Mapping Metalinguistic Knowledge in Dili, Timor-Leste Melody Ann - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Mapping Metalinguistic Knowledge in Dili, Timor-Leste Melody Ann Ross 13 th East-West Center International Graduate Student Conference February 13-15, 2014

Overview • Introduction • Research Question – Where is Dili, ethnoling makeup – History and effect on Dili’s Demographics • Lit Review – Map tasks, perceptual dialectology – The importance of speaker intuitions – Sociolinguistics in Dili, what specifically • Methods • Participants – language issues • Results – Unique Lgs, Total Lgs, Word Counts – Maps • Conclusions – Future Research (ask for mother tongues!!) rankings? 2

Dili Introduction • 1400’s – Portuguese Colony • 1975 – Power shifts to Indonesia • 1999 – Power shifts to UN • 2002 – Independence • 2006 – Crisis • 2013 – UN ends mission 3

Dili Introduction • Dili Demographics – large youth population – highest dropout rates in the country • highest literacy rates – wealthiest citizens – 74% of all migrants in the country settle in Dili • 51% of this group is under the age of 30 • Linguistically Diverse 4

Introduction 5

Lit Review – John Hajek, University of Melbourne • 2000; Sociolinguistic Environment in East Timor: Colonial Practice and Changing Language Ecologies – Aone van Engelenhoven, Leiden University • 2006; Ita-nia Nasaun Oin-Ida, Ita-nia Dalen Sira Oin-Seluk: Our Nation is One, Our Languages are Different – Kerry Taylor-Leech, Griffith University • 2008; Language and identity in East Timor 6

Lit Review • Dennis Preston, 1982 – From performance-based dialectology to perceptual dialectology – Performance-based rely on professional elicitation and analysis of observed behavior – Perceptual rely on opinions and experiences of non-professionals – Why is this important? 7

Lit Review • Currently, studies tend to focus on macro- areas in the West – Bucholtz, Mary, et al. (2007) “Hella Nor Cal or Totally So Cal?: The Perceptual Dialectology of California” – Fought, Carmen. (2002) “California Students’ Perceptions of, You Know, Regions and Dialects?” – Purschke, Christoph. (2011) “Regional linguistic knowledge and perception: on the conceptualization of Hessian” 8

Research Questions • Anecdotes suggesting that certain people tend to settle in certain places: – What are Dili resident’s perceptions of language use in Dili? • What factors influence perceptions of language use in Dili? 9

Methods 10

Methods • Distribution – Student Training – Problems • map culture, labels • group mentality • infrastructure • Metadata entered in Excel for qualitative analysis in R – total word counts, total language labels, unique language labels, demographic groups, etc. • Quadrat analysis 11

Participants Participant's Age Participant's Years Lived in Dili 30 60 25 20 50 Years Years 15 40 10 30 5 20 0 F M F M Mean of both groups=26 Mean of both groups=13 12

Participants 10 8 19 3 3 2 9 5 7 2 5 1 2 13

40yo; F; Baucau; 17 years in Dili 14

24yo; F; Baucau; 2 years in Dili 15

20yo; M; Dili; 20 years in Dili Mother tongues become like district identities for each person in East Timor and one feels proud to bring and preserve those languages there into the international world. 16

24yo; F; Baucau; 20 years in Dili 17

Unique Languages (20) Total Language Labels 250 198 200 182 150 113 91 100 82 69 54 50 35 32 31 30 25 13 12 6 5 4 3 1 1 0 0 0 18

Population ( p =0.9) Actual Speaker Populations and Perceived Populations in Dili 200 Mambae Makasae 150 Map Language Frequency Bunak 100 Fataluku Kemak TetunTerik 50 Naueti Tokodede Baikeno Galolen Waima'a Kairui Makalero Indonesian Midiki Idate English Rahesuk Bekais Chinese Portuguese 0 0 50000 100000 150000 19 2010 Census Language Population

Languages of One’s Own District Own-District and Non-District Languages by District 70 60 50 Total Number of Labels 40 Own-District Language 30 Non-District Language 20 10 0 20

Results - Mambae Central Timor-Leste, 130,000 speakers 21

Results - Bunak Mountain-Central Timor-Leste, 75,000 speakers 22

Results - Kemak West Timor-Leste, 72,000 speakers 23

Results - Makasae Eastern Timor-Leste, 70,000 speakers 24

Results - Fataluku Far Eastern Timor-Leste, 30,000 speakers 25

Conclusions • Maps show that respondents don’t believe certain languages to be in certain areas • Different groups (male, female, young, old, etc.) did not show significant differences of opinion • Maps show high linguistic and social awareness • Labels show that respondents’ awareness of languages roughly corresponds to their speaker populations ( p =.9) • Speakers are more likely to identify languages from outside their districts that their ‘own’ languages 26

References • BUCHOLTZ, Mary, Nancy BERMUDEZ, Victor FUNG, Lisa EDWARDS, & Rosalva VARGAS. (2007) “Hella Nor Cal or Totally So Cal?: The Perceptual Dialectology of California”, Journal of English Linguistics 35: 325-352. • D EMOCRATIC R EPUBLIC OF T IMOR -L ESTE . (2010). “Highlights of the 2010 Census Main Results in Timor- Leste . ” Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, Dili. • EVANS, Betsy E. (2002) “Attitudes of Montreal Students Towards Varieties of French”, in Daniel Long and Dennis • Preston (eds.) Handbook of Perceptual Dialectology. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 71-93. • FOUGHT, Carmen. (2002) “California Students’ Perceptions of, You Know, Regions and Dialects?”, in D. Long and D. Preston (eds.) Handbook of Perceptual Dialectology, vol. 2. Amsterdam: John Benajmins, 117-136. • HAJEK, John. (2000) “Language planning and the sociolinguistic environment in East Timor: Colonial practice and changing language ecologies.” Current Issues in Language Planning 1:400–413. • INOUE, Fumio. (1999) “Classification of dialects by image”, in Dennis Preston (ed.) Handbook of Perceptual Dialectology, vol. 2. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 161-176. • PRESTON, Dennis R. (1982) “Perceptual Dialectology: Mental maps of the United States dialects from a Hawaiian Perspective”, University of Hawai‘i Working Papers in Linguistics 14(2): 5-49. • PRESTON, Dennis R. (1989) Perceptual Dialectology. Dordrecht: Foris. • PURSCHKE, Christoph. (2011) “Regional linguistic knowledge and perception: on the conceptualization of Hessian”, Dialectologia special issue II, 91-118. • TAYLOR-LEECH, Kerry. (2008). “Language and identity in East Timor: The discourses of nation building.” Language problems and language planning , 32, 2, 153-180. • VAN ENGELENHOVEN, Aone. (2006) “Ita-nia Nasaun Oin-Ida, Ita-nia Dalen Sira Oin-Seluk: Our Nation is One, Our Languages are Different.”, in: Paulo Castro Seixas & Aone van Engelenhoven (eds) Diversidade Cultural na Construção da Nação e do Estado em Timor-Leste (pp. 106-131), Porto: Fernando Pessoa University Press. 27