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In Week 4 we studied covered language and place. I was intrigued by Braj Kachru's (1985) 'Circles of English' theory that is mentioned in the Van Herk reading for the week. The theory places India in the outer circle—that is, it is a place where English is important as a consequence of ~200 years of British colonialism. English is not the first language of most people in India (or at least not the only first language) yet it is an official language. Given that the Indian subcontinent is home to at least 4 different language families and over 500 languages, English is often used as a lingua franca, especially in the non–Hindi-speaking Dravidian south. English enjoys overt prestige by being mandated in various educational, legal, political, and otherwise public spheres. Additionally, fluency in educated British-like varieties of English is seen as intelligent, modern, sophisticated, and global. Young urban people (and educated older people) take pride in their variety of English; they are usually pretty aware of how different it sounds than inner circle varieties. Even non-anglophones in India are exposed to some degree of English through media, advertisement, foreign language education—or even the ubiquitous use of English loanwords for newer terms. The ubiquity of English in India coupled with the not very high % of people who speak English as a first language means that Indian English probably has more L2 users than native speakers. An interesting observation is that despite the rich linguistic diversity of the Indian subcontinent, native speakers speak a uniform kind of Indian English throughout the area. I've listed some of the features of Indian English in the post below.

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Pronunciation:
-Deaspiration of plosives /p/, /t/, /k/.

- Retroflexion of /t/ and /d/ to /ʈ / and /ɖ / (e.g.: /ɖɑɡ/ for 'dog').

-/v/ - /w/ merger or replacement with ⁄ ʋ/ (e.g: /ʋaɪn/ for both 'wine' and 'vine')

- Replacement of diphthongs /eɪ/ and  /əʊ/ with  /eː/ /oː/ respectively. (/ɖeːʈ/ for 'date')

Lexicon:
- Pre-pone as the opposite of 'postpone'. (E.g.: Let's pre-pone the appointment)

- Timepass for procrastinating and/or doing nothing particularly noteworthy. (E.g.: "I'm not busy, just doing timepass").

- Pass out for 'graduate' (E.g.: "I passed out of school some four years ago.")

- Mugging for learning by rote. (E.g.: I had to mug the entire textbook to study for the exam.)

Grammar/Morphology:
- Use of progressive aspect with for stative verbs (E.g.: "I was having two books" instead of "I had two books".)

-  Reduplication as intensification (E.g.: "My grandmother told many many stories" or "I don't know how she drinks such hot hot coffee".)

- Modals often do not undergo subject-aux inversion (E.g.: "Who you will come with?" or "What she was eating?")

- 'only' or 'itself' as focus markers (E.g.: "I didn't know that only" for "I didn't even know that", "Could we meet tomorrow itself?" for "Could we meet tomorrow" with a sense of urgency).

- Question tagging with 'na' (E.g.: "It's hot outside, na?" for "It's hot outside, isn't it?".

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Teacher sitting on your head? Friend eating your brain? The British Council's Steven Baker picks out ten expressions you will otherwise only discover by going to India.
Did you know there are more users of English in India than in the United Kingdom, Australia, United States, New Zealand and South Africa combined? Not only that, but the colourful Hindi-to-English translations, and use of what would be considered archaic vocabulary elsewhere, mean that Indian English is like no other variety on earth. Here are a few examples:
1. 'I am doing my graduation in London'
We often think of our graduation as the ceremony where you dress up in a gown and cap to collect your degree certificate after three years of early-morning lectures and late-night studying. Not in India. Here, your graduation isn't about that one special day, but refers to the full undergraduate course. 'I did my graduation at the University of London' is the equivalent of saying 'I studied for my degree at the University of London'.
2. 'I passed out of college'
When someone passes out, your first response may be to loosen their collar and get a cold towel. Fear not, in India, passing out has little to do with fainting or falling unconscious. It actually links to number one on the list. 'I passed out' from this college or that university is the Indian-English way of saying 'I graduated'.
3. 'My neighbour is foreign-returned'
Studying abroad is a popular option for Indian students. Being 'foreign-returned' - i.e., returning to India after living in another country - is seen as a good way to improve one's chances of landing a job. It is also an asset in the matrimonial adverts you find in Indian newspapers every Sunday.
4. 'My daughter is convent-educated'
A further expression found in matrimonial ads. To be 'convent-educated' is another way of saying that you studied in a school where the medium of instruction was English. The expression dates back to a time when teaching in India was often delivered by members of the clergy.
5. 'I belong to Delhi'
Ask the question 'Where are you from?' in the UK, and you will get a response such as 'I'm from London' or 'I'm from Manchester'. In India, you are more likely to hear allegiance to a city: 'I belong to Delhi' or 'I belong to Mumbai'.
6. 'Where's the nearest departmental store?'
When Bollywood actors visit the UK, shopping is often at the top of their list of things to do. Department stores like Selfridges and Harrods are especially popular. If a Hindi film star ever stops you in the street and asks for directions to the nearest 'departmental store', you now know where to direct them.
7. 'My teacher is sitting on my head'
'Tell your teacher to get down' might sound like the correct response. The expression, however, is a direct translation of the Hindi statement 'Mera teacher mere sir pe betha hai' - a colloquial way of complaining 'My teacher is stressing me out'.
8. 'My friend is eating my brain'
Don't worry, you won't need to pass the salt. A similar Hindi-to-English translation to number seven, 'My friend is eating my brain' ('Mera friend mera dimag kha raha hai') is a somewhat informal way of saying that your friend won't stop talking.
9. 'Monkey cap'
We often think of India as being extremely hot, but in the north of the country, the winters can get surprisingly chilly. Head to five-degree Delhi in December and you will see lots of people in 'monkey caps' - a descriptive Indian-English name for the good old balaclava.
10. 'Why This Kolaveri Di?'
Which foreign language pop song has had 98,439,949 views on YouTube (last time I checked)? Gangnam Style by Korean pop star Psy may seem like the obvious answer - but you would be wrong. It's actually the Tamil film track Why This Kolaveri Di?, which went viral in 2011. With Tamil and English, or 'Tanglish' lyrics, actor-singer Dhanush provides vocals on this down-tempo, acoustic folk tune. For such a sweetly sung song, the title actually translates as 'Why This Murderous Rage, Girl?'.
Find out how much India matters to the UK in our India Matters report.

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Ten surprising expressions in Indian English

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Teacher sitting on your head? Friend eating your brain? The British Council's Steven Baker picks out ten expressions you will otherwise only discover by going to India. Did you know there are more users of English in India than in the United Kingdom, Australia, United States, New Zealand and South Africa combined?

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Don't prepone it - do the needful. 10 Indianisms we should all be using | Kavitha Rao

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Indianisms are a perfectly valid form of English - as are Americanisms - excluded only by rank snobbery. They should form part of our language's global vocabulary

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The Hinglish song I chose that implements code-switching is ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ [Translation: ‘In the last seven days’] from the 2008 Bollywood film Rock On!!. Not only do vocalist Farhan Akhtar and his band code-switch between Hindi and English throughout the song, but they also take it upon themselves to ‘code-switch’ between a modern Anglo/Euro rock band-beat and a Bollywood song-and-dance melody + vibe. Given that Rock On!! was one of the first Bollywood films about an aspiring rock band, ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ was created to sound like it was written by young rock musicians from Urban India, in what would probably be their parlance.

Based on my experiences growing up in India (and based on some quick Google searches on Hindi-English code-switching), Hindi would be the more popular language in the kinship, emotions, and even entertainment domains while English would be dominant in the education, employment, technicality domains. English is associated with Westernisation, social mobility, educational privilege, and internationalism in India, and it definitely carries a higher prestige than Hindi and regional dialects in most urban situations. (Although it is not always prestigious in politics, law, religion etc). The use of Hindi syntax with English lexical items in ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ then makes sense, given the categorisation of either language based on the domains they are dominant in in South Asia. After all this metaphorical code switching---i.e. use of languages as a sociolinguistic resource when one is familiar with their social meanings in a given context---might be the most prevalent kind of code-switching in South Asia (although situational code-switching for school/work-home situations is very common too).

In the given video, the singer frequently uses sandwiched English-Hindi phrases like ‘meri laundry ka ek bill’ (my laundry bill), ‘meri denim ki jacket’ (my denim jacket), ‘present mili ek ghadi’ (a ‘present-received watch’ = a watch given to me as a present) to talk about more materialistic items associated with urban life, just like a young person in Mumbai or New Delhi might. Similarly, words that are influences of technology or other cultures like ‘paper’, ‘party’, ‘phone number’, ‘sunglasses’, ‘packet’ etc., that may not have a very commonly used Hindi equivalent, are bound to be remain in English in everyday speech (albeit phoneticised according to Hinglish rules). The style-shifting element of such code-switching is particularly evident in the use of the English words like ‘ring’, ‘heart’, ‘king’---it’s highly unlikely that the singer chooses to use English here because of a lexical gap because the Hindi equivalents of all three of those words are commonly accepted and used all over Hindi-speaking India, and yet a young urban Indian speaker might style-shift to English there just to show their modernity, educational background, affinity towards multiculturalism etc. South Asian youth are frequently mocked by linguistically pure ‘elders’ in the society for our code-switched speech to such an extent that code-switched Hinglish like in ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ is now our characteristic way of speaking. If the song used no English words throughout, it couldn’t possibly have sounded like something written by an aspiring Indian rock band. Conversely, if the song didn’t almost entirely switch to Hindi in the paragraph, it might have seemed odd to intrusively insert English words into the emotional, almost soliloquous expression of the singer’s revelations about ‘true love’. Like many other emotionally-motivated topics, love falls under the domain of expressive, traditional Hindi rather than technical, international English.

It should be mentioned that Bollywood Hinglish is already one of the major linguistic ‘codes’ that bring South Asia, its diaspora, and people who wish to connect with South Asian culture together---the idea is that regardless of the extent of one’s familiarity with Hindi, it’s not hard to follow a Bollywood movie because of the 1) expressive body language 2) sound effects 3) constant English use! However, ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ does use more Hinglish code-switching than the typical Bollywood movie, and more importantly, does so in ways that would parallel the code-switching of urban South Asian youth.

Additionally, it’s important to note that not all songs on the Rock On!! soundtrack employ code-switching as extensively as ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ does---some are completely in Hindi, and that makes the alternation between English and Hindi in this song even more interesting. There must be a reason for ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ to explicitly incorporate the native Hinglish speech of much of India’s youth into this song, but not as much into other songs on the movie soundtrack. This may perhaps because in the movie this song was the band’s initial claim to fame and needed to sound more like the Western rock it is inspired by. Or, it might be because the songwriters needed the song to sound like rock in a way that a young aspiring rock band from Hinglish India might actually create it---in expertly code-switched Hinglish rather than purely in one of the two languages. In my opinion, ‘Pichle saat dino mein’ makes a great case for the view that Hinglish, rather than colonial English and Hindu-nationalist (connoting) Hindi, is the lingua franca of young, urban South Asia.

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Pichle Saat Dino Mein (HQ Audio) - Rock On [2008]

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Lyrics of 'Pichle saat dino mein' in red, English translation of the verse in black in the link below.

(Note: either this is the translation of the radio-edited version, or whoever wrote the lyrics mistranslated "mary jane ka ek packet" [=a packet of marijuana] as "meri jeb ka ek packet" [=a packet of/in my pocket].)

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Pichle Saat Dino Mein - Bollywood Song Lyrics Translations

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BollyNook- BOLLYWOOD Nook- MOVIES SUBTITLES & SONGS lyrics TRANSLATIONS, in numerous languages!

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Lyrics of the Hinglish song 'Pichle saat dino mein' with the English parts bolded:

meri laundry ka ek bill
ik aadhi padhi novel
ek ladki ka phone number
mere kaam ka ek paper
mere, taash se heart ka king
mera, ik chaandi ka ring
pichhle saat dinon mein maine khoya
kabhi khud pe hansa main,
aur
kabhi khud pe roya

present mili ek ghadi
pyaari thi mujhe badi
mary jane ka ek packet
meri denim ki jacket
do one-day match ke passes
mere naye naye sunglasses
pichhle saat dinon mein maine khoya
kabhi khud pe hansa main,
aur
kabhi khud pe roya

kaise, bhoolun, saatva jo din aaya
kisi ne, tumse, ik party mein milwaaya
kaisa, pal tha, jis pal maine tumko pehli baar dekha tha
hum jo mile pehli baar
maine jaanaa kya hai pyaar
maine hosh bhi khoya dil bhi khoya
kabhi khud pe hansa main,
aur
kabhi khud pe roya
maine pichhle saat dino mein
ye sab hai, khoya..

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The ‘rapper’ I chose who shifts their group identity in a way that is demonstrated in their language is Iggy Azalea. I chose Azalea as my example because in spite of growing up in a small, white, rural Australian town, she has a seemingly well-rehearsed blaccent when she ‘raps’. Of course, this blaccent is nonexistent in her casual speech, which could be considered very close to Standard Australian English. Based on Azalea’s song ‘Fancy’, and an interview she gave on an Australian talk show, I’ve marked some features of African American English that her rapper persona takes on but her regular speech completely lacks:

Azalea's blaccent ~ Azalea's casual speech

PRONUNCIATION

“That” 2:58 [d] ~ [ð] 2:51 (fortition)

“First” 0:11 r-full ~ 1:57 r-less

(AAE is also r-less in many contexts, but the stressed syllabic ‘r’ like in ‘first’ is less likely to drop, if at all. In Australian English it always drops in this context. This r-fullness, unlike other features mentioned here, is applicable to most varieties of AmE, rather than particular to AAE.)

GRAMMAR

“I been” [working] 1:28 ~ “I’ve been” [thinking] 9:22 (uninflected ‘be’)

Never turn down nothing 2:32 ~ never wanna go anywhere [vs nowhere] 10:59 (negative concord)

AAE LEXICON from 'Fancy'

“Stuntin” ~ ???? 2:17

“My flow r******d” 1:05

“Slayin’ these hoes” 2:34

Through her use of features of African American English exclusively in her ‘rap’ music, Azalea shows that she is willing to profit from culture that Black people have created--without interrogating or even acknowledging her privileged position as a conventionally attractive white woman in hip-hop. Azalea herself might think that her popularity is a testament to how multiracial and global the hip-hop community is getting, and yet the way that she shows that hip-hop is apparently moving away from its Black roots is by performatively using AAE as a part of her linguistic repertoire. In other words, although Iggy Azalea’s entire raison d’être is telling the world that “foreign white girls can do hip-hop too”, she is clearly unable to do so without her rap persona intricately performing Blackness through speech and appearance. In Azalea’s case, it is almost obvious that the way she wishes to mark her wannabe ‘Blackness’ is through her language. She unapologetically uses AAE beyond how any other Australian rapper who just happens to rap with an American accent (as many do) might care or know to use. It's worth asking if Azalea would have her entire shtick of being able to 'make it' in hip hop despite being white, female, and Australian if it wasn't for her performance of Blackness (she wouldn't).

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Iggy Azalea - Interview live on The Today Show Australia (19 August 2015)

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Daily Mail is a British tabloid that has been widely criticised for its lack of credibility, including when it comes to research on language and gender. It is a prime example of a 'news source' misrepresenting scientific data and findings to further a particular political agenda that protects the rights of a structurally powerful group--men in this case. In both of the articles that I chose, Daily Mail misrepresents or manipulates data and makes hasty generalisations to forward a biologically-deterministic, patriarchal agenda.

In the article that exemplifies Lakoff’s dominance model, a study examining the use of uptalk across different social groups is misrepresented to show how “American men have started to talk like WOMEN”, as the headline exemplifies. While the study shows that uptalk was used by all the speakers regardless of class, ethnicity, gender etc, Daily Mail wishes to further the association between uptalk and “insecure, shallow Valley girls”, and mock the ‘uniquely American’ problem of men starting to talk like ‘dumb, powerless, hesitant’ women.  The article uses the study’s findings to misconclude that men’s apparent tendency to talk like a group less structurally powerful than their own could “damage their career potential”, even though the research that the article presents clearly debunks associations between uptalk and insecurity. Here, a specific, studied linguistic feature, uptalk, is being used to validate Daily Mail’s vague patriarchal generalities rooted in maintaining a status quo where men stay more powerful than women. The tabloid tries to further the notion that women speak with less certainty and that their speech is ‘shallow’ and ‘undesirable’, to the extent of ruining men’s careers when they co-opt the “way women speak”. Daily Mail’s claim that “lower pitched voices are linked to dominant behaviour, because deep voices are related to high testosterone levels” outrightly demonstrates their belief that high testosterone levels  can be correlated with “dominant behaviour” (whatever that means), even though the research they quote says nothing of the sort.

In the article that exemplifies Tannen’s difference model, the apparently higher amount of the protein 'Foxp2' in women’s brains is used to justify their apparent tendency to talk more. Of course, Daily Mail is trying to validate the scientifically-unbacked but patriarchally-desired generalisation that women talk more than men by misrepresenting flawed scientific studies, and overestimating the extent to which linguistic conclusions can be drawn from purely biologically determined models of speech (and from research on mice and 10 toddlers). The difference model is demonstrated in this article by showing the how Daily Mail manipulates almost baseless research to justify a different treatment of the genders by society so that women can be continued to be mocked for ‘talking more’, regardless of whether they actually do. Here, Daily Mail alleges that women speak more than men based on the premise that male rats, the ‘chattier’ sex when it comes to rats, have more Foxp2 in their brain. Women, the ‘chattier’ sex when it comes to humans, also have more Foxp2 in their brain, the study shows. The ‘women’ in question, of course, are limited to the female half of the ten toddlers whose Foxp2 levels were investigated. Despite the given researcher warning about “drawing big conclusions from a study of such a small number of children”, Daily Mail is adamant on confirming that women do in fact talk more. Unsurprisingly, the article ignores its own claim that female children “produce their first words and sentences earlier, have larger vocabularies and use a greater variety of sentence types than boys of the same age” when generalising that “women talk more than men” based on a study conducted on ten 3-5 year old children. Not to mention that the study done on the toddlers itself was based on data on rats, that notably cannot talk...

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- Reflects the dominance model

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American men have started to talk like WOMEN: Californian study finds that males are rising in pitch at the end of sentences

Scientists from the University of California, San Diego, recorded the voices of 24 young people and found that the 12 men they studied 'uptalked'

Uptalking or speaking like a 'valley girl' involves rising in pitch at the ends of sentences and is often associated with insecure and shallow girls

The researchers came across the finding as they tried to investigate the difference between uptalkers making a statement and asking a question

First men became enamoured with grooming regimes, but now it seems the metrosexual man has started talking in a more feminine way too.

A new study has revealed that modern men are starting to 'uptalk' by rising in pitch at the ends of sentences.

The speech pattern is associated with young women from southern California, notably Clueless lead character Cher Horowitz, but is now common amongst younger people.

Scientists came across the finding when they were trying to investigate the difference between uptalkers making a statement and asking a question.

Uptalkers are stereotypically parodied as insecure, shallow and not very clever females.

However, scientists from the University of California, San Diego, who recorded the voices of 24 young southern Californians, found that the 12 men they studied also uptalked and the speakers came from different backgrounds - not just mansions in Beverley Hills.

They were given several speech tasks, such as providing directions from a map, or recounting what happened after watching a clip from a popular sitcom.

'We found use of uptalk in all of our speakers, despite their diverse backgrounds in socio-economic status, ethnicity, bilingualism and gender,' study leader Dr Amanda Ritchart, a linguist at the university said.

The research, which was presented at the annual meeting of the Acoustical Society of America in San Francisco, identified a crucial difference between uptalkers making a statement and asking a question.

In a statement, the rise in pitch began significantly later than in a question.

But the difference was so subtle that non-uptalkers often missed it, according to Professor Amalia Arvaniti, formerly at the University of California, San Diego, who is now at the University of Kent.

'Our study busts the stereotype associated with uptalk that those who speak uptalk actually ask questions instead of make statements, a tendency that is supposed to be linked to insecurity,' she said.

'But native southern California speakers know the difference based on the exact location of the rise start, and the extent to which pitch changes in the rise.'

COULD UPTALKING DAMAGE MEN'S CAREER POTENTIAL?

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Scientists from the University of California, San Diego, recorded the voices of 24 young people and found that the 12 men they studied 'uptalked' Uptalking or speaking like a 'valley girl' involves rising in pitch at the ends of sentences and is often associated with insecure and shallow girls The researchers came across the finding as they tried to investigate the difference between uptalkers making a statement and asking a question First men became enamoured with grooming regimes, but now it seems the metrosexual man has started talking in a more feminine way too.

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- Reflects the difference model

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Sorry to interrupt, dear, but women really do talk more than men (13,000 words a day more to be precise)

Researchers have found women have higher levels of Foxp2 protein

Team from University of Maryland found male rats - the chattier gender in rodents - make more of the protein than female

Previously been claimed that woman speak 20,000 words a day

Girls learn to speak earlier and more quickly than boys

Ladies, the next time the man in your life complains you talk too much, silence him with science.

Tell him - at length, of course - it is all because of the Foxp2 protein.

It has been claimed previously that women speak about 20,000 words a day - some 13,000 more than the average man.

But now scientists have found the key to explaining why women are the more talkative sex.

A study just published suggests that higher levels of the protein are found in the female brain.

US researchers found that those with more Foxp2, known as the 'language protein', in their brains were the chattier. Among humans that was women, but in rats it was the males.

The researchers set out to determine what might make male rats more vocal than their female cage mates. They separated four-day-old pups from their mothers and counted the number of times they cried out.

Both male and female pups emitted hundreds of cries, but the males called out twice as often. As a result, when the pups were put back in the same cage as their mother, she fussed over her sons first.

Tests on the parts of the brain known to be involved in vocal calls showed the male pups to have up to twice as much Foxp2 protein as the females.

The researchers then ramped up its production in the brains of female pups and reduced it in males. This led to the female rats crying out more often and their mothers showing more interest to them.

The males in contrast, became less 'talkative', the Journal of Neuroscience reports. Next, the University of Maryland researchers tested samples from ten boys and girls aged between three and five.

This showed the girls to have 30 per cent more of the Foxp2 protein than the boys, in a brain area key to language in humans.

Researcher Margaret McCarthy said: 'Based on our observations, we postulate higher levels of Foxp2 in girls and higher levels of Foxp2 in male rats is an indication that Foxp2 protein levels are associated with the more communicative sex.'

Studies have shown that the female love of chit-chat begins at a young age. Girls learn to speak earlier and more quickly than boys. They produce their first words and sentences earlier, have larger vocabularies and use a greater variety of sentence types than boys of the same age.

However, Simon Fisher, one of the Oxford team who first pinpointed the protein, cautioned against drawing big conclusions from a study of such a small number of children.

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Sorry to interrupt, dear, but women really do talk more than men (13,000 words a day more to be precise)

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Researchers have found women have higher levels of Foxp2 protein Team from University of Maryland found male rats - the chattier gender in rodents - make more of the protein than female Previously been claimed that woman speak 20,000 words a day Girls learn to speak earlier and more quickly than boys Ladies, the next time the man in your life complains you talk too much, silence him with science.

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Referential:

https://twitter.com/_almairene/status/1045096267695583232

The use of the maple leaf emoji '🍁' and the gust of wind emoji '💨' here is referential because they are being used in combination to impart information about an event (mentioned in the previous tweet) allowing the use of cannabis. This is a truly compositional use of emoji to form a meaning dependent on the order in which the emoji are sequenced, as well as the meanings of the individual emoji themselves. While using just   '🍁' to indicate marijuana is not uncommon across social media, it is also used to embellish posts about fall. '💨'—often used to indicate speed/quickness— guarantees that only the 'marijuana-smoking' reading of '🍁'  is available here. Additionally, the use of '💨' serves to disambiguate the kind of substances allowed at this event. For example, if tobacco were allowed at the event too, the emoji-user might've preferred '🚬' instead of '💨'.   '🍁' and '💨' might individually mean 'maple leaf' and 'gust of wind', but together they may only refer to the act of marijuana consumption. (One might argue that '🍁💨' could also be used in another fall post about wind and browning leaves—context would be necessary to see which variant the emoji-user in question is referring to). Additionally, the order of emoji sequencing is relevant too. '💨🍁' would not be nearly as parsable to mean 'marijuana smoking' as  '🍁💨' .

The emoji-user chooses the shortest, most informative, and least vague way of specifying exactly what kind of substance use would be permitted at their girls' night out; thus I think their use of ' 🍁💨' is successful. They also make sure to take into account the audience of the tweet, and know that their audience would be familiar with the user's online register and interested in this fact about the event. In other words, the emoji-user is aware that the invitees of the night out understand the use of  ' 🍁💨' , and that the invitees might find this information relevant.

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The variant of the Hindi pronouns /mɛ̃/ (1p. sg. NOM) or /mɛ̃ne/ (1p. sg. ERG) that exemplifies covert prestige in Bambaiyya (Mumbai) Hindi is /ʌpʊn/, sometimes pronounced /ʌpʊŋ/. The variant /ʌpʊn/ comes from the Marathi inclusive ‘we’ (1p. pl. NOM) /ɑːpəŋ/. Marathi is the regional language of the state Mumbai is located in. Both Marathi and Hindi are politically powerful in Mumbai, and their use is linked to pride in one’s regional and national identities, respectively.

/ʌpʊn/ is considered prescriptively incorrect in Standard Hindi, and is mostly used in very informal settings. When its use exemplifies covert prestige and in-group membership, it may only be used when talking to another perceived member of the speech community. Even those who use /ʌpʊn/ with out-group members will use /mɛ̃/ in extremely formal (i.e. school, work) or written contexts. There’s no overt prestige associated with using it, even in contexts where the ability to code-switch between Hindi and Marathi is seen as prestigious.

The use of /ʌpʊn/ is most commonly viewed as covertly prestigious by speakers of Mumbai Street Hindi (‘ʈʌpoɾi’ speak). One of the notable attributes of ‘ʈʌpoɾi’ speak is how it’s considered prestigious to intersperse the national Hindi with more local Marathi slang to linguistically signal one’s unique Bambaiyya identity. The /ʌpʊn/ variant of ‘ʈʌpoɾi’ speak is often associated with young, urban, working class men—especially those that have a lot of social capital via connections to the Mumbai underworld/gangs (or want to appear like they do, perhaps).

Speakers of Mumbai Hindi outside of the aforementioned social demographics are unlikely to find the use of /ʌpʊn/ prestigious, and probably do not use it in their speech at all. In almost any context of Bambaiyya Hindi, /ʌpʊn/ would be considered impolite if used by a woman or non-man, no matter their socioeconomic class. In the two Bollywood songs I’ve linked to show instances of /ʌpʊn/ exemplifying covert prestige, each protagonist is supposed to represent a lower middle class, street-smart, rogueish man in Mumbai. The connection made between ‘ʈʌpoɾi’ speak like /ʌpʊn/ and the speech of urban working class ‘bad boys’—especially when they’re talking to other in-group members—is so common that it’s a popular Bollywood trope now, like the Business Line article I posted shows. However, in day-to-day speech too, /ʌpʊn/ still goes on to successfully reflect a certain working-class, masculine, informal, and distinctly Bambaiyya identity—to speakers of Bambaiyya Hindi, Standard Hindi, and other varieties of Hindi alike.

(The title says "I'm a ʈʌpoɾi" in ʈʌpoɾi Hindi, the Standard Hindi version would be "mɛ̃ ʈʌpoɾi hũ")

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/ʌpʊn/ appears as the first word of the first two sentences sung in the song (0:25), and several times after. In the same song, the standard variant /mɛ̃ne/ (1p. sing. erg) is also used at 1:36.

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Apun Bola Tu Meri Laila Full Video Song | Josh | Shahrukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai, Priya Gill

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In India, advertisements for Amul Butter—featuring the ‘Amul girl’, a household name—are self-contained units of (usually) humorous cultural, social, and political discourse in Hinglish, the lingua franca of much of ‘educated’ + expertly code-switching South Asia.

New Amul Butter ads appear weekly in newspapers, on billboards, online, on television, and are almost always immediate reactions to or commentaries on current events, politics, Bollywood, sports, and other pertinent themes. The most interesting feature of these advertisements is that they are targeted to a smaller subset of Amul Butter consumers in India. While Amul has a monopoly over dairy products (milk, ghee, butter, cheese etc.) in a country that loves dairy, its butter advertisements can only be consumed by Hindi-English bilinguals who are informed not only about Indian politics and Bollywood, (local + national context) but also about anglophone world news media and urban American culture(s) (global context). Interestingly enough, this may be the exact intersection of people in India who might have the most health-related concerns about the amount of butter they consume.

Yet, given that there are over 350 million Hinglish speakers in India itself, Amul Butter advertisements have no shortage of an audience, regardless of whether every speaker knows the incident/theme that each advertisements alludes to. Getting’ and liking the latest Amul Butter ad—including the cultural references and the Hinglish puns that transcend many syntactic and phonological barriers—is seen as a sign of having cultural capital. Such microdiscursive Amul ads have been around for over 50 years now, and it is universally expected in Hinglophone India that anything majorly newsworthy would warrant its own crosslinguistic pun-heavy Amul advertisement.

More Amul advertisements here:

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Amul Butter ads have always captured the imagination of the nation with their witty taglines, humorous ideas, and quirky concepts, appearing on billboards and newspapers for years.

The Amul advertisement saga began in 1966, when the company approached Mumbai-based daCunha Communications driven by the father-son duo Sylvester daCunha and Rahul daCunha to design a new ad campaign for Amul Butter.

And so the "Utterly butterly Amul!" was born in 1966. Since then, the Amul girl, the impish poppet, dressed in a polka-dotted frock and head-bow has been enthralling and captivating the Indian psyche with her cleverly penned puns, which are topical, witty, pithy and precise. Manish Jhaveri is the man, who has been writing the scripts for these hoardings since 1995.

Amul Butter advertisements have always been a step ahead with their print ads, always advertising with themes ranging from politics, social issues, sports, movies, or pop-culture to just about anything! Take a look at some of the best Amul ads over the years.

1. ‪‎Amul‬ On The Success Of Mowgli's Epic Blockbuster

2. ‪‎Amul‬ On Red Carpet Treatment For Royalty!

3. ‪‎Amul‬ On Maharashtra Drought - IPL Venue Shift?

4. ‪‎Amul‬ On West Indies Rule T20 Cricket!

5. ‪‎Amul‬ On Dhoni Turns Interviewer At Press Con !

6. ‪‎Amul‬ Tribute To Pathankot Bravehearts

7. ‪‎Amul‬ On Pageant Host Blunders! Miss Universe 2015

8. ‪‎Amul‬ On DDCA Row!

9. Amul On Chennai Flood

10. ‪‎Amul On End Of The Road For The Ambassador Car!

11. ‪‎Amul‬ On Modi's Swearing-in Ceremony, 2014!

12. ‪‎Amul‬ On Kejriwal Refuses To Pay Bail Bond

‪‎13. Amul‬ On BJP Sweeps The Polls

‪‎14. Amul‬ Tribute To Nelson Mandela

15. ‪‎Amul‬ Tribute To Paul Walker

16. ‪‎Amul‬ On Taliban's Ban On Pak Media Praising Sachin

17. ‪‎Amul‬ Take On Dhyan Chand Deserving The Bharat Ratna

18. ‪‎Amul‬ On Women Safety

19. ‪‎Amul‬ On Indian Olympic Association....suspended

20. ‪‎Amul‬ On Ang Lee's Movie Life Of PI

21. ‪‎Amul‬ On Being Official Sponsor Of Indian Olympic Team

22. ‪‎Amul‬ Wishing Amitabh Bachchan A Speedy Recovery, Feb'12

‪‎23. Amul‬ On Activist Hazare's Anti - Corruption Rally

‪‎24. Amul‬ On Bollywood Release 'Don 2', Dec'11

25. ‪‎Amul‬ Take On Papa Kehte Hain Bada Naam Karega

26. ‪‎Amul‬ On Cut It UP!

27. ‪‎Amul‬ On The Popular Bollywood Couple Expecting A Child

‪‎‪‎28. Amul‬ On Omar Abdullah Elected Chief Minister Of Jammu & Kashmir

‪‎29. Amul‬ On Khan Can Sing!

30. ‪‎‪‎Amul‬ On Rising Fuel Pricing

31. Amul‬ On IPL First Season, 2008

32. Amul‬ On Dalai Lama Getting Nobel Peace Prize!

33. Amul‬ On Coach Controversy

‪‎34. Amul‬ On Shilpa Shetty & Richard Gere Kiss Controversy, 2007 !

35. Amul‬ On Safe Investment

36. Amul‬ On Wardrobe Malfunction On Ramp!

37. Amul‬ On Dance Bar Controversy

38. ‪‎Amul‬ On KBC!

39. Amul‬ On Bollywood Flick Yuva!

40. ‪‎Amul‬ On Posh. Not Spicy

41. Amul‬ On James Bond!

42. ‪‎Amul‬ On Phone War Controversy!

43. ‪‎Amul‬ On SRK's Movie Devdas!

44. ‪‎‪‎Amul‬ On Khelo India Khelo Campaign!

‪‎45. Amul‬ On Monkey Menace!

46. ‪‎Amul‬ On Tendulkar!

‪‎47. Amul‬ On E-mail!!

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48. Amul‬ On Bull About Cows!

49. ‪‎Amul‬ On Mumbai Bus Strike!

50. Amul‬ On Hollywood Blockbuster Titanic!

‪‎‪‎51. Amul‬ On Amitabh Bachchan's Disastrous Film `MRITYU DATA'

‪‎52. Amul‬ On The Mad Cow Disease!

‪‎53. Amul‬ Ten Du-Ten Don't Campaign!

54. ‪‎Amul‬ On KFC Controversy!

55. Amul On India Winnig A Gold Medal In Commonwealth Games!

‪‎56. Amul‬ On Manmohan Singh's Liberalisation Policy

‪‎57. Amul‬ On Open Sky Policy!

58. Amul On Defeat Of The Indian Hockey Team At The Olympics,1992!

‪‎59. Amul‬ On Popular Amitabh Bachchan Film "Khuda Gawah"

60. ‪‎Amul‬ On Maradona Complains Foul Play Against Him!

61. ‪‎Amul‬ On Ms. Bhutto Back To A Domestic Lifestyle!

62. Amul‬ On Fuel Hike!

63. ‪‎Amul‬ On Football Sensation Diego Maradona, 1986!

‪‎64. Amul‬ On Popularity Of The Serial 'Mahabharata'

65. ‪‎Amul‬ On Richard Hadlee Breaking Kapil Dev's Record For Maximum Wickets!

66. Amul‬ On Divide And Drool Campaign!

67. ‪‎Amul‬ On V.P. Singh Elected From Allahabad!

68. ‪‎Amul‬ On The Russian Cultural Festival Held In India

69. Amul‬ On Ivan Lendl Returns In The US Open!

70. ‪‎‪‎Amul‬ On Celebrating The Ganapati Festival!

‪‎71. Amul‬ On Return Of Shri Sharad Pawar As Chief Minister Of Maharashtra, 1987!

‪‎72. Amul‬ On The State Of Affairs In India At That Time

‪‎73. Amul‬ On John McEnroe Using Abusive Language On The Tennis Court!

74. ‪‎Amul‬ On Americans Boycott Of The Moscow Olympics,1980!

75. ‪‎Amul‬ On Telecast Of A Popular TV Serial "Different Strokes"

76. Christmas Time And Amul!

‪‎77. Amul‬ On Souyuz In Space!

78. Sunil Gavaskar's Amul Hoarding Record!

‪‎79. Amul‬ On CIA Accuses Shri Morarji Desai Of Corruption!

‪‎80. Amul‬ On Famous Song "Khaike Paan Benaraswala"!

81. ‪‎Amul‬ On The Roza Fast!

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82. Amul‬ On Policemen Asking For Increase In Salary!

‪‎83. Amul‬ On Hollywood movie Kramer vs. Kramer, 1979!

‪‎84. Amul‬ On Björn Borg!

85. ‪‎Amul‬ On Vintage Car Models!

86. ‪‎Amul‬ On Executives Get A Better Deal After The Budget!

87. Amul On Lata Mangeshkar Being Conferred With An Honorary Doctorate!

‪‎88. Amul‬ On Dismal Performance Of The National Cricket Team,1979!

89. ‪‎Amul‬ On The Film 'Pati, Patni Aur Woh'

90. ‪‎Amul‬ On First Escalator At Chowpatty Seaface, Mumbai, 1979!

‪‎91. Amul‬ On Load Shedding Situation!

92. ‪‎Amul‬'s "You Can't Beat This Yellow Column" Campaign!

93. ‪‎Amul‬ On Bengali Music Festival!

‪‎94. Amul‬ On The Big Payoff

‪‎95. Amul‬ On Compulsory Sterilisation Introduced During Indira Gandhi Regime,1976!

96. Amul‬'s " When Helmets Were Made Compulsory In Bombay" Campaign!

97. Amul‬ On Maintenance Of Internal Security Act Introduced During Emergency

Do you want to add more witty and quirky Amul Ads? Please share in the comments below.

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‪‎97 Amul Ads That Have Made The Nation Utterly Butterly All The Time! | Newszii.com

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Amul Butter ads have always captured the imagination of the nation with their witty taglines, humorous ideas, and quirky concepts, appearing on billboards and newspapers for years. The Amul advertisement saga began in 1966, when the company approached Mumbai-based daCunha Communications driven by the father-son duo Sylvester daCunha and Rahul daCunha to design a new ad campaign for Amul Butter.

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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My personal favourite; because this is extremely specific to Hinglish (or at least Indian English). ‘Yu and vi will fight this together’ is meant to be read as ‘You and we will fight this together’. Amul made this advertisement when a beloved Indian cricket player Yuvraj Singh—lovingly referred to as ‘Yuvi’—was diagnosed with cancer (He beat it, and is back in the field now). In most varieties of Indian English ‘Yu and vi’ (for his nickname ‘Yuvi’) and ‘you and we’ are homophonous. This is because [v] and [w] are allophones in Hindi and many other Indo-Aryan languages, and so speakers of those languages that learn English do not maintain the distinction either. The underlying phoneme that [v] and [w] are allophones of is the labiodental approximant [ʋ]. Speakers use either [ʋ], [v], or [w] in words like vet, wet, vine, wine. To speakers of many prestigious dialects of English—such as (whatever is closest to) Standard American English or Received Pronunciation—this [v]-[w] merger of sorts may seem even odd or intuitively incorrect, if not straight up incomprehensible. I once heard an airport announcer say ‘/ʋɑl.ənˈtɪɚ/’ for ‘volunteer’ and the Americans next to me thought he said something like ‘wall un-tier’.

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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‘Sundar, piyo chai!’ (translation: Sundar, drink tea)  is a play on ‘Sundar Pichai’, the CEO of Google who comes from India. This advertisement came out in October 2015, when his promotion to the CEO position was first announced. Serving someone homemade chai can be seen as a way of congratulating them on an achievement, so this ad is congratulating Sundar on his position by offering him tea with (Amul) buttered toast, and playing on his non-Indo-Aryan last name. Also notice the ‘bread’-‘bred’ pun.

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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This advertisement came out in light of a political scandal involving the Indian education minister who claimed to have held a degree in political science from Yale University. When journalists investigated this claim, they found that there was no record of this minister at Yale, and that the ‘degree’ in question was a mere certificate from a 6-day training course attended by several members of the Indian Parliament. ‘Yele’ roughly translates to ‘take this’, and ‘Yele University degree’ to ‘take this university degree’ as in ‘here’s the university degree you asked for’.

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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Entry #3: Amul Girl, pioneer of Hinglish puns

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'Kim ka darshan’, roughly meaning 'auspicious sight of Kim’ is a play on the name 'Kim Kardashian'. The phrase 'Kim ka darshan nahin milla?’ translates to 'didn’t get a chance to worship Kim?'. The Amul girl pours Kim a glass of milk—a common practice during ‘darshan’, or being in the presence of a holy deity in Hinduism. The glass of milk is of course a play on the champagne from her Shape magazine ‘Kim Kardashian breaks the internet’ shoot; this ad was released on Facebook shortly after that shoot came out last year.

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From Shakespearisms to bad 20th century politics

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From Shakespearisms to bad 20th century politics

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Declining: 'Beseech'
A common Shakespearism meaning ‘to beg earnestly’, used mainly in liturgical and legal contexts. ‘Beseech’ appears often in ‘Shakespearan English to Present-day English’ guides because Shakespeare used the word in his plays often, probably because they involved royal courts, Biblical allusions, persistent imploring etc. The word appears in Hamlet, Othello, Henry VIII, Julius Caesar, and several other works by Shakespeare that almost always involve a compelling protagonist beseeching an authority to do something. ‘Beseech’ is rarely used outside of literary and certain judicial contexts today--certainly not in everyday speech today. It may appear in the dialogue of period fiction or video games that is deliberately made to sound antiquated. Perhaps ‘beseech’ shows a downward trajectory over time because high culture and entertainment is (slightly) less concerned with monarchies and sacred texts now, as compared to in the early 18th century. Additionally, perhaps words that use the particular intensifying ‘be-’ prefix of beseech are generally falling out use, and the ‘be-’ prefix is becoming less and less productive (i.e., language-internal change). In other words, maybe people over generations increasingly consider words like ‘beseech’ to be archaic or extremely formal because they’ve only seen them in those contexts.

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Entry #5: From Shakespearisms to bad 20th century politics

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Entry #5: From Shakespearisms to bad 20th century politics

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Increasing: 'Parenting'
The first use of ‘parenting’ recorded in 1918 in Washington Post, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. Since then, this word has shown an upward trajectory over time; as has the number of advice books offering prescriptive ‘parenting’ guidance. It became common around the 1960s and 1970s, coinciding with the time a more scientific approach to domestic life was popularised in women’s magazines, news media, and self-help literature. Additionally, the shift from bigger, extended families to small nuclear families was more evident towards the latter half of the 20th century than ever--around the same time when ‘parenting’ as a mass noun and goal-oriented verb blew up. Perhaps the word arose out of the need for a formulaic way for raising children among two parents, to make up for the lack of help and experience a new parent would have in a nuclear family (as compared to an extended one). Additionally, the use of the ‘-ing’ suffix to form verbs out of nouns to indicate the sense ‘to perform the role of [noun]’ may also an upward trajectory over time, ‘adulting’ being a newer example. The boom in the use of the gerund ‘parenting’, as well as parenting guidance literature, may be indicative of an emerging ‘correct’ method or skill-requiring task of raising children. The non-existence (yet) of a word such as ‘wifing’ or ‘childing’ shows that other kinship terms without entire ‘how-to’ industries around them may not always be productively combined with the ‘-ing’ suffix.

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Entry #5: From Shakespearisms to bad 20th century politics

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Entry #5: From Shakespearisms to bad 20th century politics

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Fad: 'Fascism'
The peak of the word ‘Fascism’ was fortunately short-lived, much like the Mussolini-led movement itself. It’s hardly surprising that the popularity of the word exploded in the late 1920s, a few years into the Fascist Manifesto and Italian Fascists becoming infamous for their evil, authoritarian, power-hoarding ideals. The highest point of use of ‘Fascism’ is in 1941, a year after Mussolini led Italy into World War II on the side of the Axis powers. This was the time that Fascist and Nazi leaders enjoyed most political power and control of Continental Europe. The use of ‘Fascism’ steeply declined after 1943, the same time as the decline of the Axis Powers. After the execution of Mussolini in 1945, the use of ‘Fascism’ started decreasing even more sharply. In 1944--a bit after the word’s peak--George Orwell already deemed ‘Fascist’ a sort of semantically-bleached word, calling it a ‘synonym for bully’. As the prevalence of and global interest in the ideology of Fascism have plummeted, so has the use of the word ‘Fascism’ in (English language) books. The recent surge of tagging online right-wingers as ‘neo-nazis’ and ‘fascists’ would probably make the usage data for ‘Fascism’ interesting since after 2010. However, the Ngram viewer only allows searches until 2008, so the possibility of a second, more recent fad period for the use of the word ‘Fascism’ cannot yet be determined. The hypothetical second fad period of ‘Fascism’ could be motivated by the rise in social justice rhetoric and political posturing over social media in the past ~5-7 years.

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The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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I chose the oft-cited prescriptively incorrect phenomenon of using ‘an’ as the indefinite article  before an h-initial word like ‘historic’ or ‘historical’, like in the case of ‘an historical event’. The standard American English version of this would be ‘a historical event’, given that the word-initial ‘h’ is pronounced in this variety. Other examples of this phenomenon might be “an hotel”, “an hysterical scene”.

The reason I picked this example is that it brings out the arbitrary nature of prescriptivist rules. Received Pronunciation, the prestige variety of English in Britain, advocates the use of ‘an’ before ‘historic’—as does BBC according to the Urban Dictionary link—contrary to the prescriptively correct choice in North America.

A historical (lol) and material analysis of words like ‘historical’ and ‘hotel’ would show that they were both adapted from French, where the glottal fricative [h] is rarely pronounced. When initially used in  English, words like ‘historic’ and ‘hotel’ were pronounced without the word-initial ‘h’, and ‘an’ was the indefinite determiner usually used before them. For this reason, the ‘an historic’ variant is considered prescriptively correct in Received Pronunciation.

However, The Grammarist, Grammar Girl, and Bill Walsh examples—all North American prescriptivist pop grammar experts online—completely reject the use of ‘an historic’ as either unacceptable or un-American (read: not Standard American English). The AP Stylebook, a language usage guide, also recommends ‘a historic’ over ‘an historic’.

Someone who buys into standard language ideology would find it easy to justify why someone may think ‘a historical’ is ‘more correct’ on the basis that the word-initial ‘h’ in ‘historical’ is now pronounced in prestige dialects of American English. ‘An historical’ might then be considered ‘uneducated’ speech, or an ‘unnecessary affectation’ as Grammarist puts it or ‘odd accent’ as Grammar Girl does.

However, a linguist knows that either use is *just fine*. Different varieties—or speakers within a variety—might pronounce ‘historic’ either with a word-initial ‘h’ or without, and use the appropriate determiner accordingly. Even in the case of someone saying ‘/æn hɪstɑɹɪk/’, there’s no way it can be mistaken for any other string of words in the English language. In other words, ‘a historic’ and ‘an historic’ are both intelligible and can be understood by speakers of English regardless of the determiner or pronunciation used.

Bill Walsh’s post lists a lot of ‘authorities’ advocating for the use of ‘a historic’ over ‘an historic’, while BBC and the London Times Stylebook prefer ‘an historic’. While institutions and people whose language variety is considered powerful love to dictate how language should be used, most speakers of English would freely use either variant. I personally would not flinch if an h-dropping person said ‘an historic’ instead of ‘a historic’, which is what I say. Interestingly enough, the use of ‘an historical’ would eliminate any potential ambiguity between the adjective ‘ahistorical’ and the determiner-adjective sequence ‘a historical’.

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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The AP stylebook prefers 'a historic' over 'an historic'.

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A historic — not an historic — event stands out in history. A historical event occurs in the past. http://apne.ws/guyfQN APStyle#

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A historic — not an historic — event stands out in history. A historical event occurs in the past. http://apne.ws/guyfQN APStyle#

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A historic — not an historic — event stands out in history. A historical event occurs in the past. http://apne.ws/guyfQN APStyle#
— APStylebook (@APStylebook) February 1, 2011

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A historic — not an historic — event stands out in history. A historical event occurs in the past. http://apne.ws/guyfQN APStyle#

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A historic — not an historic — event stands out in history. A historical event occurs in the past. http://apne.ws/guyfQN APStyle#

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A historic — not an historic — event stands out in history. A historical event occurs in the past. http://apne.ws/guyfQN APStyle#

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Mignon Fogarty aka Grammar Girl strongly contends that only someone who has "an odd accent for an American" might say 'an historic'.

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A lot of people learned the rule that you put before words that start with consonants and before words that start with vowels, but it's actually a bit more complicated than that. For example, here's Matthew with a question:

I've been wondering if it is actually a hour or an hour. An hour sounds more correct, but a hour reads more correct. I'm just curious on what it should be.

The rule is that you use before words that start with a consonant and before words that start with a vowel (1).

Buy Now

So to answer Matt's question, is correct, because starts with a vowel sound. People seem to ask most often about words that start with the letters and because sometimes these words start with vowel sounds and sometimes they start with consonant sounds. For example, it is a historic monument because starts with an sound, but it is an honorable fellow because starts with an sound. Similarly, it is a Utopian idea , but an unfair world .

The letters and can be tricky too. Usually you put before words that start with , but sometimes you use . For example, you would use if you were to say, "She has a one-track mind," because starts with a sound. Similarly, "She has an MBA, but chooses to work as a missionary."

Use a before words that start with a consonant sound and an before words that start with a vowel sound.

Other letters can also be pronounced either way. Just remember it is the sound that governs whether you use or , not the actual first letter of the word.

One complication is when words are pronounced differently in British and American English. For example, the word for a certain kind of plant is pronounced "erb" in American English and "herb" in British English. So the proper form in America is an erb, and the proper form in Britain is a herb. In the rare cases where this is a problem, use the form that will be expected in your country or by the majority of your readers.

Next: A Historic or an Historic?

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Today's topic is a versus an. A lot of people learned the rule that you put a before words that start with consonants and an before words that start with vowels, but it's actually a bit more complicated than that.

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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According to user Kung Fu Jesus, 'an historic' is "actually the correct pronunciation" because that's how BBC pronounces it.

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How the BBC pronounces "a historic", because an historic is actually the correct pronounciation.

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Grammarist says that in all "main varieties" of English, the use of 'an' before 'historic' is an "unnecessary affectation".

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In all main varieties of English, the use of an as the article preceding historic ( an historic) is an unnecessary affectation. The rule for the indefinite article is that we use before words beginning with a consonant sound, and an before words beginning with a vowel sound. The at the beginning of historic is a consonant sound, soft though it may be. As far as we know, there are no modern English dialects in which the in historic is silent (please correct us if we're wrong), so there's no reason for anyone to use an instead of a before the word.

The same applies with the words historical, historian, and so on. They start with consonant sound, so their article is a.

Examples

An historic appears about a third as frequently as a historic, even in some normally well-edited publications-for example:

The very possibility of it marks an historic turning point for the entire region. [ New Republic]

At least one of Lord Hutton's recommendations will mark an historic departure. [ Guardian]

And, from an historical perspective, Greece's track record as a creditor is checkered. [ Wall Street Journal]

But in most edited writing, whether British, Australian, Canadian, or American, a historic is thankfully more common than an historic -for example:

The entire five-member City Council was replaced, with a historic turnout and a whopping 95 percent of voters approving the recall. [ New York Times]

Maurice Manning, a historian and chancellor of the National University of Ireland who is a former Fine Gael politician, described the mood. [ Financial Times]

This collection puts Orchard's work in a historical perspective and gives an overview of the artist's career. [ Sydney Morning Herald]

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In all main varieties of English, the use of an as the article preceding historic ( an historic) is an unnecessary affectation. The rule for the indefinite article is that we use before words beginning with a consonant sound, and an before words beginning with a vowel sound.

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Entry #1: The ahistorical beef with 'an historical'

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Bill Walsh, a former Washington Post copy editor who had a blog on (prescriptive) grammar, thinks that "the standard pronunciations include the h, and so you must write 'a historic'"

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To restate my position: First you must deal with the word. Repeat after me: "Historic, hotel, hysterical, Hispanic." Did you pronounce those h's? Then it's a historic, a hotel, a hysterical, a Hispanic. If you truly said "Istoric, otel, ysterical, ispanic," go ahead and say "an." But you are in the minority.

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/ʌpʊn/ appears at 0:22, as the first word of the first sentence sung in the song, and several times after.

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Munna Bhai - M.B.B.S - Apun Jaisa Tapori (Sanjay Dutt) - 1080p HD

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Expressive:

https://twitter.com/Hashmita7/status/925868195411582976

In this example of expressive use of emoji, I use the emoji sequence '😍🙀💕'  after a sarcastic exclamation about a screenshot of a 'cute surprise text' I got. The 'text' in question is actually a not-so-surprising email with an attachment of a book about Spanish syntax that I'm very interested in as a linguistics student. Here, the communicative function of the three-emoji string '😍🙀💕' is to stylistically enhance and dramatise the way I parallel the feeling of excitement of being sent a syntax of Spanish book with the excitement of receiving a cute surprise romantic text. The emoji string helps communicate that in my case, something that's usually 'nerdy'—like a syntax book—warrants as much of an expression of excited heart emoji online as a cute surprise text does.

The number of emoji used in a tweet is correlated with the user's level of excitement in many social media contexts. In this case, using three emoji after a post about a syntax book might be a further indication about my strong positive feelings towards the email I received. In short, the emoji string has an expressive function because it helps mimic the stylistic features of an earnest corny post about cute surprise texts. Unlike in the example of referential emoji use above, the order of emoji in this string doesn't make a difference to meanings they convey. Additionally, the purpose of the emoji is to enhance the sentiment the string of words preceding it creates rather than to independently convey information. Such ironic, expressive use of positive emoji like '😍🙀💕' in odd or infelicitous contexts to produce humour is common among many young Twitter users.

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Quote from Business Line newspaper on the Mumbai ‘ʈʌpoɾi’ (टपोरी) trope, showing the association of words like “/ʌpʊn/” with Mumbai Street Hindi:

“For decades, we had heroes playing variations on the unsophisticated, street-smart but lovable rogue who was a staple in Hindi films. Aamir Khan did two memorable takes on this stereotype, in Vikram Bhatt's Ghulam and Ram Gopal Varma's Rangeela. As he spouted standard Bambaiyya lingo such as ‘ apun ka' and ‘ lafda', dangled a cigarette at the side of his mouth and brandished a colourful scarf, he sang Aati Kya Khandala and Yaaron sun lo zara, haan apna ye kehna, Jeena ho to apun ke jaisa hi jeena.

This was a street-smart guy and a bit of a conman, but he was a trickster with a sense of humour and his heart in the right place. His attitude was born of learning to survive in a breathless, ruthless city. But the tapori rarely messed seriously with the law; he was too smart for that. Like Aamir, Anil Kapoor grew up in Mumbai, but in a chawl, so here's a guy who knows what taporis are all about.

Shah Rukh Khan has never got it quite right (perhaps because he grew up in Delhi, do you think?) even if he sang Apun bola tu meri Laila in Josh, and did a wonderful Goan version in Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa...”

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Ishaqzaade represents current Bollywood trends, including the rise - and charms - of the ruffian from North India.

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Phatic:

https://twitter.com/AJThaJuiceman_/status/1067829779079077888

The use of the handshake emoji (doesn't appear on browsers yet) in this tweet is phatic because its function is to express solidarity with the intersection of people who are bisexual, and people who partake in Twitter meme discourse. The handshake emoji is a Twitter adaptation of the May 2018 'Epic Handshake' meme where the text on either hand represents a distinct group, and the handshake represents what those two groups have in common. In the Twitter adaptation, the handshake emoji serves as the placeholder for the meme image and continues circulating the format between the in-group: bisexual memelords.

Phatic communication via memes—in this case the handshake emoji Twitter adaptation of the Epic Handshake meme—is emerging as an extremely popular form of expression of humour. In my opinion, the use of the handshake emoji here is successful because anyone familiar with the original meme knows that the format has been correctly used to make a humourous statement about how the queerness of bisexual people is constantly challenged by people who believe in necessary monosexuality. Along with communicating solidarity by relating the shared experience of two distinct (queer) groups, the handshake emoji also conveys solidarity among people who disseminate memes as a form of in-group sociocultural microdiscourse. The handshake emoji also has a phatic communicative function because it is able to repackage a serious point about the systematic denial of queer people's attraction to women into a succinct, highly relevant, funny meme that in-group members can consume, interact with, and share with each other.