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What to do with pluricentric languages | ||
Tags: Diglossia | Simultaneous study | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7161 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes  20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 1 of 18 12 March 2013 at 11:48pm | IP Logged |
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I would have posted this in the appropriate logs (i.e. in mine and Team "Divan") but I think that it can be useful for others seeing that many of us have experience with such languages as foreign ones (I'm thinking of English, French, German, Portuguese and Spanish).
As I've been reviewing my knowledge of BCMS/SC (more specifically reviewing "Croatian" and picking up "Serbian"), I've been thinking about the experience of learning a pluricentric language that's backed up by a fair number of resources for outsiders to make sense of the characteristics of each variant. Classes for ESL, SSL (Spanish as a 2nd language) and PSL (Portuguese as a 2nd language) tend to pass off as "standard" either the "New World" variant or the "Old World" one. Independent learners can face a similar choice with courses or reference material meant to develop active use of one variant (e.g. "Pimsleur European Portuguese" vs. "Pimsleur Brazilian Portuguese"). However what I find more interesting yet intellectually demanding is to learn at least two variants, thus allowing users either to focus on one variant or satisfy their curiosity of the variants yet challenge themselves to avoid blatant mixing that natives would find too distracting or "unnatural". There are two points that I'd like to explore a bit. 1) What do other learners of pluricentric languages do when it comes to forms from the standards that aren't what they've intended to focus on? For example do people learning German (or exchange students considering Vienna or Berlin?) often keep in mind that Austrians have the codified Jänner for Germany's Januar ("January")? 2) For BCMS/SC is there a thoughtful comparison of usage for learners that goes beyond this introductory article on Wikipedia or those "differential dictionaries" which present everything as crude lists of distinct lexemes without usage notes? An example of what I'm thinking of is this type of comparison but for BCMS/SC, and not this description which I have read only to find the author resorting to cherry-picking of example sentences (as well as using contrived ones) combined with non-linguistic arguments to justify a thesis. I find it fascinating now to look at BCMS/SC by keeping myself open to at least the Croatian and Serbian standards while taking care not to get used to mixing forms (apart from jokingly or satirically) that occur primarily in one variant, regardless of the degree of formality. For example I seem to be taking the easy way out by convincing myself that one starts a "yes-no" question for "Croatian" by letting li follow the verb but for "Serbian" I am to let the verb follow the initial Da li notwithstanding that the "Croatian" way is grammatical in "Serbian" whereas the "Serbian" way occurs in colloquial "Croatian". In another example it's one thing for me to have it hammered in as a cardinal difference that "bread" is kruh to a Croat but hl(j)eb to a Serb, but it's another (and more enlightening) for me to find out that hljeb is known to Croats as an "expressive" (?) term ('ekspr.' is the abbreviation used) for "bread" in addition to being a literary way to refer to a loaf (i.e hljeb kruha "loaf of bread"). It's a lot more informative than the (half-)truth that hl(j)eb is a (proscribed) Serbianism in opposition to the (prescribed) Croatianism kruh as someone less informed could conclude by looking at one of those differential dictionaries which I've mentioned above. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5267 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 2 of 18 13 March 2013 at 1:33am | IP Logged |
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I am concentrating on Brazilian Portuguese, but I also expose myself to Iberian/African and even Timorese Portuguese. It doesn't take that much more effort to do and it pays off handsomely. I have a Brazilian accent and vocabulary but I can understand the other varieties fairly well. In fact, when I first started out with the language, I was using the Radionovelas (learning by Ear) from the Deutsche Welle African Portuguese service. The first book I read in the language was by a Mozambican author.
When I lived in Liverpool, England, my girlfriend used to rent apartments to foreigners with a contract in the local school system. I remember in particular a Frenchman who, apparently, had never been exposed to an American accent. I don't know how he dealt with broad Scouse! He did understand RP. I used to have to put on my best RP (comical for an American) just to talk to him. Another experience that influenced me was when I first visited Spain. My Spanish was learned from Cubans, Puerto Ricans and Mexicans. It took me a few days to get used to the Madrid accent and speed. People understood me but I was having some difficulty understanding them. I understood more after a few days. Still, I made up my mind then and there to never let that happen again. Imagine how you would feel if you couldn't understand Spaniards, or Argentinians well, yet could speak and understand Spanish with no problems with Mexicans. Exposure usually helps with this problem. There are some different phrasings, slang and vocabulary. (I use "guagua" for "autobús" even outside the Caribbean. I say "jugo" for juice in Spain instead of "zumo". I think it adds a bit of charm. In Spain they sometimes ask me if I've lived in the Canary Islands.) I am glad I made an effort to understand Iberian Spanish better. Spanish culture has enriched my life significantly. I listen to RNE several times a week. I love Spanish films and music yet I still listen to salsa, merengue, ranchero and tango. I listen to the news in Iberian/African Portuguese nearly everyday in addition to my emphasis on the Brazilian variety. I also read plenty in the other dialect. Just as I can't imagine knowing Spanish and ignoring Spain, I couldn't learn Portuguese and ignore Portugal, Angola and Mozambique. Imagine only being familiar with Iberian Portuguese. You'd be forsaking 200 million speakers of Portuguese. It just takes a little bit more effort to become familiar with the other varieties. Being familiar doesn't mean that you have to be idiomatically, slang fluent. It just means being familiar with the most common usage. The Northeast of Brazil is different from São Paulo which differs from Carioca (Rio) and Gaúcho (Rio Grande do Sul). I'll never be able to master all of the varieties. It's enough to be familiar with them so I don't get thrown for a loop if I happen to visit the region or meet someone from one of those locales somewhere. If I ever learn French, I would want to do the same. In addition to Metropolitan French, I would want to be familiar with the language as spoken in Quebec. How could I ignore 7 million French-speakers who live in my hemisphere! Obviously, the Caribbean is important, because I live here. I wouldn't want to ignore African French either. It's fine to concentrate on just one variety of a pluri-centric language, but why limit yourself solely to one. With a little effort you could become at least familiar with other varieties, familiar enough to understand most of it. Once your Spanish is at a high enough level, do yourself a favor. Make an effort to become familiar with other varieties of Spanish. I think you'll be glad that you did. I know I am. Edited by iguanamon on 13 March 2013 at 2:14am 7 persons have voted this message useful | |
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4712 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 3 of 18 13 March 2013 at 10:29am | IP Logged |
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I use the variant I have the most exposure to but learn to understand the other variants
as needed. That is to say, I speak German and use Northern-German influenced expressions because that's closest to where I live and what I am likely to hear, but I want to understand Bavarianisms to talk to German friends. I similarly speak French with some Belgianisms but have to understand standard French, Swiss French and even québécois to an extent. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Majka Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic kofoholici.wordpress Joined 4662 days ago 307 posts - 755 votes Speaks: Czech*, German, English Studies: French Studies: Russian | Message 4 of 18 13 March 2013 at 11:22am | IP Logged |
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Almost all the German I have learned, I learned in school. This should mean that I speak "Hochdeutsch from Germany" - this is what has been taught.
When I started to use German as my "work" language, nothing much changed in my knowledge of grammar. But all my vocabulary shifted to the Austrian variant because this was what all the native speaker used. I wasn't even aware how much it was. It needed one meeting where I was lumped with all the "Austrians" for me to register it. I got curious and went through a dictionary which listed the regional variants. According to it, I am firmly in the "Austrian" camp. Of course I understand German from Northern Germany and perhaps even most of the dialects without problems, but for me, January is "Jänner" and not "Januar" and mincemeat is "Faschiertes" and not "Hackfleisch". In English: I am currently slightly shifting back to UK-English I was taught. But the problem is that I see the US-variant more often. I noticed that my spelling is sometimes a mix of both. When learning nowadays, I am trying for the "nearest" broad variant. This means European Spanish. The rest will get sorted with regular exposure. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6708 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 5 of 18 13 March 2013 at 11:23am | IP Logged |
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I have simply decided that I don't care. My goal is to be understood (and this includes not making hilarious or indecent or utterly confusing mistakes), but I don't aspire to becoming indistinguishable from a native speaker of any one variant of any language - except maybe Danish, and that's because I live here.
As I usually say, my English, Portuguese and Spanish reside somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, but probably with more elements from the European varieties because I travel more here in Europa than overseas. With English I really don't know, because here the main influency is all the English I hear through TV and internet podcasts/videos, and that's certainly a mixed bag. When I'm travelling I tend to adapt to the variants I hear around me. For instance I have just returned from Madeira, and there it was of course the European Portuguese I heard. If I had visited Brazil instead I would have drifted towards the Brazilian variant with its long vowals (Copöcaböööööööööna). In Scotland ah wis tendin a wee bit tae spake wih a Scots accent, but I tried not to make it too obvious because some locals might think I tried to make fun of them - which certainly would have been undeserved given how much I enjoy listening to their pronunciation of English. But once I'm back home I slip back into the usual bland mexture of all available variants. Edited by Iversen on 13 March 2013 at 11:25am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4673 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 6 of 18 13 March 2013 at 8:40pm | IP Logged |
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For Croatian/Serbian, the best ''intermediary'' variant would be Bosnian, be it the Bosnian language, or Serbian as used in Bosnia and Herzegovina, or Croatian as used in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Watch AlJazeera Balkans: http://balkans.aljazeera.com/
The best thing would be choose one variant and stick with it. While no Norwegian would correct your Norwegian if you spoke 100% Nynorsk, some people in Portugal might correct your Brazilian Portuguese and some Spaniards might correct your Latin American Spanish...The differences are not big, but are big enough to ''annoy'' some people. That's why books of Paulo Coelho are adapted to Continental Portuguese prior to release in Portugal (not only the spelling is changed, but grammar and vocabulary as well)...Many Argentinian books are adapted in Spain too... While most Norwegians feel Nynorsk is a part of Norwegian identity, most Portuguese people and most Spaniards don't include other varieties into their notion of identity of Portugal or Spain... You can study Portuguese at two universities in Croatia, but all professors are from Portugal, and they never mention Brazilian usage at all (if they do, it's always in pejorative sense: ''In Brazil people speak wrong''). Croatian-Portuguese dictionaries don't include Brazilian words at all (like bobagem, garoa, or camundongo...) Edited by Medulin on 13 March 2013 at 9:13pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6914 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 18 14 March 2013 at 12:12am | IP Logged |
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When I studied Portuguese at the university, we had to choose between European and Brazilian (there were native teachers for both varieties). No other language program I know of (in Sweden) has this possibility/(requirement).
Nobody really cares if kids choose to speak English with an American accent, use American spelling etc. although nearly every teacher has a somewhat "British" accent. Similarly, teachers may speak German Hochdeutsch, Parisienne French, Spanish with Castillian distinción and so on. Everybody knows that the languages are spoken in many parts of the world, and there are no real political statements being made. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Ogrim Heptaglot Senior Member France Joined 4644 days ago 991 posts - 1896 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, French, Romansh, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Catalan, Latin, Greek, Romanian | Message 8 of 18 14 March 2013 at 10:59am | IP Logged |
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I certainly speak both English and Spanish the European way, i.e. British English (RP) and Castillian. In part it is due to circumstances. My wife is Spanish and I have spent a lot of time in Spain, and I lived in London for five years. However,I think that in any case I would have chosen to speak "European".
Although I love other Spanish accents, in particular the Argentinian, I think it would be pretty odd if should start saying "vos" to my wife or pronounce "yo" the way they do in Buenos Aires. However, my kids are fans of an Argentinian TV series, and sometimes for fun they pretend to talk "argentino". Obviously, if you live on the American continent, it makes more sense to learn American English or some variant of South American Spanish, but for me as a European I would not find it natural. However it is true that with regard to English, because of the enormous impact of American TV, Hollywood and pop culture in general, many Europeans pick up Americanisms both in pronunciation and vocabulary. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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