Speaker
Description
It has been suggested in evolutionary models of World Englishes that one of the key features that mark Singapore English as one of the most developed of Englishes in the world is the presence of ethnic variation. Ethnic variation in language, in turn, is also a hallmark of multilingual ecologies. When it comes to ethnic subvarieties in Singapore English, phonetic variation is the one area that has received the most attention, given that it is not only the most salient feature, it is also tied most closely to the construction of identities. One of the first observations on ethnic variation in the sound system of Singapore English dated as early as 1968, and thus far, there have been differing perspectives offered on the topic – be it in terms of its segmental or suprasegmental properties, or in terms of phonetic production and perception. Does ethnicity matter? Is there ethnic variation in the sound system of Singapore English? Research on this topic have pointed in opposite directions when it comes to these questions. In this talk, I aim to provide an overview of the research of the topic, tracing the differing (and contesting) perspectives on the question of ethnic variation in the sound system of Singapore English as Singapore’s multilingual ecology changes across the past few decades. The goal is to be able to offer an explanation for the differing accounts by looking carefully at the nature of Singapore’s multilingual ecology and also the theoretical frameworks scholars have believed in when drawing their conclusions. This talk therefore aims to offer a perspective that may provide some clarity to some of the existing questions on ethnic variation in Singapore English, and at the same time, challenge some assumptions that have been made in the various fields in Linguistics.