___Description of Gumperz' and Wilson's Kupwar study_____________
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ UP: <[LINK]>
In a landmark ethnolinguistic study, John Gumperz and Robert
Wilson have studied public language interaction in Kupwar village
in southern India. From their observations they have constructed
a series of variable feature scales for elements of grammar and
lexicon by collecting and sorting data from speakers who they had
assigned to one of four ethnolinguistic categories:
_Kannada_-speaking Jains and Lingayats, _Urdu_-speaking Muslims,
_Marathi_-speaking landless and untouchables, and a few
_Telegu_-speaking rope makers (who were factored out of the
study). The Jains are the majority group and they and the
Muslims are the "two land-owning and cultivating groups."
_Marathi_ is the principal official and literary language and
serves as the main language for inter-group communication. Most
Kupwar men are bi- or multi-lingual. The social makeup is
stable, and all but the Telegu ropemakers have been in the area
for centuries. Gumperz and Wilson want to know why this
situation of language contact has not resulted in one language
becoming dominant, perhaps shifting radically in structure, as
historical linguists and some creolists would assume.