LL-L "Language use" 2011.04.05 (02) [EN]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 05 April 2011 - Volume 02
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From: Mike Morgan <mwmbombay at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language use" 2011.04.04 (03) [EN]

Yes, Ron, I think the distinction between individual bi/multilingualism and
collective (?) bi/multiculturalism is an important one... and many
collectively bi/multulingual communities are unbalancedly bi/multilingual in
two important ways:

1) native speakers of the dominant language have less reason to be
multilingual. Thus, for instance the percentage of bi/multilingual
individuals is much lower among English native speakers in the US than among
probably any other group. (IF I had to guess -- and it WOULD be a GUESS -- I
would guess that 90% of US English native speakers are functionally
monolingual...2 years of high school Spanish probably doesn't count!)

Likewise here in central north India, native Hindi speakers are much more
likely to be monolingual -- though percentages of monolinguals is much lower
than in the US -- than native speakers of any other language.

2) Among the other non-dominant groups, there are a multiple of reasons for
lower than average levels of bi/multilingualism: size of the community,
self-containedness of the community, cultural distinctness from other
communities, education levels, etc... Thus I would guess that they
percentage of E/SE Asians in San Jose who are functionally monolingual in
their E/SE Asian language is higher than the percent of Latinos who are
functionally monolingual -- though again that is a guess (my wife is "from"
Sunnyvale, next door to San Jose)

Reinhard/Ron wrote:
> Anyway, I didn’t understand this thread to deal with individuals’ language

> proficiencies. I understood it as dealing with more than one language
being
> used within communities.

 mwm || U C > || mike || мика  || माईक || マイク || மாய்க் (aka Dr Michael W
Morgan)
===========================================================
Senior Consultant
BA in Applied Sign Language Studies (BAASLS)
Indira Gandhi National Open Univeristy
New Delhi, India
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"The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their
minds to be good or evil." (Hannah Arendt)

"When good people in any country cease their vigilance and struggle, then
evil men prevail." (Pearl S. Buck)



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From: Hannelore Hinz <hannehinz at t-online.de> <hannehinz at t-online.de>
Subject: LL-L "Language use" 2011.04.04 (04) [EN]

Nu bün ick bannig niegelich, wat Ron schreew:


                    Herbert Hoover even spoke Mandarin! How about that, huh?


Säukwuurt bi Google: Mandarin-Sprache.

Funn'n:  http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hochchinesisch

Dat heff ick nich dacht.

Gräutens.

Hanne



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