Legitimising dialect discrimination

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Forbes

#540544 Sat, 12 Jul 08 10:49 PM

Not only is there a limit to what the law can achieve, but there is a limit to what the law should set out to achieve.

Many laws are about balancing rights, whether between individuals or groups. Care needs to be taken that well-intentioned laws do not have unintentioned effects. We need to make sure that by affording rights to one group, we do not unduly affect the rights of others. On the whole, the rights of minorities are pretty well protected in the UK. I do not think we need to bring the law into language. Laws specifically relating to language tend to be either oppressive or ridiculous.

Forbes

Joined on Thu, Jun 16 2005

Regular Member (834)

Dialects

Anonymous

#540554 Sat, 12 Jul 08 11:21 PM

< Laws specifically relating to language tend to be either oppressive or ridiculous.>

Really? Can you give us some examples of such laws?

If you are not black and I tell you that you can no longer use the word "***" in reference to black people, unless you want to pay the consequences, am I oppressing you?

Anonymous

Dialects

Anonymous

#540567 Sun, 13 Jul 08 12:29 AM

<I do not think we need to bring the law into language.>

How do you feel about "linguistic profilng" and the courts?

Anonymous

Dialects

Forbes

#540801 Sun, 13 Jul 08 05:10 PM

Basque and Catalan were banned in Franco's Spain - that was oppressive.

La Loi Toubon is ridiculous.

As for the use of specified words I think it all has to do with context. There can never be an absolute ban - that would mean no one would be allowed to mention the words that cannot be used.

Q. What words can't I use?

A. I'm not allowed to say.

The law is adequate to deal with racial abuse.

I had to Google "linguistic profiling". I found this definition: "Acting upon [ a ] racial or demographic imprint in a criminal way by denying [the victim's] access to a business transaction that should not be in any way biased, based on a person's racial background". That is unacceptable. The law covers it.

Forbes

Dialects

MrPedantic

#540901 Sun, 13 Jul 08 09:34 PM

Anonymous
<If you told your HR dept that you had rejected a candidate solely because he had a West Country accent, you would be immediately sent on a five-day course and forced to learn punishing quantities of bewildering polysyllables.>

You mention accent there, MrP. How would you define "dialect"?

Sorry, I meant to imply "dialect".

MrP

MrPedantic

Joined on Wed, Oct 13 2004

Veteran Member (12,047)

...opella forensis / adducit febris...

Accents, Dates, Dialects

MrPedantic

#540904 Sun, 13 Jul 08 09:45 PM

Forbes
I ought perhaps to have said: " Anon's question, omitting (unlike sexual or ethnic discrimination) could have been posed 2000 years ago in Rome.

I'm reminded of Catullus LXXXIV (not dialect, but a common idiolectal phenomenon):

Chommoda dicebat, si quando commoda uellet
dicere, et insidias Arrius hinsidias,
et tum mirifice sperabat se esse locutum,
cum quantum poterat dixerat hinsidias.
credo, sic mater, sic liber auunculus eius.
sic maternus auus dixerat atque auia.

Roughly: "Arrius would say chommoda for commoda, and hinsidias for insidias, and imagined he had spoken marvellously well, if he said hinsidias as emphatically as he could. I suspect his mother and his uncle the freeman used to say it thus; and thus his grandfather and maternal grandmother."

MrP

MrPedantic

Dialects

Anonymous

#540951 Sun, 13 Jul 08 11:50 PM

>You mention accent there, MrP. How would you define "dialect"? >

<Sorry, I meant to imply "dialect".>

Same question: How would you define "dialect", MrP?

Anonymous

Accents, Dialects

MrPedantic

#542054 Tue, 15 Jul 08 10:01 PM

Anonymous
How would you define "dialect", MrP?

It doesn't need to be defined, old chap. In this context:

If you told your HR dept that you had rejected a candidate solely because he used/had a West Country dialect/accent

both you and your HR dept would know what you meant; and whatever your private definition, you would still be sent on the polysyllabic five-day course.

MrP

MrPedantic

Accents, Dates, Dialects

Jon Salt

#542207 Wed, 16 Jul 08 05:19 AM

Hello, sirs. I be applying to join in your conversations. I have noticed that those around me what tend to stick with dialect do tend to be those fellows who consciously reject the education what is provided by the centre. I humbly submit, sirs, that those who uses dialects do in fact tend to be duller of mind and spirit than those who don't. Now, don't be getting me wrongly, there ain't no reasons why the dialect of the centre is better than the dialect of the regions sirs. It is just that there do exist a tendency for the educated country folk to lose their dialect and retain but a mild accent. If you gentlefolk are honest with youselfs, you will find that you don't expect much by talk from a fella with a very strong local flavour to his chat. He will be found to be a fella with very strong local thoughts.

Jon Salt

Joined on Tue, Nov 13 2007

New Member (35)

Accents, Conversations, Dialects

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