[Mihalic] Korapsen

[Janna Zimmermann]

Hi All,

I am by no means suggesting that the variety used by Wantok is good.
On the contrary. As has been noted, e.g. by John Burton, the variety used is heavily influenced by English.
But quite honestly: In a country where the language of education is English as of grade three, with no standardization of Tok Pisin, what can you expect?
It is hard to determine the number of readers Wantok has. But it IS the only newspaper published in TP. Therefore, one must assume that it definitely influences its readers – and the variety Wantok uses is situated at the urban end of the Creole continuum.
Even if Tok Pisin creates a sense of togetherness for lots of people, the prestige of English is rather high. And despite the effort of linguists, who for decades have recommended the standardization of Tok Pisin, nothing has happened so far.
So unless something changes soon, I’m afraid English will creep into Tok Pisin more and more. 

Best regards,
Janna



> A cheer for that, John. What is all this changed spelling nonsense all
> about? For everyone it makes things twice as hard to read. 
> 
>    "urban PNG English is constantly subject to TP influence"--that's
> something worth pursuing yet. I remember the Education Research Unit #25
> many years ago giving standard deviations in PNG English, with the
> implication that these should be standardized within the national
> boundaries.
> 
>     Dispela raita em i save tru. This writer they knew what they were
> talking about.
> 
>          Pat Gesch
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: mihalic-bounces at anu.edu.au [mailto:mihalic-bounces at anu.edu.au] On
> Behalf Of John Burton
> Sent: Monday, 23 November 2009 9:10 AM
> To: mihalic at anu.edu.au
> Subject: [Mihalic] Korapsen
> 
> IMHO both examples illustrate that what is seen in Wantok is only a 
> stilted subregister of TP, because it is mostly English-language news 
> (or news gathering in predominantly English-dominated contexts by BA 
> Journalism graduates) translated into TP. Spoken TP is holding its own 
> perfectly well in its urban varieties (or you might say urban PNG 
> English is constantly subject to TP influence), but that's not what is 
> being written down. What is a "skwat", for example? Why not simply write 
> "National Fraud and Anti-Corruption Squad"? I don't buy the idea that 
> Wantok's readers would be confused by English - all literate enough to 
> bother to read a newspaper have surely done several grades of schooling, 
> none of it in TP until quite recently.
> 
> The above is only a rant against Wantok. When "korapsen" was first heard 
> in TP is a separate topic. I certainly heard "korapt" in village TP way 
> back when.
> 
> John Burton
> 
> Janna Zimmermann wrote:
> > Hello Everyone,
> >
> > I am currently doing my PhD on the increasing Anglicization of Tok Pisin.
> > I have compiled a corpus of several hundred texts from the Wantok Niuspepa
> (from 1973 - 2004).
> > With only 2 occurrences, it is not exactly a common word within the
> corpus.
> > But the first example is from 1993, so the word has been 'around' for some
> time.
> > I would say that it has been integrated into Tok Pisin.
> >
> > "Dipatmen i bosim wok bilong painim na lukautim pis insait long kantri i
> odaim pinis ol lain bilong Nesenel Fraud na Enti Korapsen skwat long sekap
> long ol wok bilong Kerema Be Fiseris kampani." (Page 3, 1993, February 25)
> > "Insait long dispela pas, Mista Howard i tok olsem Australia i laikim bai
> PNG i mas lukluk long stretim dispela hevi bilong korapsen insait long ol
> gavman dipatmen, na givim tok orait long larim Australia i salim ol opisa
> bilong ol i kam na wok insait long ol bikpela posisen long ol gavman
> dipatmen." (Page 3, 2003, September 4)
> >
> > Does this help?
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Janna
> >   
> >
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----------------------------- 
Janna Zimmermann
Theaterstr. 7
69117 Heidelberg
Tel.: +49 - (0)6221 - 893 51 51
Mob.: +49 - (0)179 - 14 39 246

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