Zoya Proshina The abc and Controversies of World Englishes ббк 81
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Russian EnglishRussian speakers of English belong to the Expanding Circle where, as compared with the countries of the Outer Circle:
English in Russia is a school subject included in the curricula of almost every secondary school, de facto rather than de jure. It is not a mandatory foreign language to be studied, though such a discipline as Foreign Language is compulsory in every school curriculum. Nevertheless, although not imposed by law or regulation, English is the most commonly taught of all foreign languages. Whereas the majority of schools begin English classes at the middle school stage (5th grade and on), there is a clear tendency to reduce the age at which learners begin, and more and more schools have been introducing optional (and sometimes mandatory) English courses as early as first grade. The number of Russian schoolchildren studying English approximates 14 to 16 million (Ustinova 2005: 245). Even kindergartens, in order to be considered prestigious and high-ranking, hire English teachers to conduct 20 or 30-minute classes or games in English. Many well-to-do parents are eager to have their children enrolled in schools with an intensive English program (normally, education in Russia is free, but the so-called English-specialized schools are highly-competitive and parents are ready to pay considerable sums of money for their child to be admitted to such a school). Though English is not an obligatory entrance exam for every university, school or college, this language is predominant in university curricula. About 3.8 million (out of 4.7 million) of students learn English at the university level (Ustinova 2005: 245). English language programs for part-time students who are certified as specialists in a particular sphere but need a better knowledge of English for their career are also very popular – thus doctors, engineers, economists and lawyers take evening courses in the English department. So the situation in Russia’s education system clearly shows the English language boom: “an unquenchable thirst for knowledge of English” (Ter-Minasova 2005: 451). English is a working language in the Russian divisions of many large transnational companies like Samsung, Mars, Coca-Cola, a.o. It is not infrequent to find intensive code-mixing and code-switching in the staff written and oral communication at these companies. English is most popular in Russian advertisement and commercials (Ustinova & Bhatia 2005). According to the research conducted by Tej Bhatia (2001) and Irina Ustinova (2005: 249), the four main structural components of advertisement – product name (RED, a tariff rate of the MTC, Greenfield tea), company name or logo (shops: Funny Angel, Sweet Mama, Foot Land in Nakhodka; travel agencies Pacific Line, Double Step Travel, Lucky Tours, car repair shops Auto Oasis, Car; banks Trust, CIT Finance Investment Bank in Vladivostok and many others), wrappers or labels (Finely Selected Specialty Tea; Kid’s Clothing Company; Funny Things From All The World), and slogans (Digitally yours; Ideas for life; It’s different; You and only you) are most often created in English. Ironically, but Cyrillic letters are frequently used to transcribe an English name: Лоджистик Лайн, Визард, НЬЮ ТАЙМС, Старфиш, or a Russian-English mixture is used: Бубль-Гум. Kid’s super center. There are also reverse phenomena – names of companies (especially shops) transliterated from Russian into English, which brings exotic and prestigious flavor to the name: the shop Shik & Blesk, a cosmetics supermarket Zaichiki; the club for men Povesa. Letter mixture is also typical: e.g., the kid’s clothes shop СлаDкие Dетки, the movie theater ИллюZION, the clothes shop «Кульt Личносtи» can be found in Vladivostok. According to sociolinguistic research, every year the number of English-language advertisement steadily increases in Russian cities. Thus, in the Yakut city of Neryungri, the number of English names for shops, cafes, and other services made up 4 % in 1994, 13 % in 1998, and 19 % in 2004. (Нерюнгри 2006) After perestroika, almost every big Russian city started publishing English language newspapers. They are mostly intended for foreign businessmen and are generally launched by native speakers who are editors while many reporters and translators are Russians (Vladivostok News; Vladivostok Times; Sakhalin Times; Sakhalin Independent, etc.). In 2005 there emerged a new TV channel in English, RTTV, Russia Today, which broadcasts news reflecting Russia’s position concerning latest events. English has been entering other media (TV programs, radio, internet, books), especially in the form of code-mixing that functions as “an English-Russian language play” (Rivlina 2007). Some examples are books of fiction that can be found in any bookstore today: Sergey Minaev Духless (дух “soul”); Irina Khakamada Sex в большой политике (“Sex in a big politics”), Lena Lenina МультиMILLIONAIRES (MultiMILLIONAIRS); Oksana Robsky Про любoff/on (About love + off/on); Tatyana Ogorodnikova Брачный коNтракт или Who is ху…(Marriage coNtract, or Who is who). Tremendous is the role of English in Russian youth musical subcultures where it has “remained an identity marker of music circles, and served as an icon of modernity, freedom and high culture” permeating into most musical genres - jazz, rock, folk, hip-hop, and Russian pop music (Eddy 2007). Perfomers not only sing American songs but also create their own lyrics in English. However, the nativized variety, Russia / Russian English9, is not unanimously accepted within the country. To gain the status of a local variety in the Expanding Circle, Russia English, with its cross-linguistic and cross-cultural peculiarities, must be approved of by both its speakers and international communicators (Crystal 1998: 86). However, in Russia the attitude to the status of English used by Russians is complex and problematic. A sociolinguistic survey, conducted among 232 students majoring in English and 39 faculty members at Far Eastern National University (Vladivostok), Sakhalin State University (Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk), and Amur State University (Blagoveschensk) from autumn 2004 to spring 2005, was to uncover the attitude of Russian speakers to the idea of Russia English as a local variety of ELF (See the full description of the survey findings in (Proshina 2006) The faculty members were asked some questions including: Which variety of English do you speak? The answer determined a choice of American English, British English, Russia English, a mixture (specify), and ‘I don't know’. This question implied only one answer; however, some respondents, while choosing ‘a mixture,’ wanted to emphasize the priority of the components in the mixture and thus ticked two answers, e.g., ‘American English’ and ‘a mixture’. The answers about the self-identification of the variety of English used by our teachers revealed the following (Fig. 14): 13% of the teachers believe that they speak only American English; 31% consider themselves to be speakers of only British English (since the British model of English prevailed in all Russian schools before the perestroika period); 13% identified the variety they use as a mixture of British and American English, and only 5% said they speak Russia English, though 44 % are aware that they speak a mixture including English influenced by their native Russian. F The questionnaire given to students included the following questions: 1) Which varieties of English would you like to study most of all and least of all? (the students were to rank their preferences from 1, maximum, to 6, minimum) The answers were to be chosen among American English; British English; Australian English; East Asian Englishes; Russian English; and ‘I do not care’. 2) What variety of English do you use when communicating with foreigners? A multiple choice of answers comprised British English; American English; Russia English; a mixture; and ‘I do not know’. The answers to the first question about the preferred English variety to study (Fig. 15) revealed that 63% of the respondents prefer to study American English, 48% would like to study British English, 10% give preference to Australian English; 6% are aware of the need to study specific features of East Asian Englishes, 5% choose Russian English, and 3% of the respondents prove to be indifferent (the percentage was counted by the maximal rating number). When commenting on the Russia variety of English, students claimed that “it is difficult to conceive what Russia English is” or “it is interesting to study Russia English, but for us it is of no use.” These comments indicate low awareness of the nativised variety of English in Russia. Fig. 15. Students’ preference of the variety of English to study
The answers to the second question revealed the following (Fig. 16): 20% of the students believe that when communicating with foreigners they speak American English, 7% think they use British English; 6% are aware that they speak Russian English; 59% acknowledge that their English is a mixture, and 8% find it difficult to give a definite answer. The last option can be accounted for by the students’ theoretical unawareness of the differences in the varieties of English (though this question did not presuppose comments, some students wrote their explanations, “I simply cannot differentiate between the varieties since I do not know the theory of difference. I automatically use both British and American words without noticing it and I suppose I have strong Russian accent.”) Fig. 16. Students’ opinions of varieties of English they use for communicating with foreigners
We see that most students are aware of the influence of their native Russian on the variety of English they use. However few students claim that their variety of English is Russia English. Since at school they are geared to American or British norms they believe that they rely on these norms and speak American or British English (especially regarding grammatical structures and lexical uses) with a Russian phonetic accent. Predominance of American English over British English is typical of the Russian Far East; in the European part of Russia the picture might be reverse. These findings of the survey stress the dependence of Russians on native speakers’ models. By way of comparison, a similar study done by Willard Shaw (1983) revealed that students from Singapore and India (the Outer Circle) showed the awareness and a preference for speaking in their ethnic variety of English (“their own way") used by educated Singaporeans and Asian Indians, though Singapore students divided their preferences almost equally between British English and Singaporean English (38.3% and 38.9% respectively, the difference being only 0.6%). 47.4% of the Indian respondents chose to learn and to speak Indian English and only 28.5% preferred to study British English. However, in Thailand (like Russia, referring to the Expanding Circle) students prefer learning British English (49.1% vs. 3.5% for Thai English) (Shaw, 1983).
This comparison leads us to the conclusion that the attitude of speakers to their local variety of English is quite positive in the Outer Circle countries but rather controversial in the Expanding Circle countries. While the Outer Circle speakers take pride in being identified as users of their peculiar variety of English, speakers in the Expanding Circle are oriented towards Inner Circle norms and tend to perfect their English by imitating native speakers. From this experiment we can conclude that the status of Russia English as a local variety, one of the world Englishes, is not strong enough in Russia. Neither teachers nor students are fully aware of the fact that we are using Russia English as a lingua franca. There are even voices rejecting local English as a variety in Russia (Cафонова 2000). However, the majority of the respondents understand that their English is a mixture of Standard American, British norms (Queen's English), and elements formed under the influence of their native Russian language and culture. They are just not accustomed to the concept of Russia (or Russian) English. The attitude towards Russian English is mainly negative. Russia English (as well as Russian English) is associated with broken, bad English rather than with a lingua franca able to convey Russian culture and Russian mentality to other nations. We need an "attitudinal readjustment" (Kachru 1983: 85) about Russia English. Although the status of the English language used in Russia is still a subject for domestic debate, it is quite evident that Russia English, as it is spoken and written by educated Russians, can be characterized by certain features deviating from the British or American standards. These deviations are noticeable at all language levels: phonetic, morphological, syntactical and semantic. For example, in the phonetic level Russia English is characterized by
Morphological deviations are numerous, the most important being as follows:
Syntactical deviations are manifested in the following ways:
Semantic deviations are various and numerous. The most typical ones might be categorized as follows:
Lexical innovations of Russia English include:
Pragmatic deviations are most stable for they are related to the source (Russian, in our case) culture:
No doubt, a lot is to be done yet in Russia to raise the awareness of Russia English and to foster the appreciation of it. Russia English, stigmatized as a mistaken variety, is still an unadopted child in Russian linguistics. But this variety is a vehicle for conveying Russian culture and, considered in its acrolectal level, it should be regarded as a means to tell our identity and to spread our culture. It is impossible but agree with Larry Smith when he argues that “Although they [our students] will want to know a great deal about other people and other cultures, they should remember that they can only be themselves. English is a means to communicate to the rest of the world their identity, culture, politics, religion, and ‘way of life’ ” (Smith L. 1983b: 9). Questions to discuss: 78. Is Russia English institutional or performing variety? 79. Are there any other uses of English in Russia that are not mentioned in this chapter? Which function of English do you find most prominent these days as compared with pre-perestroika period? 80. Here are some names of modern Russian American authors. Using the Internet sources find some material about them and present your findings in class: Anya Ulinich: http://www.zeek.net/703book/ Lara Vapnyar: http://www.bookbrowse.com/biographies/index.cfm?author_number=957
Olga Grushin: http://www.olgagrushin.com/pb/wp_00123021/wp_00123021.html?0.9316744003126745 Gary Shteyngart: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Shteyngart
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ig. 14. Faculty’s self-labeling of the variety of their English
