What happens when a community speaks more than one language?

What is it about?

In societies with multiple languages, people often use different forms of language. Many studies focus on how languages change over time, but they often miss the impact of people's beliefs and feelings about language, known as language ideologies. These beliefs influence how people view and use different language forms, forming what we call language attitudes. Our study introduces a new way to understand language change by including these ideologies in a model that considers speaker preferences. Surprisingly, we found that people's preferences for a language can be more important than the prestige associated with a standard form. We also looked at how interactions between people with different language preferences affect the shift from one language form to another. When communities with opposing preferences interact, the coexistence of language forms becomes less likely. Interestingly, varying the level of interaction between people with different preferences can lead to unexpected shifts from coexistence to the extinction of a language form and then back to coexistence, ultimately resulting in the dominance of the previously extinct form. Our study uses mathematical models to show that the size of the community influences how long different language forms coexist. In summary, our research provides a quantitative approach to understanding how people's beliefs about language impact language change in society.

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Photo by Papaioannou Kostas on Unsplash

Photo by Papaioannou Kostas on Unsplash

Why is it important?

This work influences linguistics with quantitative perspectives, contributes to models of applied mathematics, and encourages interdisciplinary collaboration while emphasizing the need for more comprehensive data in computational linguistics. It holds significant insight for language planning and public policies aimed at preserving endangered languages.