Earning Capital in Hawai‘i’s Linguistic Landscape

Abstract

In its traditional formulation, the sociolinguistic concept of diglossia (Ferguson 1959; Fishman 1967) takes inequality as a starting point. In multilingual societies described as diglossic, ‘vernacular’, non-official language varieties are relegated to informal, private, and usually low prestige contexts while official languages, often the legacies of colonial rule, are reserved for formal and public contexts which by their very nature index high prestige. Language in Hawai’i is said to demonstrate this type of diglossia, where English is a co-official state language along with Hawaiian, and where Pidgin (also known as Hawai’i Creole) is more or less only deemed appropriate for low prestige contexts (Marlow & Giles 2010; Reinecke 1969; Romaine 1999; Sato 1991). The English specific to Hawai’i is generally not stigmatized even though Local¹ people recognize that there are differences between mainland US and Hawai’i varieties of the language. On the other hand, Local people often take pains to distinguish between ‘proper English’ and Pidgin, often referring to the latter as a form of ‘broken English’. Of course, Pidgin arguably carries covert prestige (Labov 1966), for speaking this language is a crucial way to mark oneself as Local amongst a population made up of short-term visitors, transplants from the mainland United States, immigrants, and other recent arrivals.