List of diglossic regions

Diglossia refers to the use by a language community of two languages or dialects, a "high" or "H" variety restricted to certain formal situations, and a "low" or "L" variety for everyday interaction. This article contains a list of nations, cultures, or other communities which sources describe as featuring a diglossic language situation.

Americas

African American Vernacular English

In the United States, Standard English is considered H while AAVE is considered L. Its pronunciation is, in some respects, common to Southern American English, which is spoken by many African Americans and many non-African Americans in the United States. Several creolists, including William Stewart, John Dillard, and John Rickford, argue that AAVE shares so many characteristics with creole dialects spoken by black people in much of the world that AAVE itself is a creole, while others maintain that there are no significant parallels. Many African-Americans do not use AAVE, but those who do not are at risk of being criticized about their identity. Additionally, many non-African-Americans use AAVE, depending on where they live and their socioeconomic status.

Brazilian Portuguese

According to some contemporary Brazilian linguists (Bortoni, Kato, Mattos e Silva, Perini and most recently, with great impact, Bagno), Brazilian Portuguese may be a highly diglossic language. This theory claims that there is an L-variant (termed "Brazilian Vernacular"), which would be the mother tongue of all Brazilians, and an H-variant (standard Brazilian Portuguese) acquired through schooling. L-variant represents a simplified form of the language (in terms of grammar, but not of phonetics) that could have evolved from 16th-century Portuguese, influenced by other European, Amerindian (mostly Tupian) and African languages, while H-variant would be based on 19th century European Portuguese (and very similar to Standard European Portuguese, with only minor differences in spelling and grammar usage). Mário A. Perini, a Brazilian linguist, even compares the depth of the differences between L- and H- variants of Brazilian Portuguese with those between Standard Spanish and Standard Portuguese. Milton M. Azevedo wrote a chapter on diglossia in his monography: ''Portuguese language (A linguistic introduction)'', published by Cambridge University Press, in 2005, parts of which are available freely on Google books.

Jamaica

In Jamaica, everyone is able to speak and understand the vernacular ''patois'' (or Patwa), a centuries-old English derived creole. Many also understand and can speak "standard" English; however, in common everyday oral usage, people generally use one or the other exclusively, according to social status and formal education. In everyday commerce, business, banking, media and government—in short, the entire private and public sector—acrolect English is used. This has resulted in a diglossia situation. Situational code-switching, style shifting and code-alternation occur continuously, seamlessly in communication between all Jamaicans of all classes and in all situations, in all speech acts. Recently, Jamaican ''patois'' has gone through a process of decreolization, similar to that which happened with AAVE due to the basilect creole variety developing alongside the acrolect English. It is important to note that for all practical purposes, English is Jamaica's native language. When the English took over the country from the Spanish in the seventeenth century Jamaica was linguistically a blank slate. The country came under English jurisdiction and the incoming new colonists were English. English became the de facto language because there was no other language there at the time. The native Arawak (Taino) had long disappeared, and with the arrival of the English in 1655 the few Spanish settlers on the island fled to Cuba. The thousands of West African slaves that would be brought in for labour on the island's notorious sugar plantations of the eighteenth century had not yet arrived. Jamaican ''patois'' came into being when the island's burgeoning sugar industry created a large demand for field labour. The incoming African slave labourers—who spoke many various languages themselves—and the English speaking plantocracy communicated through the formation of a contact creole language unique to Jamaica. Today we know this creole as ''patois'', and even those Jamaicans who don't speak it on a daily basis can speak it fluently, and fully understand it. Jamaican ''patois'' is sometimes written (in song lyrics, reported speech in books and newspapers for example) but because of the lack of standardization, many words may be spelled in many different ways. Standard English is taught in Jamaican schools, although teachers may speak to pupils and their parents in ''patois'' outside of the classroom.

Paraguay

In Paraguay, both modern-day Spanish and the Guaraní indigenous language are spoken, and both are official and taught in schools. But a great part of the population speak an informal, barely codified variant of the latter, with many Spanish influences, called Jopará.

Peru

In Peru, as throughout most of Latin America, Spanish is considered the 'H' language while indigenous languages like Quechua dialects or Ayamara are considered the 'L' language. This has resulted in most Peruvians who do speak an indigenous language using Spanish more and more in everyday life.

Africa and Asia

Bengali

Traditionally, Bengali exhibits diglossia in both written and spoken forms of the language's uppermost registers. Shadhubhasha (সাধু shadhu = 'chaste' or 'sage'; ভাষা bhasha = 'language') exhibited longer verb inflections and heavily Sanskritized vocabulary. Up to the turn of the 19th century, most Bengali literature took this form. Cholitbhasha (চলতিভাষা ) or Cholitobhasha (চলিত cholito = 'current' or 'running'), based on the formal registers of spoken, educated dialects, has much simpler grammatical forms, and has become the modern literary standard.

Sylheti language is in a diglossic situation with Bengali.

Burmese

Burmese is a diglossic language with two distinguishable registers (or diglossic varieties):

#Literary High (H) form ( my-Mymr, မြန်မာစာ ''mranma ca''): the high variety (formal and written), used in literature (formal writing), newspapers, radio broadcasts, and formal speeches
#Spoken Low (L) form ( my-Mymr, မြန်မာစကား ''mranma ca.ka:''): the low variety (informal and spoken), used in daily conversation, television, comics and literature (informal writing)

The literary form of Burmese retains archaic and conservative grammatical structures and modifiers (including particles, markers and pronouns) no longer used in the colloquial form. In most cases, the corresponding grammatical markers in the literary and spoken forms are totally unrelated to each other. Examples of this phenomenon include the following lexical items:

*"this" (pronoun): my-Mymr, ဤ ''i'' → my-Mymr, ဒီ ''di''
*"that" (pronoun): my-Mymr, ထို ''htui'' → my-Mymr, ဟို ''hui''
*"at" (postposition): my-Mymr, ၌ ''hnai.'' → my-Mymr, မှာ ''hma''
*plural (marker): my-Mymr, များ ''mya:'' → my-Mymr, တွေ ''twe''
*possessive (marker): my-Mymr, ၏ ''i.'' → my-Mymr, ရဲ့ ''re.''
*"and" (conjunction): my-Mymr, နှင့် ''hnang.'' → my-Mymr, နဲ့ ''ne.''
*"if" (conjunction): my-Mymr, လျှင် ''hlyang'' → my-Mymr, ရင် ''rang''

Historically the literary register was preferred for written Burmese on the grounds that "the spoken style lacks gravity, authority, dignity". In the mid-1960s some Burmese writers spearheaded efforts to abandon the literary form, asserting that the spoken vernacular form ought to be used.
Some Burmese linguists such as Minn Latt, a Czech academic, proposed moving away from the high form of Burmese altogether. Although the literary form is heavily used in written contexts (literary and scholarly works, radio news broadcasts, and novels), the recent trend has been to accommodate the spoken form in informal written contexts. Nowadays, television news broadcasts, comics, and commercial publications use the spoken form or a combination of the spoken and simpler, less ornate formal forms.

Cape Verdean Creole

Perhaps one of the oldest creoles in existence, the Kriolu/Crioulu/Kabuverdianu/Caboverdiano of the Cape Verde islands has existed alongside the Portuguese brought by slave traders since the 15th century. Inhabiting the island with slaves brought from all along the West African coast, a pidgin developed to allow for communication both between traders and slaves as well as among slaves of different ethnic groups. Today, Kriolu is used mostly in the home and in casual settings, while Portuguese is the language of government and business. More recently, some events and organizations are beginning to conduct business, conferences, and symposiums in Kriolu, while schools debate to what extent Kriolu should be used in the classrooms. Efficiency and international competency are certainly important to consider when making a choice to use Portuguese or Kriolu in institutional settings, but so is the cultural identity for which Kriolu is so essential to maintain.

Chinese

For over two thousand years, the Chinese used Classical Chinese (Literary Chinese) as a formal standard written language. The standard written language served as a bridge for communication throughout China and other Sinophone countries and Chinese influenced countries like Japan, the Ryukyus, Korea, and Vietnam for millennia.

However, the colloquial varieties of Chinese continued to evolve. The gulf became so wide between the formal written and colloquial spoken languages that it was blamed for hindering education and literacy, and some even went so far as to blame it in part for the political turmoil that occurred in China during the 19th and early 20th centuries. This eventually culminated in the adoption of written vernacular Chinese, which was based on modern spoken Mandarin, for all formal communication.

Modern Chinese

After the adoption of vernacular Chinese as the modern standard written language in the early 20th century, diglossia was no longer a big issue among the majority of Chinese speakers who learn Mandarin Chinese as the standard national dialect. However, standard Chinese and its pronunciation in local Chinese language varieties is still a formal register in regions where Mandarin is not spoken natively, such as most of South China.

For instance in Hong Kong and Macau, Cantonese is the primary language of spoken communication, although all formal written communication is done in standard written Chinese. Unique among the other Chinese language varieties, Cantonese has its own written form, but it is largely used in informal contexts, such as personal communication, internet slang, advertising, music, and film.

Literate Chinese speakers can read and write in the Mandarin-based standard written language. However, because the graphemes in Chinese's logographic writing system are not directly linked to pronunciation (though there are quasi-phonetic hints), Cantonese speakers who do not speak Mandarin will read aloud the characters in Cantonese pronunciation only. The resulting speech is Mandarin-based grammar and vocabulary pronounced word-by-word in Cantonese. If the same sentence were to be spoken using regular colloquial Cantonese, it might be quite different. Here is an example:

:''Note: Mandarin romanized using Hanyu Pinyin. Cantonese romanized using Yale. Written Cantonese shown uses characters not in standard written Chinese.''

In the above example, note the switching of the direct and indirect objects and the use of different vocabulary for certain words in the standard Chinese and colloquial Cantonese renditions. In addition, Cantonese grammar allows the use of classifiers to serve in the place of a genitive particle.

Classical Chinese

Before the modern adoption of written vernacular Chinese, the diglossic situation also applied to Mandarin speakers when Classical Chinese was the standard written language.

Continuing the previous example for comparison, using Classical Chinese it would be:

Because Chinese's logographic writing system doesn't indicate exact pronunciation, the pronunciation of Classical Chinese in Old Chinese is generally not possible (though tentative reconstructions of the phonology of Old Chinese have been attempted). Instead, Classical Chinese is also generally pronounced according to the local dialect (such as the Mandarin and Cantonese pronunciations given above), much like how Cantonese speakers pronounce the modern Mandarin-based written Chinese using Cantonese.

Unlike the situation with modern Chinese, however, Classical Chinese spoken according to the pronunciations of the modern spoken Chinese varieties is still largely unintelligible without training due to the syntax and vocabulary changes that Chinese has undergone since Old Chinese. In addition, sound mergers in the modern dialects cause many distinct words in Classical Chinese to sound homophonous. For one notable example, see ''Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den''.

Hindi

Hindi has two forms: the H form called '' shuddha Hindi'' and the L form called '' Hindustani''. Both are based on the same dialect: '' Dehlavi''.
The L variety, Hindustani (often simply called Hindi) contains many loanwords from Persian and Arabic, along with a massive vocabulary of English loanwords which increases day by day. The L variety is identical with spoken Urdu—except for the fact that the latter is written in Perso-Arabic script. The H variety was standardized in the 1960s during the movement to adopt Hindi as national language of Indian Union. ''Shuddh'' (lit., pure) Hindi primarily uses words from Sanskrit to replace not only English loanwords, but also loanwords from Persian and Arabic which had been nativized for centuries. These words are called '' tatsam'' words, and they even replaced many ''tadbhav'' words, i.e. words of Sanskrit origin but having undergone profound phonological changes.

An example is the Hindi version of the sentence: "This morning I read the newspaper but could not study those books."

Here, ''prātaḥ, samāchār-patr(a)'' and ''parantu'' are loanwords from Sanskrit used in the H form, versus the Arabic loanwords ''subah, akhbār'' and ''lekin'' which are rather more popular in speech. ''Adhyayan'' is loanwords from Sanskrit which can even replace native ''tadhbhav'' word ''paḍhāī'' (which in turn is derived from Sanskrit ''paṭhana'' after phonological changes). On the other hand, the H form has highly minimized the use of Persian and Arabic phonemes , , , and . Partly because they are written in the Hindi alphabet (devanagari, strictly speaking an alpha-syllabary) as a dot beneath traditionally existing alphabets (ज़, फ़, ख़, ग़, क़ ), and the dot is omitted in casual writing, many Hindi speakers mistake them for the Sanskrit phonemes , , , and .

The L variety is used in common speech, TV serials and Bollywood movies and songs. The H variety is used in official and government writings, scholarly books and magazines, signboards, public announcements and public speaking.

Malay

The Malay language exists in a Classical variety, and modern standard variety and several vernacular dialects.

In Brunei, Standard Malay (Bahasa Melayu) is promoted as the national language and is the H variety, while Brunei Malay is used very widely throughout society and it constitutes the L variety. One major difference between these dialects of Malay is that Brunei Malay tends to have the verb at the front, while Standard Malay generally places it after the subject. It has been estimated that 84% of core vocabulary in Brunei Malay and Standard Malay is cognate, though their pronunciation often differs very considerably. While Standard Malay has six vowels, Brunei Malay has only three: /a, i, u/.

One complicating factor is that English is also widely used in Brunei, especially in education, as it is the medium of instruction from upper primary school onwards, so it shares the H role with Standard Malay. Another code that competes for the H role in some situations is the special palace register of Brunei Malay, which includes an elaborate system of honorific terms for addressing and referring to the Sultan and other nobles. Finally, although Standard Malay is used for sermons in the mosques (as expected for the H variety), readings from the Qur'an are in Arabic.

Manchu

Standard Manchu was based on the language spoken by the Jianzhou Jurchens during Nurhaci's time, while other unwritten Manchu dialects such as that of Aigun and Sanjiazi were also spoken in addition to the related Xibe language.

Mongolian

Classical Mongolian language was the high register used for religious and official purposes while the various Mongolian dialects serve as the low register, like Khalkha Mongolian, Chakhar Mongolian, Khorchin Mongolian, Kharchin Mongolian, Baarin Mongolian, Ordos Mongolian, and the Buryat language. The Tibetan Buddhist canon was translated into Classical Mongolian. The Oirat Mongols who spoke the Oirat Mongol language and dialects like Kalmyk language or Torgut Oirat used a separate standard written with the Clear script.

The Mongolian language, based on Khalkha Mongolian, now serves as the high register in Mongolia itself while in Inner Mongolia a standard Mongolian based on Chakhar Mongolian serves as the high register for all Mongols in China. The Buryat language has been turned into a standard literary form itself in Russia.

Sinhalese

Sinhala (also known as Sinhalese), spoken in Sri Lanka, is a diglossic language. There are several differences between the literary language (also known as Literary Sinhala, LS) and the spoken language (Spoken Sinhala, SS), especially about verbs:

* different personal pronouns:
** "he, she": LS '; SS ' (lit. "that one", common);
* lack of inflection of the verb in SS:
** "I do", "you (sing.) do": LS ', ' (inflected); SS ', ' (not-inflected, the same form for all persons)
* lack of future tense in SS, substituted by present tense plus optional temporal adverb:
** LS ' "I will go"; SS ' "tomorrow I will go" (lit. "tomorrow I go");
* different verbal forms (e.g. present participle in LS versus reduplicated form in SS);
* different adpositions:
** "with": LS '; SS '
** "from" (temporal): LS '; SS '
** "before" : LS '; SS ', '
* different vocabulary, e.g.:
** "to help": LS '; SS '
** "to touch": LS '; SS '
** "to marry": LS '; SS '
** "to study": LS '; SS '
** "to fight": LS '; SS '

Literary or written Sinhala is commonly understood, and used in literary texts and formal occasions (public speeches, TV and radio news broadcasts, etc.), whereas the spoken language is used as the language of communication in everyday life. Children are taught the written language at school almost like a foreign language.

Singapore

Many analysts regard the use of English in Singapore as diglossic, with Singapore Standard English (SStdE) forming the H variety and Singapore Colloquial English (SCE, also known as 'Singlish') constituting the L variety. SStdE is similar to other varieties of Standard English in grammar and lexis but with some of its own features of pronunciation, particularly the use of full vowels (rather than ) in most function words and also the sporadic absence of dental fricatives, while SCE is characterised by a simplified grammar (including the omission of some conjunctions and the copula verb BE) and regular use of pragmatic particles such as ''lah'' and ''ah'', as well as frequent inclusion of Hokkien and Malay words.

However, other analysts prefer to see variation in the English spoken in Singapore along a continuum, with the style adopted depending on the education level and circumstances of the conversation. Some well-educated, proficient speakers have been shown to use mostly SStdE but with many pragmatic particles when talking to their friends, and this seems to provide evidence to support the continuum analysis.

It is certainly true that speakers are able to switch quite abruptly, for example as they exit a classroom and start chatting to their friends, so one way or another there are many characteristics of diglossia in spoken Singapore English.

Tagalog

Tagalog is the primary language spoken in the southern half of Luzon, the northernmost island group in the Philippines. Southern Luzon covers the provinces around and including Metro Manila.

The Manila Dialect is the basis for the country's national language, Filipino (which is the High register). Tagalogs originating from provinces outside of Metro Manila speak their own dialects, such as Batangan Tagalog (which are the Low registers). Additionally, speakers of other Philippine languages originating from different parts of the country, such as Cebuano and Ilokano, will switch to Tagalog when communicating with those outside of their respective regions and in formal settings. Official publications and other documents are also written in Tagalog and Philippine English (the country's other official language), and seldom in a local language.

Tamil

Tamil has 3 forms: ''Cankatamizh'', modelled on Old Tamil, ''Centamizh'', the style used in modern formal contexts today, and ''Kotuntamizh'', the modern colloquial form. These styles form a continuum, so that some writers use ''Cenkatamizh'' words while writing in ''Centamizh''. ''Cenkatamizh'' and ''Centamizh'' are very different from the various dialects of ''Kotuntamizh''.

The classic form is preferred for writing, and is also used for public speaking. While the written Tamil language is mostly standard across various Tamil-speaking regions, the spoken form of the language differs widely from the written form. Perunchitthranar, a Tamil nationalist and others of his ilk, advocated that all Tamils speak only the pure form of the language, i.e., Centhamizh.

Tamil fiction-writers use ''Centhamizh'' for all descriptive writing and use "Kotunthamizh" only to narrate conversations between the characters in their works. There have been exceptions to this rule. Noted novelist Kalki Krishnamurthy once dismissed ''Centhamizh'' as ''Kodunthamizh'' (tortured Tamil) although his novels are written almost entirely in ''Centhamizh'', both description and conversation. Even though all Tamils—no matter how educated they are—always converse in ''Kotuntamizh'', Tamil novels used to depict educated people speaking in the classic form. Several decades ago, most Tamil movies had characters who spoke in ''Centamizh''.

Thai

Standard Thai language has not only two (high and low) but several social registers with distinct functions: 1. Street or common Thai (ภาษาพูด, spoken Thai): informal, without polite terms of address, as used between close relatives and friends; 2. Elegant or formal Thai (ภาษาเขียน, written Thai): official and written version, includes respectful terms of address; used in simplified form in newspapers; 3. Rhetorical Thai: used for public speaking; 4. Religious Thai: (heavily influenced by Sanskrit and Pāli) used when discussing Buddhism or addressing monks; 5. Royal Thai (ราชาศัพท์): (influenced by Khmer) used when addressing members of the royal family or describing their activities. Most Thais can speak and understand all of these. Street and elegant Thai are the basis of all conversations; rhetorical, religious and royal Thai are taught in schools as the national curriculum.

Tibetan

Classical Tibetan was the high register used universally by all Tibetans while the various mutually unintelligible Tibetic languages serve as the low register vernacular, like Central Tibetan language in Ü-Tsang (Tibet proper), Khams Tibetan in Kham, Amdo Tibetan in Amdo, Ladakhi language in Ladakh, and Dzongkha in Bhutan. Classical Tibetan was used for official and religious purposes, such as in Tibetan Buddhist religious texts like the Tibetan Buddhist canon and taught and learned in monasteries and schools in Tibetan Buddhist regions.

Now Standard Tibetan, based on the Lhasa dialect, serves as the high register in China. In Bhutan, the Tibetan Dzongkha language has been standardized and replaced Classical Tibetan for official purposes and education, in Ladakh, the standard official language learned are now the unrelated languages Hindi-Urdu and English, and in Baltistan, the Tibetan Balti language serves as the low register while the unrelated Urdu language