English, the domi-nant
language in Britain and the United States, isdebatable.Studies of code-switching in the
classroom havethrown a great deal of light on the hierarchical rela-tions between different
languages in multilingualsocieties. In some societies, e.g., Malta, code-switchingbetween English
and Maltese is officially encouragedand is common in most classrooms, although theexact
distribution of the languages will depend agreat deal on the individual teacher (cf.
CamilleriGrima, 2001). However, since there are far moreteaching materials available in
English than in Mal-tese, the already high status of English in Maltesesociety is reinforced in
the classroom, and Maltesetends to be used for less prestigious activities, such asto create an
informal atmosphere or to create warmth(Camilleri Grima, 2001). In Botswana, the
officialpolicy is that all education from the last few years ofprimary schooling onwards is to be in
the postcolo-nial language, English, rather then the indigenouslanguage Setswana (Tswana).
Teachers occasionallyswitch between the two languages, but for pupils theonly legitimate
language is English (Arthur, 2001). InBritish classrooms, bilingual teaching assistants
aresometimes employed in the early years of primaryeducation to help minority-language
students becomeCorrectness and Purism431
integrated into school life; however, these assistantsare rarely drawn into the main action of the
class-room, but left on the margins while the main actiontakes place monolingually in English
(Martin-Jonesand Saxena, 2001).

5)
Communicative Competence.The phrase ‘communicative competence’ was intro-duced by the
North American linguist and anthropologist, Dell Hymes, in the late 1960s(Hymes,
1962/1968, 1971). He used it to reflect the following key positions on knowledge and use
of language: 1)The ability to use a language well involves knowing how to use language
appropriately in any given context.2)The ability to speak and understand language is not based
only on grammatical knowledge. Fnomen counts as appropriate language varies according
to context and may involve a range of modes – for example, speaking, writing, singing. Learning
what counts as appropriate language occurs through a process of socialization into par-ticular
ways of using language through participation in particular communities.

Hymes’s juxtaposition of the word ‘communica-tive’ with ‘competence’ stood in sharp

contrast atthe time with Noam Chomsky’s influential use ofthe term ‘linguistic competence,’
which Chomskyused to refer to a native speaker’s implicit knowledgeof the grammatical rules
governing her/his language(Chomsky, 1957, 1965). Such knowledge, Chomskyargued, enables
speakers to create new and grammat-ically correct sentences and accounts for the fact
thatspeakers are able to recognize grammatically incor-rect as well as correct sentences such as, in
EnglishShe book the read, or in Spanishplaza yo a la voy(‘square I am going to’). While accepting
the impor-tance of grammatical knowledge, Hymes arguedthat in order to communicate
effectively, speakershad to know not only what was grammaticallycorrect/incorrect, but
what was communicativelyappropriate in any given context. A speaker thereforemust possess
more than just grammatical knowledge;for example, a multilingual speaker in a
multilingualcontext knows which language to use in which con-text and users of a language
where there are bothformal and informal forms of address know when touse which, such
asvous(formal) andtu(informal) inFrench. Hymes famously stated that a child who pro-duced
language without due regard for the socialcontext would be a monster (1974b: 75).The
emphasis that Hymes placed on appropriate-ness according to context, in his use of the
termcompetence, challenged Chomsky’s view about whatexactly counts as knowledge of a
language – knowl-edge of conventions of use in addition to knowledge ofgrammatical rules. In
addition, and more fundamen-tally, Hymes problematized the dichotomy advancedby Chomsky
between ‘competence’ and ‘performance’and the related claim about what the study of linguis-
tics proper should be. Chomsky’s interest was in theuniversal psycholinguistics of language, the
humancapacity for generating the syntactic rules of lan-guage. His interest in knowledge,
captured in hisuse of ‘competence,’ was therefore at an ideal orabstract level rather than
in any actual knowledgethat any one speaker or group of speakers might pos-sess. For Chomsky,
the focus of linguistics as a disci-pline should be on understanding and describing thegeneral and
abstract principles that make the humancapacity for language possible. In contrast, ‘perfor-
mance’ or actual utterances – that is, what peopleactually say and hear with all the errors,
false starts,unfinished sentences – could add little to an under-standing of the principles
underlying language useand was therefore not deemed to be a relevant focusof linguistic
study.Hymes acknowledged the value of the moreabstract and idealized approach that
Chomsky advo-cated, not least because such a universalistic ap-proach challenged any
theories of language based ongenetic differences or notions of racial hierarchy(Hymes, 1971:
4). However, he argued that therewere other important dimensions to the study of lan-guage
that should not be so readily excluded fromlinguistics as a scientific field. Hymes’s own
interestin language was in large part driven by a concern forlanguage questions arising in real life
contexts, suchas why children from economically advantaged anddisadvantaged social
backgrounds differ in the lan-guage they use. Chomsky’s and Hymes’s differentaims for
developing language theory are nowheremore clearly evident than in Hymes’s comment
onChomksy’s (1965: 3) now famous statement, onthe purpose of linguistic theory: ‘‘Linguistic
theory isconcerned primarily with an ideal speaker-listener, ina completely homogenous speech-
community, whoknows its language perfectly....’’ Hymes (1971: 4) com-ments: ‘‘The theoretical
notion of the ideal speaker-listener is unilluminating from the standpoint
ofthechildrenweseektounderstandandtohelp.