Lace avilen ko radio Romani language and identity on the Internet A thesis submitted to The University of Manchester for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Humanities 2013 Daniele V Leggio School of Arts, Languages and Cultures List of contents List of Abbreviations 4 List of Figures 4 List of Tables 4 List of Graphs 5 Abstract 6 Declaration and Copyright Statement 7 Acknowledgment 8 1 Introduction 9 1.1 Diasporas on the Internet 10 1.2 The Multilingual Internet 14 1.3 Language choice in diasporic CMC 16 1.4 The challenge for language planning theories 19 2 Practices and theories of language standardization 22 2.1 The emergence of standard languages 22 2.1.1 The Middle Ages linguistic situation 23 2.1.2 The Modern Age and the emergence of the nation-state 23 2.1.3 The Contemporary Age 25 2.2 Language standardization in the post-colonial period 26 2.2.1 Status and corpus planning 26 2.2.2 The application of the model 28 2.2.3 Reversing language shift 29 2.2.4 Language rights 31 2.2.5 Language planning in a global word 34 2.3 The case of Romani 36 2.3.1 Romani activists and intellectuals 36 2.3.2 Rights recognition and state support 39 2.3.3 RLS efforts 41 2.3.4 The Internet 42 2.4 Summary 44 3 The Mitrovica Roma 47 3.1 The Mitrovica Roma community 47 3.1.1 Life in Kosovo 47 3.1.2 Migrations and dispersal 51 3.1.3 Life in diaspora 55 3.2 Radio Romani Mahala 57 3.3 Summary 63 4 Languages and identities on RRM: ethnographic account 64 4.1 Methodology and ethics 64 4.2 RRM chat-room 66 4.2.1 User-names, users’ demographics and general behaviours 67 4.2.2 CMC discourse features and net-iquette on RRM 72 4.2.3 RRM chat-room as a diasporic space 73 4.3 Language choice on RRM 76 4.3.1 Greetings and goodbyes 77 4.3.2 Community maintenance and strengthening 81 4.3.3 Humour and strong personas 85 4.3.4 Affection and intimate feelings 90 2 4.3.5 Self-policing and politeness 95 4.4 Summary 97 5 Languages and identities on RRM: quantitative analysis 100 5.1 Methodology 100 5.2 Language choice in user-names 103 5.3 Language choice in messages 107 5.3.1 General distribution 107 5.3.2 Distribution by communicative functions 109 5.4 Summary 124 6 The codification of Romani on RRM 128 6.1 Methodology 128 6.2 Choice of variety 131 6.2.1 Fully shared features 131 6.2.2 Contrasting features 135 6.2.3 Partially shared features 141 6.2.4 User consistency in choice of variants 150 6.3 Choice of spelling 152 6.3.1 Postalveolar fricatives 153 6.3.2 Postalveolar affricates 154 6.3.3 Glottal and velar fricatives 156 6.3.4 Semi-vowels 158 6.3.5 Alveolar affricate 159 6.3.6 Labial fricative 159 6.3.7 Vowels 160 6.3.8 Aspirated consonants 160 6.3.9 Early Romani /ř/ 161 6.3.10 Spelling summary 161 6.4 Summary 163 7 Cosmopolitan practices, language development and the Internet 166 7.1 Language practice on RRM 167 7.2 Language development on the Internet 169 7.3 Representing and performing diasporas on-line 171 7.4 Cosmopolitan practices on RRM 173 7.5 Concluding remarks 178 References 180 Word count: 63281 3 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CMC - Computer Mediated FUT - Future Communication GEN - Genitive IM - Instant Messaging Software IMP - Imperative RMS Romani Morpho-Syntax Database INTER - Interjection RRM - Radio Romani Mahala M - Masculine 1SG - First Singular NEG - Negator 2SG - Second Singular OBL - Oblique 3SG - Third Singular PERF - Perfective 1PL - First Plural PL - Plural 2PL - Second Plural PRES - Present 3PL - Third Plural REF - Reflexive ACC - Accusative REM - Remoteness ABL - Ablative SG - Singular COMPL - Complementizer SUBJ - Subjunctive DAT - Dative VOC - Vocative F - - Feminine LIST OF FIGURES Figure 3.1: RRM homepage 1 58 Figure 3.2: RRM homepage 2 60 Figure 3.3: RRM homepage 3 61 Figure 4.1: Flatcast add-on, RRM not broadcasting 67 Figure 4.2: Flatcast add-on, RRM broadcasting 68 Figure 6.1: Location of Arli varieties 130 LIST OF TABLES Table 2.1: Haugen’s (1972: 271) language planning matrix. 26 Table 2.2: Romani spellings 45 Table 5.1: Distribution of functions by languages 111 Table 5.2: Distribution of function by switches 111 Table 6.1: Arli varieties of former-Yugoslavia documented on RMS 130 Table 6.2: Features shared by Mitrovica Gurbet and all Arli varieties 131 Table 6.3: Features differentiating Mitrovica Gurbet from the Arli varieties 135 Table 6.4: Features partially shared between Mitrovica Gurbet and Arli varieties 142 Table 6.5: RRM alphabet 162 4 LIST OF GRAPHS Graph 5.1: Language mixing in user-names 103 Graph 5.2: Language choice in user-names 104 Graph 5.3: Language choice in messages 105 Graph 5.1: Switching in messages 107 Graph 5.5: Position of switches 108 Graph 5.6: Switches for salutations 113 Graph 5.7: Distribution of languages for salutations 114 Graph 5.8: Distribution of switches for attention seeking 115 Graph 5.9: Distribution of languages for attention seeking 115 Graph 5.10: Distribution of switches for politeness 116 Graph 5.11: Distribution of languages for politeness 116 Graph 5.12: Distribution of switches for requests 117 Graph 5.13: Distribution of languages for requests 117 Graph 5.14: Distribution of switches for humour 118 Graph 5.15: Distribution of languages for humour 119 Graph 5.16: Distribution of switches for emphasis 120 Graph 5.17: Distribution of languages for emphasis 120 Graph 5.18: Distribution of switches for plain talk 121 Graph 5.19: Distribution of languages for plain talk 121 Graph 5.20: Distribution of switches for singing and shouting 122 Graph 5.21: Distribution of languages for singing and shouting 122 Graph 5.22: Distribution of switches for change of addressee 123 Graph 5.23: Distribution of languages for change of addressee 124 Graph 6.1: Forms of 1st and 2nd persons copula 137 Graph 6.2: Indicative and copula negators 138 Graph 6.3: Umlaut in 1SG copula and 1SG.PERF marker 139 Graph 6.4: Perfective markers 140 Graph 6.5: Prothesis of a- 141 Graph 6.6: Palatalization of alveolars 143 Graph 6.7: Palatalization of velar stops before front vowels 145 Graph 6.8: Short and long forms of 2SG.DAT 145 Graph 6.9: Genitive markers 146 Graph 6.10: Loan verb adaptation markers 148 Graph 6.11: Forms of demonstrative pronouns 149 Graph 6.12: Users consistency in choice of Romani variety 151 Graph 6.13: Unvoiced postalveolar fricative 153 Graph 6.14: Unvoiced postalveolar affricate 154 Graph 6.15: Voiced postalveolar affricate 155 Graph 6.16: Voiceless glottal fricative 157 Graph 6.17: Voiceless uvular fricative 157 Graph 6.18: Semi-vowel /j/ 158 Graph 6.19: Alveolar affricate 159 Graph 6.20: Aspirated consonants 161 5 ABSTRACT The fall of the Eastern Block, the dissolution of former Yugoslavia and the subsequent enlargement of the European Union to include former socialist countries contributed to an increase in the movement of people from Eastern to Western Europe which began about a decade earlier. Among them, the Roma are probably the most clearly recognizable group and surely the ones that received, and keep receiving, more media attention. While their presence in the media as subjects of discussion is a topic worth analyzing, the present work is about their presence in a particular medium, the Internet, as actors and producers of content. As a population of Indian origin spread across Europe over the past five centuries, Roma have often been regarded as a diaspora. Ethnographic studies about diasporas and their usage of the Internet have often described diasporic websites as discoursive spaces in which new, hydrid identities are negotiated and stereotyping and marginalizing discourses about diasporic subjects are challenged. The role of languages in these websites, however, has often been neglected. On the other hand, sociolinguistic studies have highlighted how the Internet provides a space for vernacular language usage in which the relaxation of language norms and users’ creativity play a crucial role in overcoming the limitations in text transmission imposed by the medium. A partial bridge between these two trends of studies has been provided by the analysis of code-switching in diasporic websites, which has shown how meaningful language alternation is used to flag users’ hybrid identities. The study of the relationship between diasporic languages and identities on the Internet clearly appears to be in its infancy and only few case studies have looked at the interactions between each diaspora’s specific cultural and sociolinguistic settings and the usage of the Internet. Furthermore, many diasporas, including the Roma, speak unwritten languages which have not been or are just starting to be standardized. Processes of language standardization have always involved both identity and language policies and have often been pivotal in struggles for nationhood or minority rights recognition. While so far such processes tended to be mostly centralized and top-down, the Internet is offering a space for the spontaneous transition from orality to literacy. Thus, analyzing the interaction between diasporic, non-standardized languages and the identities of their speakers as manifested on the Internet can provide new insights into the relations between diasporic languages and identities and into language standardization processes.