fredag 25. mars 2011

Different Varieties of English

India

Indian English or South-Asian English is a distinctive dialect spoken mostly in the Indian sub-continent. According to the 1991 Census of India, Ninety million people speak English in India. English is one of India's official languages. Less than a quarter of a million speak English as their first language, these people are most likely Anglo-Indians, consisting of less than a million people in India. Most other Indians use English as their second or third language. These people often need English to work. 


In general, Indian English has fewer peculiarities in its vowel sounds than the consonants, especially as spoken by native speakers of languages like Hindi, which in fact has a vowel phonology very similar to that of English. Most pronunciations of Indian English are rhotic, but many speakers with higher education are non-rhotic. The Indian people often use the "ing" ending more often than the normal English speakers.

China


English spoken in China is often referred to as Chinglish, often containing bad spelling
and may have pejorative or deprecating connotations.
The degree to which a Chinese variety of English exists or can be considered legitimate is disputed. A normal issue with Chinglish is the wrong word order. Some people might say "Up your bottoms!" instead of the familiar expression "Bottoms Up!"

Indian English and Chinglish does not have many similarities. One of the few is that both varieties of English is hard to understand for a English speaker from England or America. Indian English has one big difference from Chinglish and that is that Indian English have most of the right words, they just pronounce it differently from Normal English While Chinglish has changed several words and then makes it incredibly hard to understand.

2 kommentarer:

  1. Interesting article where you compare English spoken in China and in India. I might suggest that you explain the words rhotic, pejorative and deprecating. All though I'm sure you know them well your readers might not be so familiar with the phrases. I would also suggest that you reveal your sources! Always interesting to see where you found the background material.

    SvarSlett
  2. interesting post Philip. i never really thought about the difference between Changlish and Indian English
    keep up the good work!

    SvarSlett