Aldaberdikyzy
Aidyn
Kazakh
National University named after al-Farabi
The
very end of XX century was remarkable by its deep and constructive reasoning of
so-called society-language matters: whether it was a problem of extinguishing
or “dead” languages or discussions of language expansion and “colonization”. As
the most evident demonstration of it can be UNESCO’s involvement in fostering the
world’s language diversity, which, in its own turn, “leads to cultural diversity”
(Language Vitality and Endangerment, UNESCO, 200i6) and adopted the Universal
Declaration of Cultural Diversity and its action plan.
Language
diversity is affected by a preceding factor of languages’ existence, namely,
linguistic vitality. The indicators of linguistic vitality are considered as
the following:
· relative position on the urban-rural continuum;
· domains in which the language is used;
· frequency and type of code switching;
· population and group dynamics;
· distribution of speakers within their own social
networks;
· social outlook regarding and within the speech
community;
· language prestige; and access to a stable and
acceptable economic base (Endangered Languages, M. Lynn Landweer, 2003).
The
aim of this article is differentiating the term “domain” from a sociolinguistic
viewpoint and analyzing domains of the modern Kazakh language supplying it by
examples from Kazakhstani sociolinguistic situation.
Before
embarking upon the theme, it is of great importance to explore the notion
“domain” etymologically. This word was first used in IT language denoting “a
name of their website - i.e. a domain”(New English Dictionary, Cambridge), thus
a domain name is an identification string that defines a realm of administrative autonomy, authority, or control in
the Internet. The most prominent domains are com, net and org, and the country code top-level domains (ccTLDs), for example kz for Kazakhstan
or tr for Turkey etc.
Sociolinguistically the term “domain”, certainly,
differs. According to Fishman (1972: 442) a domain is "a sociocultural
construct abstracted from topics of communication, relationships between
communicators, and locales of communication, in accord with the institutions of
a society and the spheres of a speech community".
Ager (2001: 130) differentiates public, private or
intermediate domains. Romaine (1992: 83) goes deeper and breaks down sociologic
domain into subdomains. Apparently, the more the number of domains or
subdomains in which a language is used, the higher the vitality of a language
is. Further, the author will try to analyze the Kazakh language from Fishman’s
and Ager’s viewpoints to observe the effects of language domains on its
vitality.
In Kazakhstan a number of social domains are found
consistently in any language community. For domain analysis it has been found
it useful to break down these culturally relevant domains into variable
subdomains. Speakers choose which language to use every time they interact
within a given subdomain. The cumulative choices then suggest which of the
languages in the community's repertoire is the language of choice for each
domain.
The foundational social domain of the Kazakh language throughout
Kazakhstan is that of the home. After the home, the next most foundational
domains are cultural events, followed by social events. Depending on how one
slices the societal pie, such events as marriages, funerals, births, naming
ceremonies, harvest, competitive feasts, public discussions or arguments, can
be considered subdomains of cultural events. Social events could include such
things as political campaigns, work parties, sport. It is of great interest to
observe the cultural domain use of Kazakh, while societal domain of the Kazakh
language use is more explicit, but it is rather intentional than natural.
Within the domain of the mosque, there are subdomains of Islamic ceremomy like
public namaz or meetings. Kazakh is preferred by majority of muslims.
In many, but not in every Kazakhstani cities’ context,
there are additional domains where language choices are made. These include
formal education, business, travel, and written communication. Within the
domain of formal education, subdomains include the language of instruction, the
language(s) of study, the language(s) allowed in recreation, and the
language(s) that the faculty use to communicate to local parents about school
matters. Despite the fact that more and more Kazakh language oriented nurseries
and schools (or groups within the schools and high schools) have been opening, it
is evident that the number of Kazakh speaking schoolchildren is not increasing.
Within the domain of business there are subdomains of employment, private
business (such as trade store operation), and marketing. Without sure Kazakh is
ignored partially or even totally in such spheres as banking, marketing or
promotion. Advertising is the one of economic spheres where Kazakh is used
almost equally with Russian taking into amount their amount, but not quality,
i.e. the presence of direct (loan) translation instead of contextual, that of
grammar and orthographic mistakes. Within the domain of travel one could
identify three potential possibilities: using transport owned by relatives or
speakers of one’s own language, using transport owned by outsiders, and using
public transport. Two formers are surely affected by the linguistic competence
of travelers, while the latter is usually not supported by the means of Kazakh.
Thus, the underlying question relative to the number
of language use domains asks: Is there sufficient use of the Kazakh language
throughout community life? In essence the more domains in which the vernacular
is used the better. Anecdotal evidence suggested that the last domain to be
lost in any potential language allegiance battle is that of the home. Thus, the
home forms the anchor domain for this hierarchy. Generally accepted wisdom is
that the varieties used in public domains are more vital, and are hence more
likely to persist than those used at home. A language used in domains situated
at all three levels, namely, public, private and intermediate, is more dynamic
than one used in only one or even in two. According this evaluation Kazakh is
not fully operated in all domains, consequently its dynamism is doubtful. Taking
into account all these, it can be stated that increasing the vitality of Kazakh
can be succeeded by enlarging the number of domains or subdomains it is used,
that is by activities of corpus planning.
References
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