The Notion ‘Language’

The identification of different languages is not a straightforward matter. Every language is characterized by variation within the speech community that uses it. If the resulting speech varieties are sufficiently similar as to be considered merely characteristic of a particular geographic region or social grouping they are generally referred to as dialects, so Cockney and Norfolk are usually considered to be dialects of English. Sometimes social, political and historical pressures are such that the varieties are considered to be distinct enough to be treated as separate languages, like Swedish and Norwegian or Hindi and Urdu. Often the question of whether two languages are varieties of a single language or distinct languages is much argued over, like Macedonian and Bulgarian, or English and Scots. The naming of a language is another point of possible contention. While most linguists estimate around 6800 languages in the world, they also recognise four or five times that number of language names. A particular language may be known by one name to scholarship and another to its speakers; thus the name ‘Akan’ is not generally used by speakers of the language since Akan speech forms constitute a dialect continuum running from north to south in Ghana and different communities refer to their tongue by different names – Asante, Fante, Twi, Akuapem, Brong, Akyem or Kwahu.

Source:CONCISE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD by KEITH BROWN