Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- List of contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Map of the British Isles
- Introduction
- Part I English
- 1 The history of English
- 2 Standard and non-standard English
- 3 Phonological variation in England
- 4 Grammatical variation in England
- 5 Scottish English and Scots
- 6 Northern Irish English
- 7 Southern Irish English
- 8 English in Wales
- 9 English on the Isle of Man
- 10 English in the Channel Islands
- Part II The Celtic Languages
- Part III The Other Languages of the British Isles
- Part IV Applied Sociolinguistic Issues
- References
- Index
3 - Phonological variation in England
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- List of contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Map of the British Isles
- Introduction
- Part I English
- 1 The history of English
- 2 Standard and non-standard English
- 3 Phonological variation in England
- 4 Grammatical variation in England
- 5 Scottish English and Scots
- 6 Northern Irish English
- 7 Southern Irish English
- 8 English in Wales
- 9 English on the Isle of Man
- 10 English in the Channel Islands
- Part II The Celtic Languages
- Part III The Other Languages of the British Isles
- Part IV Applied Sociolinguistic Issues
- References
- Index
Summary
… though the people of London are erroneous in the pronunciation of many words, the inhabitants of every other place are erroneous in many more
John Walker (1791)Introduction
The long history of English dialectology has furnished a wealth of information on variation in the language. The most extensive record concerns the geographical distribution of segmental variables. More recently, the pioneering work of investigators such as Labov (1966, 1994, 2001), Trudgill (1974, 2002a), L. Milroy (1987), J. Milroy (1992) and Eckert (2000) has revealed the social constraints on variation. Instrumental methods have further enhanced our understanding of the fine-grained and gradient nature of variation.
It is not possible in the space available in this chapter to provide a comprehensive descriptive survey of phonological variation in English. Instead, our aim is to provide a critical summary of work from the last twenty years or so, since the first edition of this book was in preparation. While our focus is on the English of England, we also draw comparisons with other varieties of English, and indeed other languages, where it is pertinent to do so.
We begin by outlining key developments in methodology and analysis.
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- Language in the British Isles , pp. 52 - 74Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2007
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