Hypercorrection

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
This article is about language usage. For the psychology use, see Hypercorrection (psychology).

In

language-usage prescription. A speaker or writer who produces a hypercorrection generally believes through a misunderstanding of such rules that the form or phrase they use is more "correct", standard, or otherwise preferable, often combined with a desire to appear formal or educated.[1][2]

Linguistic hypercorrection occurs when a real or imagined grammatical rule is applied in an inappropriate context, so that an attempt to be "correct" leads to an incorrect result. It does not occur when a speaker follows "a natural speech instinct", according to Otto Jespersen and Robert J. Menner.[3]

Hypercorrection can be found among speakers of less prestigious language varieties who attempt to produce forms associated with high-prestige varieties, even in situations where speakers of those varieties would not. Some commentators call such production hyperurbanism.[4]

Hypercorrection can occur in many languages and wherever multiple languages or language varieties are in contact.

Types of overapplied rules

Studies in

Greek.[5]

Sociolinguists often note hypercorrection in terms of pronunciation (phonology). For example,

rhotic way (pronouncing the letter "r" as /hɑːrd/ rather than /hɑːd/) more often when speaking carefully. Furthermore, middle class speakers had more rhotic pronunciation than working class
speakers did.

However, lower-middle class speakers had more rhotic pronunciation than upper-middle class speakers. Labov suggested that these lower-middle class speakers were attempting to emulate the pronunciation of upper-middle class speakers, but were actually over-producing the very noticeable R-sound.[6]

A common source of hypercorrection in English speakers' use of the language's morphology and syntax happens in the use of pronouns (see § Personal pronouns).[4]

Hypercorrection can also occur when learners of a new-to-them (second, foreign) language try to avoid applying grammatical rules from their

native language to the new language (a situation known as language transfer). The effect can occur, for example, when a student of a new language has learned that certain sounds of their original language must usually be replaced by another in the studied language, but has not learned when not to replace them.[7]

English

English has no authoritative body or

language academy codifying norms for standard usage, unlike some other languages. Nonetheless, within groups of users of English, certain usages are considered unduly elaborate adherences to formal rules. Such speech or writing is sometimes called hyperurbanism, defined by Kingsley Amis
as an "indulged desire to be posher than posh".

Personal pronouns

In 2004, Jack Lynch, assistant professor of English at Rutgers University, said on Voice of America that the correction of the subject-positioned "you and me" to "you and I" leads people to "internalize the rule that 'you and I' is somehow more proper, and they end up using it in places where they should not – such as 'he gave it to you and I' when it should be 'he gave it to you and me.'[8]

However, the linguists

utterances such as "They invited Sandy and I" are "heard constantly in the conversation of people whose status as speakers of Standard English is clear" and that "[t]hose who condemn it simply assume that the case of a pronoun in a coordination must be the same as when it stands alone. Actual usage is in conflict with this assumption."[9]

H-adding

Some British accents, such as

TV series Thunderbirds, e.g. "We'll 'ave the haristocrats 'ere soon" (from the episode "Vault of Death"). Parker's speech was based on a real person the creators encountered at a restaurant in Cookham.[10]

Hyperforeignism

Main article: Hyperforeignism

Hyperforeignism arises from speakers misidentifying the distribution of a pattern found in loanwords and extending it to other environments. The result of this process does not reflect the rules of either language.

habanero is sometimes pronounced as though it were spelled "habañero", in imitation of other Spanish words like jalapeño and piñata.[12] Machismo is sometimes pronounced "makizmo", apparently as if it were Italian, rather than the phonetic English pronunciation which resembles the original Spanish word, /mɑːˈtʃiz.mo/. Similarly, the z in chorizo
is sometimes pronounced as /ts/ (as if it were Italian), whereas the original Spanish pronunciation has /θ/ or /s/.

English as a second language

Some English-Spanish

archaic, or an informal pronunciation in some dialects.[13]

Serbo-Croatian

As the

standard variety of the language in more formal occasions, thus using the locative even when the accusative should be used (typically, when indicating direction rather than location): "Izlazim na kolovozu" instead of "izlazim na kolovoz".[14]

Hebrew and Yiddish

Israeli Hebrew are "snobbatives" (from snob + -ative, modelled upon comparatives and superlatives):[15]

  • the hypercorrect pronunciation khupím instead of khofím for חופים‎ 'beaches'.
  • the hypercorrect pronunciation tsorfát instead of tsarfát for צרפת‎ 'France'.
  • the hypercorrect pronunciation amán instead of omán for אמן‎ 'artist'.

The last two hypercorrection examples derive from a confusion related to the

Sephardi Hebrew pronunciation is rendered as /aː/ but which is pronounced /ɔ/ in Ashkenazi Hebrew, and in Hebrew words that also occur in Yiddish. However, the Qamatz Qaṭan
vowel, which is visually indistinguishable from the Qamatz Gadol vowel, is rendered as /o/ in both pronunciations. This leads to hypercorrections in both directions.

Other hypercorrections occur when speakers of Israeli Hebrew (which is based on Sephardic) attempt to pronounce Ashkenazi Hebrew, for example for religious purposes. The month of Shevat (שבט‎) is mistakenly pronounced Shvas, as if it were spelled *שְׁבַת‎. In an attempt to imitate Polish and Lithuanian dialects, qamatz (both gadol and qatan), which would normally be pronounced [ɔ], is hypercorrected to the pronunciation of holam, [ɔj], rendering גדול‎ ('large') as goydl and ברוך‎ ('blessed') as boyrukh.

Spanish

In some Spanish dialects, the final intervocalic /d/ ([ð]) is dropped, such as in pescado (fish), which would typically be pronounced [pesˈkaðo] but can be manifested as [pesˈkao] dialectically. Speakers sensitive to this variation may insert a /d/ intervocalically into a word without such a consonant, such as in the case of bacalao (cod), correctly pronounced [bakaˈlao] but occasionally hypercorrected to [bakaˈlaðo].[16]

Outside Spain and in

s̟] is found in some areas as well, primarily parts of Andalusia. Speakers of varieties that have [s] in all cases will frequently produce [θ] even in places where peninsular Spanish has [s] when trying to imitate a peninsular accent. As Spanish orthography
distinguishes the two phonemes in all varieties, but the pronunciation is not differentiated in Latin American varieties, some speakers also get mixed up with the spelling.

Many Spanish dialects tend to aspirate syllable-final /s/, and some even elide it often. Since this phenomenon is somewhat stigmatized, some speakers in the Caribbean and especially the Dominican Republic may attempt to correct for it by pronouncing an /s/ where it does not belong. For example, catorce años '14 years' may be pronounced as catorces año.[17]

German

The

East Franconian dialects are notable for lenition of stops /p/ /t/ /k/ to [b], [d], [g]. As such a common hypercorrection is the fortition of properly lenis stops, sometimes including aspiration as evidenced by the speech of Günther Beckstein
.

The

final obstruent devoicing) even by speakers from dialect areas that pronounce the digraph [ɪç] or [ɪʃ]
.

Palatinate German language speakers are among those who pronounce both the digraph ⟨ch⟩ and the trigraph ⟨sch⟩ as [ʃ]. A common hypercorrection is to produce [ç] even where standard German has [ʃ] such as in Helmut Kohl's hypercorrect rendering of "Geschichte", the German word for "history" with a German pronunciation: [ç] both for the <sch> (standard German [ʃ]
) and the ⟨ch⟩.

Proper names and German loanwords into other languages that have been

German-Americans
and the companies named after them, even if they were or are first generation immigrants.

Some German speakers pronounce the metal umlaut as if it were a "normal" German umlaut. For example, when Mötley Crüe visited Germany, singer Vince Neil said the band couldn't figure out why "the crowds were chanting, 'Mutley Cruh! Mutley Cruh!'"[18]

Swedish

In Swedish, the word att is sometimes pronounced /ɔ/ when used as an infinitive marker (its conjunction homograph is never pronounced that way, however). The conjunction och is also sometimes pronounced the same way. Both pronunciations can informally be spelt å. ("Jag älskar å fiska å jag tycker också om å baka.") When spelt more formally, the infinitive marker /'ɔ/ is sometimes misspelt och. ("Få mig och hitta tillbaka.*")

The third person plural pronoun, pronounced dom in many dialects, is formally spelt de in the subjective case and dem in the objective case. Informally it can be spelled dom ("Dom tycker om mig."), yet dom is only acceptable in spoken language.[19] When spelt more formally, they are often confused with each other. ("De tycker om mig." as a correct form, compared to "Dem tycker om mig"* as an incorrect form in this case). As an object form, using dem in a sentence would be correct in the sentence "Jag ger dem en present" ('I give them a gift.')

See also

References

Citations

  1. ^ Wilson, Kenneth G. (1993). The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. Columbia University Press. Archived from the original on 20 November 2002.
  2. ^ Sociolinguistic Patterns, William Labov, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972, p 126
  3. JSTOR 452423
    .
  4. ^
    ISBN 978-0-87779-132-4
    .
  5. Daily Motion
    .
  6. ISBN 978-0-521-52805-4
    .
  7. ^ Carey, Michael. "Interlanguage Phonology Sources of L2 Pronunciation 'Errors'". Phonetics and Phonology. Macquarie University Department of Linguistics. Archived from the original on 2 July 2005.
  8. ^ "Wordmaster: Hypercorrection Is Not Simply Being Fussy or a Nitpicker or a Pedant". VOA: Learning English. 23 July 2007. Archived from the original on 15 October 2012. Retrieved 28 January 2024.
  9. ISBN 0-521-61288-8
    ), 107.
  10. ^ "Voiceover: Gerry Anderson". David Graham Official Site. Archived from the original on 1 September 2013. Retrieved 5 March 2013.
  11. ISBN 978-0-521-29719-6
    .
  12. ^ "Definition of HABANERO". www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved 2022-10-21.
  13. ISBN 978-90-272-2463-7
    .
  14. ^ Boban Arsenijević (2016-01-18). "Burek koji se može poneti".
  15. ^ See p. 77 in Zuckermann, Ghil'ad (2003), Language Contact and Lexical Enrichment in Israeli Hebrew. Palgrave Macmillan.
  16. ISBN 978-0-521-78045-2
    .
  17. ISBN 9780669398441
    .
  18. ^ Eric Spitznagel (November 27, 2009). "Motley Crue's Vince Neil is Finally Bored With Boobs". Vanity Fair.
  19. ^ "Frågelådan". www4.isof.se. Retrieved 2021-09-22.

Sources cited

  • Labov, William. 1966. "Hypercorrection by the Lower Middle Class as a Factor in Linguistic Change". In Sociolinguistics: Proceedings of the UCLA Sociolinguistics Conference, 1964. William Bright, ed. Pp. 84–113. The Hague: Mouton.
  • Joshua Blau, On Pseudo-Corrections in Some Semitic Languages. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities 1970.
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