论文标题

“较高”的地位语言并不总是赢:英语在印度的堕落和印地语的兴起

The "higher" status language does not always win: The fall of English in India and the rise of Hindi

论文作者

De Silva, Kushani, Parshad, Rana D., Basheer, Aladeen, Antwi-Fordjour, Kwadwo, Beauregard, Matthew A., Chand, Vineeta

论文摘要

古典语言动力学将语言转移解释为说话者采用较高状态语言来代替较低状态语言的过程。这是充分记录的,英语具有超出竞争的语言,例如苏格兰盖尔语,威尔士和普通话。 1961 - 1991年的印度人口普查报告说,印地语/英语双语者急剧增加,这表明英语在印度正在上升 - 并且正在超越印地语。但是,1991年至2011年的数据表明,双语数字已经饱和,而单语言的语言者则继续呈指数增长。为了捕捉这种违反直觉的动态,我们提出了一种新颖的语言动力学模型,以单语言扬声器和印地语/英语双语者之间的相互作用模型,该模型以几乎完美的准确性捕获了过去50年的印度人口普查数据,超过了文献中最知名的语言动态。因此,我们提供了一个较低的状态语言竞争较高状态语言的第一个示例。

Classical language dynamics explains language shift as a process in which speakers adopt a higher status language in lieu of a lower status language. This is well documented with English having out-competed languages such as Scottish Gaelic, Welsh and Mandarin. The 1961-1991 Indian censuses report a sharp increase in Hindi/English Bilinguals, suggesting that English is on the rise in India - and is out-competing Hindi. However, the 1991 - 2011 data shows that Bilingual numbers have saturated, while Monolingual Hindi speakers continue to rise exponentially. To capture this counter-intuitive dynamic, we propose a novel language dynamics model of interaction between Monolingual Hindi speakers and Hindi/English Bilinguals, which captures the Indian census data of the last 50 years with near perfect accuracy, outperforming the best known language dynamics models from the literature. We thus provide a first example of a lower status language having out competed a higher status language.

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