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Ferguson's 9 criteria of diglossia.

Article in Sociolinguistic Studies · October 2019

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 Ferguson’s nine criteria of diglossia
Diglossia as a term was not available in the English language repertoire of words: it was rather an
adaptation from French “Diglossie”. Other languages of Europe generally used the word for
bilingualism in this special sense as well. This need of a new terminology was purely scientific,
Ferguson (1959) introduced a framework that employed and defined this new term. Diglossia
according to Ferguson (it is referred to also as Classical Diglossia) is a situation in which two varieties
of the same language are used in a linguistic situation but with distinct functions. Ferguson regarded
the function part and the same origin of the variety part crucial to label any situation a diglossic one;
he built his hypothesis on Mercais’ first encounter with this linguistic phenomenon in 1930 when he
dealt with diglossia in the Arab countries.
Ferguson’s “Classical Diglossia” stands according to him on nine criteria that explains any
diglossic situation more thoroughly. In his paper “Diglossia” In which he explained his standpoint, he
choose four speech communities and their languages as reference: Modern Greek, Arabic, Swiss
German, and Haitian Creole. All of them with their H and L varieties.
His first criterion is Function; one of the most important on the list, for it shows that H and L have
different functions, they do not overlap. They are used in different domains that a student could be
solving an assignment in H (Standard Arabic) and at the same time chatting with his friend about the
same assignment in L (Algerian dialectal Arabic), the two varieties slightly overlap, for the student
performs this code switch almost perfectly and instinctively. The knowledge of which variety to use in
each given situation is of great importance.
The second criterion is Prestige; as the diglossic situation requires two varieties H and L, the high
variety is always considered as prestigious. This attitude is powerful sometimes that speakers may
deny ever using L varieties, and see it as not a language, but it is never truly honest. In an example,
Ferguson illustrated by Americans preferring to hear a play or some poetry in H variety even though
they may not understand the whole text. In addition, speakers of Haitian Creole denying its’ existence
yet using it daily in less formal situations, as opposed of Standard French. Ferguson called this as
“Self Deception”. This odd phenomenon is sometimes related to religion, it was a serious problem in
Greece in 1903 when the bible was introduced in the L variety (Dhimotiki) and this lead to public riot.
In Arabic, the H variety is the variety of Qur’an and considered by many as the first language ever, so
its statues stood and will stand as long as Islam exists.
A society’s heritage and literary works are always in H variety, in all languages Ferguson used; this
case was fixed for a long time that H is seen as the legitimate language of literature. Consequently, H
serves as the standard variety of the language, as the case of Arabic and Greek. This is the third
criterion: literary heritage.
Children acquire L variety as their mother tongue. Acquisition, Ferguson’s fourth criterion draws
the distinction between the two varieties H and L, for L is acquired as any mother tongue, at home,
with no explicit grammar or rules. As opposed to H, the level of proficiency is never achieved in H
unless formal education. This difference in method of acquisition is very important. The grammatical
structure of L is learned without explicit discussion of grammatical concepts; the grammar of H is
learned as rules to be imitated.
Standardization as the fifth criterion says that in all four languages studies are done on the H
variety, it is codified and accepted by the community, in addition to dictionaries. This means that
variation form H is limited, and L variety studies are very recent and done by scholars from outside
the speech community. This fact makes it very doubted for many times they do not give justice to
reality. Unlike H, L variety has a wide range of variation in pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary.
Unlike what people may think diglossia is very stable. This stability can sometimes last for
centuries. As the sixth of Ferguson’s criteria, Stability serves as a solution to the communicative
 tensions that arises in diglossic situations. It may be resolved by the use of relatively uncodified,
unstable, intermediate forms the language (Arabic: al-lugah al-wusta), and repeated borrowing of
vocabulary items from H to L.
One of the striking differences between H and L according to Ferguson is Grammar, his seventh
criterion. H grammar is more complex than L; he stated, «It is certainly safe to say that in diglossia
there are always extensive differences between the grammatical structures of H and L». By
differences, he meant that H has grammatical categories not present in L, like an inflectional system of
nouns and verbs that may not exist in L varieties. Simply, L is much simpler than H, not only in the
language Ferguson used in his paper, but for all diglossic situations.
H and L share the Lexicon, Ferguson’s eighth criterion, but H includes in its lexicon terms that are
nor present in L, for subject containing those terms are discussed in L variety. The same could be said
about H lacking some L terms. What is interesting is what Ferguson said: «…a striking feature of
diglossia is the existence of many paired items, one H one L, referring to fairly common concepts
frequently used in both H and L, where the range of meaning of the two items is roughly the same, and
the use of one or the other immediately stamps the utterance or written sequence as H or L».
Moreover, he gave the example in Arabic, when a journalist hears someone talking in L but the written
version of it will be in H. the common terms of both varieties are subject of alteration to what suits the
situation as part of diglossia.
Phonology, Ferguson’s ninth and last criterion, two kinds of systems are discerned. One is where H
and L share the same phonological elements, but H may have more complicated morphophonemics.
Alternatively, H is a special subset of the L variety inventory. Speakers fail to keep the two systems
separate. A second type is one where H has contrasts that L lacks, systematically substituting some
other phoneme for the lacking contrast; but L may `borrow' elements as tatsamas, using the H variety
contrast in that particular item.

Algeria is a very distinct diglossic country, in which both “Classical” and “Extended” diglossias
are present, classical diglossia is portrayed with the existence of standard Arabic along with its local
variable. Extended diglossia begins when French enters the scene, according to Fishman’s (1972)
definition. Algerian diglossia follows Ferguson’s nine criteria; Standard Arabic is more stable, being
protected from change because of its association with writing and education. Dialectal Arabic is more
localized and displays dialectal variations. Standard Arabic and French are the prestigious variety in
the diglossic spectrum. The whole literature is in standard Arabic. Language acquisition of L variety
as a mother tongue. Being not Arabic in origin draws the missing standardization process for standard
Arabic came with the Islamic conquests (632 AD).
Overall, Fergusons gave a usable framework for such a large diglossic situation that he really
described diglossia before it was labelled in the past, during his lifetime, and event in the future.

Aba Oussama – Master 2 LS.

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