A brand new language has been quickly spreading, as noticed by linguist Nicholas Grenoble. The inflow of English has been noticeable, with current immigrants and short-term staff primarily utilizing the language. Moreover, younger individuals are studying English by way of numerous mediums comparable to motion pictures, video video games, social media, and YouTube. Grenoble’s analysis goals to know the dynamics of this case each linguistically and sociolinguistically. Particularly, he needs to know who speaks which language, when, and with whom. He’s additionally enthusiastic about how Greenlanders are studying English and the way it impacts their information and use of their mom tongue, Kalaallisut.
To assemble info and reply these questions, Grenoble and mission postdoc Jessica Kantarovich carried out observations in Nuuk, Greenland. One specific space of curiosity for them was the stories of Kalaallisut getting shorter. Kalaallisut is a polysynthetic language, the place suffixes tackle the function of phrases in languages like English. Grenoble gives an instance, explaining that the phrase “qujanaq” means “thanks.” By including the suffix “-rsuaq,” that means “massive,” the phrase turns into “qujanarsuaq,” which interprets to “massive thanks” or “thanks very a lot.” The researchers carried out interviews in Kalaallisut to find out if and the way phrases had been getting shorter. Additionally they studied the on a regular basis use of the language.
Of their analysis, Grenoble and Kantarovich additionally interact in participant-observation work. They spend time in public locations, comparable to shops and eating places, to watch the language utilization. They take note of who’s utilizing which language in informal and transient interactions. One specific focus for the students is the idea of shifting audio system, which refers to younger individuals of their homeland who cease studying their dad and mom’ minority language and shift to the bulk language. This phenomenon is of nice curiosity to Grenoble and his staff.