Who's learning Indian English?

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milky

#315836 Tue, 16 Jan 07 09:22 AM

Would one ever see an advert such as this in an American newspaper or job website?

Posted 29 April 2006

Indian English teachers

Are you interested in teaching Indian English in the USA? Good payment,apartment/house, 40 hours working days/week, 3 months contract/6 months contract/1 year contract, enjoyable.

attn. Mr.Sures kumar

milky

Joined on Thu, Jan 15 2004

Senior Member (3,149)

Hume said that if we had perfect or complete descriptive knowledge of reality, we could not, by reasoning, derive a single valid "ought".

Marvin A.

#316205 Wed, 17 Jan 07 04:46 AM

I'm sure there's something like that somewhere, as a joke. That would really be a laugh, because at least here, where it isn't often that you run into an Indian, they have the reputation of being very hard to understand.

Marvin A.

Joined on Fri, Dec 8 2006

Regular Member (638)

Jokes

milky

#316223 Wed, 17 Jan 07 06:08 AM

Marvin A. wrote:
I'm sure there's something like that somewhere, as a joke. That would really be a laugh, because at least here, where it isn't often that you run into an Indian, they have the reputation of being very hard to understand.

I was speaking seriously. If, as you say, Indian English speakers are difficult to understand, why don't American English speakers, who may wish or need to communicate with that group in the near future, learn Indian English?

milky

American English, Jokes

Marvin A.

#316390 Wed, 17 Jan 07 04:29 PM

Milky wrote:
Marvin A. wrote:
I'm sure there's something like that somewhere, as a joke. That would really be a laugh, because at least here, where it isn't often that you run into an Indian, they have the reputation of being very hard to understand.

I was speaking seriously. If, as you say, Indian English speakers are difficult to understand, why don't American English speakers, who may wish or need to communicate with that group in the near future, learn Indian English?

Wow, you're funny. What next, classes on understanding Chinese-English? Then perhaps Russian-English? You can't be serious. We don't really regard Indian-English as being a proper dialect of English, merely English spoken with an Indian accent, and grammatically influenced by the persons native tongue. The better the person knows English, the easier they will be to understand.

Marvin A.

Accents, American English, Dialects, Jokes, Regards

Alienvoord

#316400 Wed, 17 Jan 07 05:02 PM

Indian English is a group of English dialects, with their own pronunciations and vocabularies. It is not just "English with an Indian accent," it is the variety of English spoken in India.

Alienvoord

Joined on Tue, Jul 25 2006

Toronto

Full Member (315)

I'm a Canadian English speaker

Accents, Dialects

MrPedantic

#316550 Thu, 18 Jan 07 12:08 AM

Indian English also has its own literature (e.g. V.S. Naipaul) and stylistic features (e.g. elaborate phrasing, use of idioms that would seem Wodehousian or old-fashioned to BrE speakers).

MrP

MrPedantic

Joined on Tue, Oct 12 2004

Veteran Member (11,955)

...opella forensis / adducit febris...

Idioms, Literature

milky

#316644 Thu, 18 Jan 07 06:39 AM

Just who would that "we" be?

milky

Accents, Dialects, Regards

milky

#316652 Thu, 18 Jan 07 06:55 AM

<<We don't really regard Indian-English as being a proper dialect of English, merely English spoken with an Indian accent, and grammatically influenced by the persons native tongue.Standard and non-standard dialects>>

A standard dialect (also known as a standardized dialect or "standard language") is a dialect that is supported by institutions. Such institutional support may include government recognition or designation; presentation as being the "correct" form of a language in schools; published grammars, dictionaries, and textbooks that set forth a "correct" spoken and written form; and an extensive formal literature that employs that dialect (prose, poetry, nonfiction, etc.). There may be multiple standard dialects associated with a language. For example, Standard American English, Southern English, Standard British English, and Standard Indian English may all be said to be standard dialects of the English language.

A nonstandard dialect, like a standard dialect, has a complete vocabulary, grammar, and syntax, but is not the beneficiary of institutional support.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialect

milky

Accents, American English, British English, Dialects, Grammar, Literature, Regards, Vocabulary

milky

#316653 Thu, 18 Jan 07 06:57 AM

FYI

Indian English, the largest second language variety of English, is undergoing a process of structural nativization that leads to the variety developing a semi-autonomous norm-developing potential.

http://hrza1.hrz.uni-giessen.de/forschungsbericht/layout/einzel95.cfm?FB=05&Institut=2100&lfd_Nr=90p

Indian English belongs to NIVEs (Non-native Institutionalized Varieties of English), which strongly resemble forms which are found in learner languages and at one time may have been the result individual language acquisition. Yet these varieties, according to Williams's claims, have spread throughout the population and become institutionalized, thus becoming "regional standards"; moreover these NIVEs are now themselves the target of second language acquisitions.

http://www.ciil.org/Main/Announcement/MBE_Programme/session6/martinagosh.htm

Using the Optimality-theoretic insight that a grammar of a linguistic variety is a set of ranked constraints, I was able to provide an account of the theoretically problematic differences between two varieties of Indian English: vernacular Indian English (VIE) and standard Indian English (SIE). The differences between these two grammars are most conspicuous in the syntax of wh-questions, Focus, non-overt subjects/objects, and expletive (it) subjects. My research reveals that while VIE allows subject-verb inversion in indirect questions and forbids it in direct questions, the mirror opposite holds of SIE. VIE also allows non-overt subjects and objects as well as non-overt expletive subjects; these are disallowed in SIE. Finally, in VIE, but not in SIE, object noun phrases that are focused do not appear in positions where they are (Case) licensed. In my analysis (1995, 1997, 2000), I conclude that these grammatical differences arise due to different rankings of the same constraints, a theoretically desirable account.

http://www.linguistics.uiuc.edu/rbhatt/syntax_LanguageContact.htm

milky

Direct questions, Grammar, Indirect questions, Noun phrases, Nouns, Verbs

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