Colonial Activities Influencing English Language

It is undoubtedly true that English is an internationaloften
language and it is the most widespread language onoccurred. As a result, pidgins and creoles developed
earth. . It is spoken in many parts of the world, yetand new varieties
with various degrees of differences in grammar,of English emerged.Different patterns of colonial
pronunciation or vocabulary. How do these varietiesactivity and their effects on English
arise? When weAccording to David Graddol et al., there were three
take a close look at the history in the last fewtypes of
centuries, it isEnglish colony, each of them having different effects
certain that the varieties of English have a closeon the
relationship withdevelopment of English. In the first type, exemplified
the colonial activity in this period.by America and
Until the late sixteenth century English was notAustralia, substantial settlement by first-language
spoken anywherespeakers of
outside the British Isles. The spread of EnglishEnglish displaced the pre-colonial population. In the
beyond the Britishsecond, typified
Isles resulted from the spread of theby Nigeria, sparser colonial settlements maintained
English-speaking people throughthe pre-colonial
colonial activity.population in subjection and allowed a proportion of
As English-speaking colonies were established, Englishthem access to
came intolearning English as a second, or additional, language.
contact with indigenous languages of the pre-colonialThe third type,
population. Veryexemplified by the Caribbean islands of Barbados
often speakers in these communities tend toand Jamica. Here, a
incorporate manypre-colonial population was replaced by new labor
linguistic features from their first language whenfrom elsewhere,
speaking the newprincipally West Africa.North America
one. Besides, there was diversity in the languageIn 1607 the first British colony was established in
used by theJamestown.
English-speaking settlers themselves. Dialect leveling