Speaker types in the context of "Walter Sutherland (Norn)"

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⭐ Core Definition: Speaker types

Within the linguistic study of endangered languages, sociolinguists distinguish between different speaker types based on the type of competence they have acquired of the endangered language. Often when a community is gradually shifting away from an endangered language to a majority language, not all speakers acquire full linguistic competence; instead, speakers have varying degrees and types of competence depending on their exposure to the minority language in their upbringing. The relevance of speaker types in cases of language shift was first noted by Nancy Dorian, who coined the term semi-speaker to refer to those speakers of Sutherland Gaelic who were predominantly English-speaking and whose Gaelic competence was limited and showed considerable influence from English. Later studies added additional speaker types such as rememberers (who remember some words and phrases but have little or no grammatical competence and do not actively speak the language), and passive speakers (who have nearly full comprehension competence but do not actively speak the language). In the context of language revitalization, new speakers who have learned the endangered language as a second language are sometimes distinguished.

In contexts of language acquisition and language teaching studies, there is sometimes a distinction between native speakers and second language speakers, depending on whether the language was learned as a language of primary socialisation or after having fully acquired a first language. In contexts of multilingualism a bilingual speaker may also be described as a heritage speaker (although a heritage language actually refers to a language whose speakers have moved from the original area where the language was spoken: e.g. Welsh is a heritage language in Patagonia, but not in Wales) if they have not been as fully exposed to one of their languages, leading to a diminished degree of confidence in themselves as speakers, and sometimes also limited competence in one of their languages.

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👉 Speaker types in the context of Walter Sutherland (Norn)

Walter Sutherland (died c. 1850) was a Scottish man, who was reportedly the last native speaker of Norn, a North Germanic language which had once been spoken throughout Shetland, Orkney and Caithness. Sutherland was from Skaw, on the island of Unst, and quoted as being a fisherman who lived in the northernmost house in the British Isles, near the present-day Unst Boat Haven.

Sutherland may, however, have been merely the last native speaker of Norn on Unst. Some unnamed Norn speakers of the island of Foula were reported by Jakob Jakobsen to have survived much later than the middle of the 19th century, though he noted doubt that these people were able to speak "genuine Norn". Another surveyor, Laurits Rendboe, argued in 1987 that the last living speakers of Norn were indeed these men from Foula. Despite this, Sutherland remains the last recorded Norn speaker.

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Speaker types in the context of Ivaritji

Ivaritji (c. 1849 – 25 December 1929), also spelt Iparrityi and other variations, and also known as Amelia Taylor and Amelia Savage, was an elder of the Kaurna tribe of Aboriginal Australians from the Adelaide Plains in South Australia. She was "almost certainly the last person of full Kaurna ancestry", and the last known speaker of the Kaurna language before its revival in the 1990s.

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Speaker types in the context of Central Siberian Yupik language

Central Siberian Yupik (also known as Siberian Yupik, Bering Strait Yupik, Yuit, Yoit, "St. Lawrence Island Yupik", and in Russia "Chaplinski Yupik" or Yuk) is an endangered Yupik language spoken by the Indigenous Siberian Yupik people along the coast of Chukotka in the Russian Far East and in the villages of Savoonga and Gambell on St. Lawrence Island. The language is part of the Eskimo–Aleut language family.

In the United States, the Alaska Native Language Center identified about 400–750 Yupigestun speakers, considering "dormant speakers" who understand but cannot converse. In Russia in 2021, 172 people indicated that they speak the language, while only 92 of them use it in everyday life. Thus, the total number of speakers is no more than 550–900 people.

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Speaker types in the context of Passive speaker (language)

A passive speaker (also referred to as a receptive bilingual or passive bilingual) is a category of speaker who has had enough exposure to a language in childhood to have a native-like comprehension of it but has little or no active command of it. Passive fluency is often brought about by being raised in one language (which becomes the person's passive language) and being schooled in another language (which becomes the person's native language).

Such speakers are especially common in language shift communities where speakers of a declining language do not acquire active competence. For example, around 10% of the Ainu people who speak the language are considered passive speakers. Passive speakers are often targeted in language revival efforts to increase the number of speakers of a language quickly, as they are likely to gain active and near-native speaking skills more quickly than those with no knowledge of the language. They are also found in areas where people grow up hearing another language outside their family with no formal education.

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LINKED FROM (PARENTS)
← Ivaritji ← Iparrityi ← Central Siberian Yupik language ← Passive speaker (language) ← Walter Sutherland (Norn)
LINKS TO (CHILDREN)
Endangered language → Linguistic competence → Nancy Dorian → Passive speaker (language) → First language → Second language → Multilingualism → Heritage language →