On the origin and nature of Standard English

Tom McArthur
A focus on the nature of “ Standard English” & ELT
The King’s Standard
 In 1138, The battle of the flags (standards)
between the English and Scots
 Extension to non-military, peaceful meanings
( standard pound, standard yard, gold standard,
etc)
 The term was introduced into literature and
language by the early 18th c. ( Henry Fulton)
Classical and Neo-classical Norms
 The First primer of a Western language ( he grammatike’
te’khne, Dionysius Thrax, 2nd C BC, Alexandria)
 His main treatise was that the spoken word can be
judged in terms of the written word.
 Kione’ : a spoken dialect ( Cicero’s De oratore )
 Cicero’s categorisation of Latin: ( urbanitas, rusticitas and
pereginitas)
In Britain, the courtly and literary level of the
East Midland dialect ascended over other
dialects . Reasons
 Politics: the nation-state
 Communication: the Greco-Latin heritage
 Literature: vernacular genre
 Religion: translating the bible
 Technology: the invention of movable types
 Industrialisation: standard processes and products
High English: the best and the rest
 A dictionary of the English Language ( Samuel
Johnson, 1775) & The Royal Standard English
Dictionary, William Perry, Edinburgh)
 Baily, 1991: OUR standard vs. others’
 Two models: SE & dialect vs. Standard English
 Third Model recently emerged: English as a group
of dialects, all equal.
An Assured Standard: the King’s English,
Henry W & Francis G. F. ,OUP, 1906:
:Responses

 The authoritarian response

 The Libertarian response
 The egalitarian response
 The uncertain response
 The eclectic response
Perceptions of Standard English:
social & geographical criteria
 The strong traditionalists
 The mild traditionalists
 The liberal progressives
 The uncertain
.McArthur’s Conclusion on Standard English

 Sociolinguistic
 National-cum-international issue
 Contentious
Literature Review on the topic
 According to the theory of concentric circles (Kachru, 1985), English being used
around the world is divided into three groups: inner circle, outer circle and
expanding circle.
 The inner circle refers to the countries where English is a native language: the
USA, UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and New Zealand;
 the outer circle denotes EFL countries (e.g. former English colonies), such as
India, Singapore, Malaysia, South Africa;
 the expanding circle involves EFL countries like China, Japan, Israel, Greece,
Poland, etc.
 McArthur divided English as native language, second language and foreign
language (McArthur, 1998).

General Interpretation of Concentric Circles Terminology

Expanding circle

Outer circle
Inner circle
 Kachru’s Concentric (=Overlapping) Circles of
English (from Kachru 1997: 213)
Standard English & Linguists
 Peter Trudgill, 1999, argues that SE is a language that has
been characterised and hence standardised.
 SE is not an accent, 9%-12% of the population of Britain
speaks Standard English with some form of regional accents
(Trudgill & Cheshire, 1989). Received Pronunciation RP is a
common accent, but it is a standardised accent, but not SE
itself.
 Crystal states that What is called now SE is one variety of
English but not the “ English Language”
 Crystal (1995) also gives his opinion that Standard English is a
“minority variety (identified chiefly by its lexical, grammar and
orthography) which carries most prestige and is most widely
understood”
Standard English & ELT
 We, teachers, may consider our main mission as to only teach
“correct language” without realizing that, even for educated
native speakers, natural and correct language includes a
variety of language forms, not a single variant (Beebe, 1988;
Milroy, J. & Milroy, L.,1985)
 According to Trudgill’s theory, Standard English does nothing
with accent; the accent can be chosen when we learn Standard
English.
 teachers can become developers of sensitivity toward many
varieties of language rather than pedantic linguistic enforcers
(Mckay & Hornberger,1996)
 SE, ELT & Culture: As LIU (1998) says, the point of learning
culture in teaching EFL is to make target language learners be
capable of using English appropriately according to the
contexts and necessity.
 English as “CLOCAL” language (Pakir, 1999)
Conclusion
 There is fixed “ Standard English”
 Apart from the heating linguistic, sociolinguistic and political
debate, we, ELT teachers need to be, to some extent, aware
of the controversy, but not to involve our students with the
many varieties of English that might confuse them.
However, we need to send clear messages to our students
that they need to expose themselves as much as they can
to authentic materials, spoken mainly, in order for them to
be acquainted with the language they want to learn at
large.
 In my experience in classroom, students in general like to
explore beyond what teachers give in class, but they feel
worried of making mistakes. This might be one of the
reason that they might feel secure with one norm.
 Because Arabic has a linguistically rigid standard language,
I think Arab students tend to prefer one norm to learn.
:Questions
 Reflect on your (former) students’
reaction and outcome when taught by
NS and NNS teachers in terms of SE
and dialect?
 Do most published course books take
dialect variety into consideration?
Why? why not?