Varieties of the English language

VARIETIES OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

PLAN

• DEFINITION OF THE BASIC TERMS
• ENGLISH VARIANTS
• SCOTTISH ENGLISH
• BRITISH DIALECTS
• COCKNEY
• ESTUARY ENGLISH
• YORKSHIRE DIALECT

THE BASIC TERMS

Standard English-the official language of Great Britain taught at schools and universities, used by the press, the radio and the television and spoken by educated people may be defined as that form of English which is current and literary, substantially uniform and recognized as acceptable wherever English is spoken and understood.

BASIC TERMS

• Variety is a form of the language
• Variant is a variety of the English language which has a literary norm.
• Dialect is a local variety of the English language

ENLISH VARIANTS

• English Variants on the British Isles
• English Variants outside the British Isles

THE BASIC PERCULIARITIES OF VARIETIES

Variants and dialects differ from Standard English in terms of pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary

VOCABULARY PERCULIARITIES

• Some groups of words belong to the vocabulary of a variant or dialect exclusively and constitute its specific features. Such words are called Americanisms, Canadianisms etc. (a redneck)
• Some words which have changed their meaning or fallen out of usage in Standard English still retain their original meaning in variant and dialects ( fall – in American English autumn )

3. The same word may have different meanings in Standard English and in variants and dialects. ( the word gate in Scottish English means road )

4. Some semantic fields can be structured differently ( the term minor in Standard English is a person below 18 while in Scottish law a pupil is a person ( to age 12 for girls and 14 for boys) and minors (older children up to 18)

ENGLISH VARIANTS ON THE BRITISH ISLES

• Standard English
• Scottish English
• Irish English

Scotland

James VI and I (James Charles Stuart; 19 June 1566 – 27 March 1625)

Scottish English

• King James VI of Scotland became King James I of England in 1603.
• The Acts of Union 1707 amalgamated the Scottish and English Parliaments.

SCOTTISH ENGLISH

Scottish English is the variant of the English language spoken in Scotland. The main, formal variety is called Scottish Standard English or Standard Scottish English ( SSE ).

Scottish words

• wee - small
• bony - beautiful and healthy
• lassie - a girl or a woman
• bairn - child
• kirk- church
• loch -lake
• daffy- crazy
• cuddy -fool

loch

kirk

IRISH ENGLISH

Irish English/ Hiberno‐English (from Latin Hibernia: "Ireland") or Anglo –Irish- the variety of English spoken in Ireland.

Historical facts

• English was brought to Ireland as a result of the Norman invasion of Ireland of the late 12th century. Initially, it was mainly spoken in an area known as the Pale around Dublin, with mostly Irish spoken throughout the rest of the country;
• The Tudor conquest and colonization of Ireland in the 16th century marked a revival in the use of English. By the mid-19th century, English was the majority language spoken in the country.

Vocabulary

Loan words from Irish ( Abú- interjection Hooray ! Used in sporting occasions)

Vocabulary

• Words are that are derived from the Irish language. Some are words in English that have entered into general use, while others are unique to Ireland. These words and phrases are often anglicised versions of words in Irish or direct translations into English ( Bockety-Original Irish ( Bacach (lame)- Unsteady, wobbly, broken )

Vocabulary

• Words and phrases common in Old and Middle English, but which have since become obscure or obsolete in the modern English language generally. Hiberno-English has also developed particular meanings for words that are still in common use in English generally.
• Mitch ( a verb) –play truant ( from Middle English)
• Yoke ( a noun) – thing, object, gadget ( from Old English geoc)

• Dear = expensive
• Anything strange?- What’s new?
• 8 bells- 8 o’clock
• These sausages are cat- bad
• She is a gas girl!- funny

Words borrowed from Irish English

• Boycott
• Brogues
• Hooligan
• Whiskey

Banshee

BRITISH DIALECTS

• Southern dialects
• Northern dialects
• Midland dialects
• Western dialects
• Eastern dialects

MAP OF BRITISH VARIANTS AND DIALECTS

COCKNEY

Cockney is one of the best known Southern dialects, the regional London dialect.

St. Mary-le-Bow the Cheapside district

Cockney words

Cockney rhyming slang- a feature of the Cockney dialect

Examples:

Joy of my life- wife

Storm and strife- wife

Struggle and strif e- wife

MORE COCKNEY WORDS

• cash and carried – married
• The excuse me – W.C.
• hit or miss – kiss
• ocean pearl- girl
• cuddle and kiss- miss
• heaven above – love
• tea leaf- thief

GUESS

1. I climbed the pears. (stairs)

2. Would you Adam and Eve it? (believe)

3. How do you like my whistle and flute ? ()

4.What beautiful minces !

5. Think! Use your loaf of bread !

6.He was Brahms and Liszt .

7. Where is my bone ? (phone)

THE FUTURE

An influential July 2010 report by Paul Kerswill, Professor of Sociolinguistics at Lancaster University, Multicultural London English: the emergence, acquisition and diffusion of a new variety , predicted that the cockney accent will disappear from London's streets within 30 years .

THE FUTURE

The study, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, said that the accent, which has been around for more than 500 years, is being replaced in London by a new hybrid language.

" Cockney in the East End is now transforming itself into Multicultural London English, a new, melting-pot mixture of all those people living here who learnt English as a second language “ Prof Kerswill

ESTUARY ENGLISH

Estuary English is the variety of the English language spoken in the South-East of England, especially along the river Thames and its estuary. Among the lexical features of the dialect is the use of Cockney words and phrases as well as words from American and Australian English.

YORKSHIRE

THE YORKSHIRE DIALECT

This dialect belongs to the group of Northern- Midlands dialects. The dialect has roots in older languages such as Old English and Old Norse.

Words:

• bairn- child
• backend -autumn
• lug- ear
• urchin -hedgehog

VARIANTS OUTSIDE THE BRITISH ISLES

• American English
• Australian English
• Canadian English
• Indian English
• New Zealand English etc

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