Questions Key Issue 4



Chapter 5 Questions Key Issue 1

1. How are the scales of language contradictory? (intro)

2. Compare language learning in the US to the rest of the world. Use specific examples.

3. Why do countries choose official languages? Why would an official language be one that few people could speak?

4. What are the world’s most widely spoken languages?

5. Compare the differences between the language family, language branch (often called sub-family), and the language group.

6. Discuss the use of the language tree as it relates to language classification.

7. Describe the classification of English based on the language families.

8. Discuss the Sino-Tibetan language family.

9. Why are many of the Asian language families unrelated to other large language families?

10. What is the largest African language family? How many languages exist within it?

11. Describe Khoisan.

.

[pic]

Questions Chapter 5 Key Issue 2

1. Briefly describe the Germanic language branch. Include the language groups.

2. What are the main differences and similarities between Urdu and Hindi?

3. Why is language one of the main elements of cultural diversity in India?

4. What languages belong in the Iranian group?

5. What was the hearth of the Slavic language? What is the result of the migration of the Slavic speakers?

6. Why did the use of Russian increase and what language group does it belong to?

7. What are the three most spoken West Slavic languages

8. What is the most important South Slavic language and how is it written?

9. What was the fate of the Serbo-Croatian language?

10. What is the fifth most important Romance language and where is it spoken?

11. Describe the diffusion of English throughout the world. What type of diffusion would this be?

12. Describe the origins of English.

13. Describe the origins and diffusion of Romance languages.

14. Compare origins and diffusion of Romance languages and English.

15. Compare the two theories of origin and diffusion of the Indo-European language family.

[pic]

Questions Key Issue 3

1. What is a dialect and how does it develop?

2. Explain what “isogloss” and give an example not in your book.

3. Explain the reasons for the development of the four distinct US dialects.

4. How does the English vary in the US and Britain? Why?

5. How is a “standard language” chosen? What is Britain’s standard language?

6. How many dialects developed in Britain and why?

7. What are the main reasons why US and British English vary so much?

8. What is both interesting and surprising about American and British pronunciation of English?

9. Why might those in Portugal be upset about the standardization of Portuguese?

10. What are some problems associated with determining if two languages are different dialects of one language or two distinct languages?

[pic]

Chapter 5 Questions Key Issue 4

1. How does the distribution of a language illustrate the fate of an ethnic group. Site at least two examples of success and diminishment.

2. Explain the political unrest in Belgium and compare it to Switzerland.

3. How does Nigeria exhibit problems associated with the presence of many language speakers?

4. Why was Basque able to survive the influx of Indo-European languages?

5. How did the Gothic language become extinct?

6. What had to be done to revive the Hebrew language? Why was it chosen as an official language of the new state of Israel?

7. Where did Celtic languages exist in Europe at one time? Now? Why has the area diminished?

8. What efforts are being made to revive the Celtic language?

9. Compare the language policies of Australia and New Zealand.

10. Explain the difference between a lingua franca, a pidgin language and a creolized language.

11. English has become a global lingua franca. Give evidence to support this statement.

12. Explain the history of AAVE.

13. What does the Appalachian dialect have in common with Ebonics

14. How do francophone (French-speaking) people attempt to protect their language?

15. Describe the phenomenon of Spanglish.

16. Should the US declare English as the official language? Why or why not?

17. What issues besides linguistic differences impact political struggles in Canada?

18. Do you think the internet will promote or demote the importance of English globally? Why?

[pic]

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download