Hans-Georg Wolf

World Englishes: A Cognitive Sociolinguistic Approach

The book presents Cognitive Linguistics as a framework for the study of cultural variation in world Englishes and within languages in general by offering a corpus-based analysis of the linguistic realization of the cultural model of community in African English. It also reflects on the role of English in intercultural communication and positions Cognitive Linguistics within a wider hermeneutic tradition.

8. Culture-specific conceptualisations of corruption in African English: Linguistic analyses and pragmatic applications

In this chapter, we provide a cultural-linguistic analysis of African English expressions from the domains of political leadership, wealth, and corruption, with a special emphasis on the latter. It is an application of theoretical concepts developed in Cognitive Linguistics and cognitive anthropology, in particular of the notions ‘cultural model’, ‘cultural schema’, and ‘conceptual metaphor’. This analytical apparatus, which is briefly surveyed in section 2, is combined with corpus-linguistic methods. Section 3 discusses cultural conceptualisations central to the African community model, and thus provides the background for the focal analysis of linguistic expressions of corruption in section 4. These expressions are found to be induced by a set of underlying conceptual metaphors which in turn reflect salient cultural practices like gift-giving, negotiating and favouritism. These metaphors are euphemistic; they are drawn upon in the conceptualisation of corruption in order to hide the illicit nature of corrupt practices. In our analysis, special attention is paid to food-related and gift metaphors. Section 5 outlines some consequences of the cultural-linguistic approach for the study of the pragmatics of intercultural communication. We argue for the strengthening of the semantic/hermeneutic component, which takes differences in culture-specific conceptualisations into account.

Intercultural communication in English: Arguments for a cognitive approach to intercultural pragmatics

Abstract Until now, academic interest in intercultural communication has largely ignored the fact that much if not most of these interactions go on in second and foreign language varieties (cf. Kachru 1994: 13), and, specifically, the role of English as a lingua franca (House 1999: 74). Another shortcoming of studies of intercultural communication is an undue theoretical restriction in functionalist pragmatic approaches that excludes crucial aspects of the category “culture,” on the grounds that they lie outside of the scope of linguistic pragmatics (e.g., Blommaert 1991). In opposition to this tenet, the study of the relation between language and culture has been on the agenda of cognitive linguistics from the very beginning, and recent works in this field highlight the usage-based nature of the cognitive linguistic enterprise, which in turn shifts the focus to questions of sociolinguistic and socio-cultural variation (Dirven 2005; Geeraerts 2005). To our minds, cognitive linguistics, and cognitive sociolinguistics (Kristiansen & Dirven forthcoming) in particular, have much to contribute to overcome the limitations of functionalist pragmatics. So the aim and scope of our paper are as follows: First, we will discuss the implications of the use of English in intercultural communication against the backdrop of current debates in the field of world Englishes. Following this short discussion, we will present the results of studies involving second language (L2) speakers from different cultural backgrounds that highlight differences in conceptualizations pertaining to the domain(s) of family, age, and ancestors. We will argue that these differences are likely to result in intercultural incomprehension or misunderstanding (in a wide sense). Abstracting from this cognitive-pragmatic level, we will use our examples to highlight shortcomings of mere functionalism, and to demonstrate that cognitive linguistics, with its semantic and conceptual orientation, can enhance our understanding of the different cultures of speakers engaged in intercultural communication. Finally, at the metatheoretical level, we will point out that the application of cognitive linguistic methods to the study of intercultural communication entails a further recognition of hermeneutics in cognitive linguistics (cf. Geeraerts 1992).

Communicating with Asia : the future of English as a global language

Communicating with Asia: introduction Gerhard Leitner, Azirah Hashim and Hans-Georg Wolf Part I. English in Selected Regional and National Habitats with a Glance at the Role of Outward-Bound Communication Needs: 1. The development of English in Pakistan Tariq Rahman 2. English for Japan: in the cultural context of the East-Asian expanding circle Nobuyuki Hino 3. Convergence and divergence of English in Malaysia and Singapore Ee-Ling Low and Rachel Tan Siew Kuang 4. Indian English prosody Pramod Pandey 5. Charting the endonormative stabilization of Singapore English Tan Siew Imm 6. Arabic in contact with English and Malay in Malaysia Azirah Hashim and Gerhard Leitner 7. Preposition stranding and pied-piping in Philippine English: a corpus-based study Danilo T. Dayag 8. The Americanization of the phonology of Asian Englishes: evidence from Singapore Ying-Ying Tan 9. Postcolonial and learner Englishes in Southeast Asia: implications for international communication Michael Percillier Part II. Major Other Languages in Asia, their International Status and Impact on Education: 10. Multilingualism, Hindi-Urdu and Indian English: intra-national and international diaspora Tej K. Bhatia and William C. Ritchie 11. Bahasa Indonesia and Bahasa Melayu: convergence and divergence of the official languages in contemporary Southeast Asia Lim Beng Soon and Gloria Poedjosoedarmo R. 12. Putonghua and Cantonese in the Chinese territories Chan Shui-Duen 13. The Chinese language in the Asian diaspora: a Malaysian experience Wang Xiaomei 14. Russian in Far East Asia: linguistic policies on the periphery of empire Roxana Doncu 15. Russian and Turkic languages in Central Asia Zoya Proshina Part III. Wider Perspectives: 16. Understanding Asia by means of cognitive sociolinguistics and cultural linguistics - the example of ghosts in Hong Kong English Hans-Georg Wolf and Thomas Chan 17. Understanding Asia through English literature Gerhard Stilz 18. English as a lingua franca and educational impact in Asia Andy Kirkpatrick 19. The Australian Asia project Joseph Lo Bianco and Yvette Slaughter.

Investigating culture from a linguistic perspective : an exemplification with Hong Kong English

Abstract The special issue in which our article features bears evidence to the growing concern for a linguistically informed study of culture and, vice versa, a culturally informed study of language. In recent years, Cognitive Sociolinguistics has established itself as a viable approach to analyze and systematize linguistic realizations of conceptually coded cultural patterns (see e.g. Wolf / Polzenhagen 2009). In our article, we give a brief summary of the fundamental tenets of the Cognitive-Sociolinguistic approach as regards culture. Highlighting the field of World Englishes, we demonstrate that certain lexical items and entire lexical fields in non-native varieties of English cannot be properly interpreted without cultural background knowledge and, more specifically, without a systematic account of their underlying cultural conceptualizations. This insight is then applied to the analysis of expressions and collocations from Hong Kong English; under investigation are, in particular, socio-culturally salient conceptualizations from the domain of FAMILY. Our paper closes with a discussion of the applicability of Cognitive Sociolinguistics methods and findings to curriculum reform and design. Emphasized here are the potential for students’ hands-on analytic engagement with texts produced in culturally “alien” varieties of English, and, more globally, intercultural competence as a possible learning outcome

De-escalation—A Cultural-Linguistic View on Military English and Military Conflicts

The domain of military conflicts and operations has hitherto not been discussed from an explicitly cultural-linguistic perspective. Linguistically, this domain has primarily been the purview of Military English, as English is one of the two working languages of NATO (the other one being French) and the main lingua franca of multinational military operations and peacekeeping missions. Military English, arguably, has been mainly concerned with linguistic standards, as part of NATO Standardization (STANAG) and intelligibility problems due to different varieties and accents. Nevertheless, works on Military English also notice the importance of culture, but respective studies are functional in scope and based on a few behavioural categories and traits, partly leaning on Hofstede’s findings on national cultures. As of now, these studies do not contribute much “to better understand different world cultures and societies”. Besides, the problem of culture seems to be treated separately from the problem of English as a lingua franca, a hiatus that exists in the academic field of English as a lingua franca as well. Thus, a secondary aim of this chapter is to bridge the gap between the focus on culture and English as a lingua franca in the framework of Military English. The main purpose, however, is to introduce Cultural Linguistics as a viable approach to facilitate intercultural understanding—as a prerequisite for de-escalation—(not only) in military contexts. The analysis of three examples will serve as an illustration.