Society and Change in Bali Nyonga: Critical Perspectives

6. Language Use in a Multicultural Online Community

110 Chapter Six Language Use in a Multicultural Online Community Patience Fielding A lot has been said about the Internet creating a global village, reducing space and time and maintaining a sense of community. Discussions abound on the Internet as a new means of global communication and its great impact on language use. The strong presence of online English has caused consternation among many and has stirred debates on how the Internet serves the needs of language titans while neglecting the needs of smaller groups. Many scholars have expressed concern about the dominance of world English and the Internet as a new arena for its spread (Mair 2002; Nunberg 2002; Dor 2004). Some view the spread of English as a “natural’ or benign extension of globalization (Fishman, Conrad, and Ruybal-Lopez 1996; Fishman 1998; Crystal 2000, 2003). Others take a dimmer view, writing of “linguistic imperialism” and its threat to the status of smaller languages (Phillipson 1992; Phillipson and Skutnabb-Kangas 2001; Pakir in press). Although the Internet may be accelerating the globalization process each society or culture tends to have a set of localized linguistic practices online that distinguishes its members from other significant groups (Appadurai 1996; Hongladarom 2000). In this paper I examine language use on Mbonbani, a Diasporic egroup of indigenes of Bali Nyonga, a village in Cameroon West Africa where Mungaka is the indigenous language. To analyze social change in Bali as it pertains to a new dynamic, I look at the use of the Bali language in domains beyond its immediate borders. I focus particularly on the presence of Mungaka in a virtual community to highlight how Mungaka has moved from strictly oral traditional spheres to an online environment, co-existing with larger languages such as English, French and Cameroon Pidgin English. I also provide a brief history of the sociolinguistic situation in Cameroon, the home country of the Mbonbani participants. I highlight the role of globalization in the creation of Diasporic 111 populations of Cameroonians and Bali indigenes which has resulted in the existence the pockets of multilinguals scattered on various parts of the globe. I move to consider how the Internet fits in this Diasporic environment with its provision of new ways of disseminating information, facilitation of contact over space and time and building Mbonbani, a new online community. I observe the communication practices in this forum and analyze how language use in a virtual community reflects a new dynamic by transcending territorial boundaries. While members of this Diasporic community use language and the Internet to construct, negotiate, renegotiate, contest and deconstruct their individual and group identities based on local, religious, national and global ideologies (Rai 1995; Mitra 1997, 1997; Lal 1999; Iganacio 2000; Bahri 2001), they also adapt their ways of being to the new technologies to foreground an indigenous language which otherwise would remain in a strictly oral environment. I argue that the Internet provides affordances for the creation of a linguistic space where participants appropriate new technologies to advance and enhance cultural traditions even in such situations of language shift. I highlight how participants use both their home language, Mungaka as well as English to maintain themselves. I make the case that the Internet is a boon not only to English but potentially to many other languages, especially minority languages that bridge geographically dispersed speakers as evident in the numerous examples of technology use for language revitalization (Warschauer 1998; Cunliffe and Herring 2005). I conclude that contrary to the belief that smaller languages are disappearing at alarming rate (Wurm 1991; Krauss 1992; Crystal 2000; Nettle and Romaine 2000), the spread of the Internet is bringing new languages online with pockets of bilinguals even in very small languages such as Mungaka. Thus, although it is the case that English had a head start in Internet use over other languages, it is also the case that the Internet has made it possible for other languages, both ‘big’ (e.g. German, French Japanese and Spanish) and ‘small’ (e.g. Mungaka), to exist on the Internet. I conclude with implications of the study, reflect on their broader implications and speculate about potential venues for further inquiry. 112 Research Questions and Methodology This study investigates language use and ideologies as manifested in an online forum and seeks to find out the following: x How does language use in an online Diasporic group mediate culture and reflect the traditional values and practices of a...