Jamaican Patois/Language Change links

on
https://getrevising.co.uk/revision-cards/language-theories-of-change

Functional Theory 


Language changes according to the needs of its users. Changes in technology/industry make need for new words.
  • Words become obsolete (archaism)
  • New words enter the language. New inventions need to be called something (iPod, MP3, USB)
  • Slang also makes change, making new words, using them and tossing them as soon as the general public gets a hold of them. This is due to striving for personal/group expression, as well as social identity.

Potential, Diffusion, Implementation, Codification

  • POTENTIAL: Internal weakness exists in the language, such as messy patterns that need fixing or external pressure forces change and variation.
  • DIFFUSION: Change made to language starts to spread through various speech communities.
  • IMPLEMENTATION: Variant of language begins to be used in the appropriate contexts
  • CODIFICATION: Variant of language becomes officially accepted and entered into the dictionary

S-Curve Model

Change will be taken up at a certain rate - at first the effects would be minimal but the change will accelerate as time goes on, until it eventually levels off. Like an S-shaped graph

Substratum Theory: 

Influence of immigration

Random Fluctuation


Wave Model

Baliey (1973) suggested a model that geographical distance can have an effect on language change.  Just as someone close to the epicentre of an earthquake will feel the tremors, a person or group close to the epicentre of a language change will pick it up, whereas a person or group further away from the centre of the change is less likely to adopt it.  i.e. a word adapted or adopted by multicultural youths in London is unlikely to affect white middle class speakers in Edinburgh, as they are removed from the epicentre both culturally and socially.











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