Native Englishes (inner circle):
British Isles and North America
Michelle Lomeli, Irina Giesbrecht
Outline
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Countries of the inner circle
North American English
British English / UK English
Canadian English
Irish English
In praise of English (Pennycook)
Discussion
Native English
The language a human being learns from birth.
The Inner Circle:
Represents the traditional bases of English
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The United States 215 million The United Kingdom
61 million Anglophone Canada 18.2 million Ireland 3.8 million •
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Australia New Zealand
Malta South Africa
some of the Caribbean territories. The total number of English speakers in the inner circle: 380 million
NorthAmerican English •
was inherited through British colonization.
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The first wave of English‐speaking settlers arrived in North America in the 17th century.
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Not official in the U.S. federal government.
Dialects of the United States: How do they differ from each other?
Northern: As in General American is rhotic. •
The Mary‐marry‐merry merger: Words containing /æ/, /ɛ/, or /eɪ/ before an r and a vowel are all pronounced "[ɛ~eɪ]‐r‐vowel, and have the same first vowel as Sharon, Sarah, and bearing.
(this merger is widespread throughout the Midwest, West, and Canada). •
The word on rhymes with don, not with dawn
Southern: •
The merger of [ɛ] and [ɪ] before nasal consonants, so that pen and pin are pronounced the same, but the pin‐pen merger is not found in New Orleans, Savannah, or Miami (which does not fall within the Southern dialect region). •
Lax and tense vowels often neutralize before /l/, making pairs like feel/fill and fail/fell homophones for speakers in some areas of the South. Eastern: non‐rhotic
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most accents in this region have not merged the vowels of father and bother, that is, the two do not rhyme, as they do in GenAm. In general, these accents undergo the cot‐caught merger, making cot and caught homophonous.
Western: Unlike the Inland North (or Great Lakes), cot‐caught merger
and no Northern Cities Shift. •
/u/ is being fronted like in most of North America.
Main features:
Pronunciation:
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Most North American speech is rhotic.
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The sound corresponding to the letter r is a retroflex [ɻ] or alveolar approximant [ɹ]
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The merger of /ɑ/ and /ɒ/ (making father and bother rhyme)
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The merger of /ɒ/ and /ɔ/ (where cot and caught are homophones) Vocabulary
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Borrowed words:
From Native American languages: raccoon, squash (from Algonquian)
From Dutch: cookie, stoop
From French: portage
From Spanish: Rodeo barbecue
From Yiddish: schmooze, tush
The rise of capitalism, the development of industry and material
innovations throughout the 19th and 20th centuries as well as the
American Revolution were the source of a massive stock of distinctive new
words, phrases and idioms.
Vocabulary of :
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Transportation and Railroading:
dirt roads and back roads to freeways and parkways. •
Jobs and occupations:
bartender, patrolman, bellhop, employee.
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Businesses and workplaces:
department store, supermarket, drugstore, gas station.
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Innovations: automated teller machine, smart card, cash register, dishwasher. elevator, ground.
British English or UK English
As a West Germanic language it originated from the Anglo‐Frisian dialects brought to England by Germanic settlers from various parts of what is now northwest Germany and the northern Netherlands.
The original Old English was then influenced by two waves of invasion:
1‐ By language speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family; they conquered and colonized parts of Britain in the 8th and 9th centuries. 2‐ The Normans in the 11th century, who spoke Norman French and ultimately developed an English variety of this called Anglo‐
Norman.
Dialects and accents of the U.K.
1- English English (southern English, Midlands English, Northern English dialects)
2- Welsh English
3- Scottish English
English English
• Non‐rhotic pronunciation.
• In Northern versions there is no distinction between /ʊ/ and /ʌ/ making put and putt homophones (as /pʊt/). (foot‐strut split) Welsh English :
• rising intonation at the end of statements.
• The vowel /ʌ/ in English words such as "bus" is pronounced [ə], instead of the [ɐ] used in England.
• pronouncing [ɪ] as [ɛ] e.g. "edit" (edet)and "benefit" (benefet)
The Scottish and Northern English dialects • borrowed words from Old Norse and Gaelic, though most of the structure and common words are Anglo‐Saxon.
e.g. 'kirk' (church) 'beck' (stream) 'feart' (feared) 'lang syne' (long ago) •
Viking and Norman :
bairn (child) gefa (give)
bait (tease) hett (hot)
fell (skin) husbondi (husband) lake knifr (knife)
The accent best known to many people outside the United Kingdom as English English, is that of Received Pronunciation (RP).
Once referred to as the Queen's (or King's) English or "BBC English" or "Oxford English", and the Oxford Dictionary gives RP pronunciations for each word.
Canadian English
Canadian English is the product of four waves of immigration and settlement over a period of almost two centuries. •
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The influx of British Loyalists fleeing the American Revolution from the Mid‐
Atlantic States.
British and Irish immigrating after the War of 1812.
Waves of immigration from around the globe in 1910 and 1960.
From Asia, Hong Kong was the leading birth source
of immigrants to Canada in 1996. In 2001, China was the leading birth country of immigrants followed by India.
Canadian English contains elements of :
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American English: holiday, vacation.
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British English: constable, chartered, account.
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French : tuque (a particular type of winter)
guichet (ATM or bank machine) chalet (cottage)
garderie (daycare centre), chum (boyfriend)
le fun (great, cool) smooth (easy‐going). Main features:
Pronunciation
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Canadian rising: The diphthongs /aɪ/ and /aʊ/ are "raised" before voiceless consonants, namely /p/, /t/, /k/, /s/, and /f/
Almost all Canadians have the cot‐caught merger, which also occurs among many U.S. speakers who do not distinguish /ɔ/ (as in caught) and /ɑ/ (as in cot), which merge as [ɒ], a low back rounded vowel.
Vocabulary
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Canadian English shares vocabulary with American English: holiday (interchangeably with vacation) Canada shares many items of institutional terminology and professional designations with the countries of the former British Empire. constable (for a police officer of the lowest rank)
Grammar
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Canadians will start a sentence with As well, in the sense of "in addition“ this construction is a Canadianism.
Canadian and British English share idioms like in hospital and to university, while in American English the definite article is mandatory.
Irish English
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In the late 12th century English was only spoken by a small minority of people inhabiting an area known as the Pale around Dublin.
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It was first introduced on a wide scale: The Plantations of Ireland (16th ‐
and 17th century)
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the implementation of the Penal Laws.
During the early-to-mid 19th century English became the majority language
in Ireland.
Main features:
It preserves Gaelic features in pronunciation, syntax, and vocabulary.
Most Hiberno‐English dialects are rhotic.
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Pronunciation
words such as cat and garden sound like ‘kyat’ and ‘gyarden’: initial /k/ and /g/ with a following semivowel /j/. Hugh and Hughes sound as if they began with a ‘ky’. true, drew sound like ‘threw’ and ‘dhrew’
Vocabulary
Nouns retained from Irish often relate to food
boxty
= a potato dish (from bacstaidh mashed potato)
Grammar:
preference for nominal structures: Give her the full of it (Fill it) He has a long finger on him (He steals) Constructions with preposition and pronoun together:
His back's at him (He has a backache) She stole my book on me (She stole my book)
A structure resembling the German perfect:
"I have the car fixed." Tá an carr deisithe agam.
"I have my breakfast eaten." Tá mo bhricfeasta ite agam.
The tendency to replace the simple present tense with the conditional (would) and the simple past tense with the conditional perfect (would have).
"John asked me would I buy a loaf of bread." (John asked me to buy a loaf of bread.) "How do you know him? We would have been in school together." (We went to school together.)
The word ye, yis or yous is used in place of you for the second‐person plural.
Ye'r, Yisser or Yousser are the possessive forms, e.g. "Where are yous going?"
The linguistic effects of the independence of Ireland:
the emergence of IrE, e.g. • after‐perfects
We are just after receiving a letter from Kate of Farside (291)
• modal object perfects We will have our wheat finished in about another week. (294)
• habitual do
But Dear Joseph when you do write [emphatic] you mite say some thing to William as some like to be mentioned by Name for he is very Kind to Mary Ann. But your Bother in Law does think [habitual] that as you have no Brothers or Sisters in Ireland but Mary Ann and him. (295)
• habitual be
I am Surprised that Michael does not be enquiring after me, … (296)
• unbound reflexives
Seeing that they are elected by ourselves, and represent us, … (286)
In praise of English
• 19th century: British confidence in their own greatness
• “glorification of English and global spread“
In praise of English
“ The British flag waves over one‐fifth of the habitable globe, one‐fourth of the human race
acknowledges the sway of the British monarch, more than one hundred princes render him allegiance. The English language is spoken by more people than any other race, it bids fair to become at some time the speech of the globe, and about one‐half of the world's ocean shipping trade is yet in British hands.” (Rolleston 1911)
In praise of English
• Crystal (1987)
– dominant in the whole world
– main language of • “books, newspapers, airports, and air‐traffic control, international business and academic conferences, science, technology, medicine, diplomacy, sports, international competitions, pop music, and advertising”
In praise of English
Which areas are not dominated by English? In praise of English
• Bryson (1990): – “More than 300 million people in the world speak English and the rest, it sometimes seems, try to.”
What do you think about that?
In praise of English
• Claiborne (1983):
– most important 'second language' in the world
– spoken by tens of millions of educated Europeans and Japanese
– most widely studied foreign tongue in both the USSR [Soviet Union] and China
In praise of English
• Jenkins (1995): – “English has triumphed. Those who do not speak it are at a universal disadvantage against those who do. Those who deny this supremacy merely seek to keep the disadvantaged deprived.”
ÆLinguicism, Linguistic Imperialism (Phillipson)
In praise of English
• breadth of vocabulary
• fast‐growing for 1,000 years, borrowing words everywhere
• “largest, most variegated and most expressive vocabulary in the world” (Claiborn)
– total number of words estimated between 400,000 and 600,000
– biggest French dictionaries: 150,000 entries
– biggest Russian ones: 130,000 entries
In praise of English
• Bryson (1990):
• “The richness of the English vocabulary, and the wealth of available synonyms, means that English speakers can often draw shades of distinction unavailable to non‐English speakers.”
– French: house – home; mind – brain, man – gentleman, 'I wrote' ‐ 'I have written'
– Spanish: chairman – president
– Russian: no words for efficiency, challenge, engagement ring, have fun, take care
In praise of English
“It is the enormous and variegated lexicon of English, far more than the mere numbers and geographical spread of its speakers, that truly makes our native tongue marvellous – makes it in fact, a medium for the precise, vivid and subtle expression of thought and emotion that has no equal, past or present.” (Claiborne 1983)
In praise of English
Are English speakers better equipped to express their thoughts?
Thanks for your attention and participation!
Sources
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Bryson, Bill, The Mother Tongue: English & How It Got That Way.
Christensen, Lis. A First Glossary of Hiberno‐English. 1996.
Kallen, Jeffrey L., ed. Focus on Ireland. Varieties of English around the World. 1997.
Katzner, Kenneth, the Languages of the World.
Kiberd, Declan. Inventing Ireland: The Literature of the Modern Nation. 1995.
Pennycook, Alastair, English and the Discourses of Colonialism. London: Routledge 1998, 133‐
144.
Phillipson, Robert, Linguistic Imperialism. Oxford: OUP. 1992.
Milroy, James and Lesley, Real English the grammar of English dialects in the British Isles
http://www.europeonrail.com/pics/maps/BritishIsles.gif
http://www.evolpub.com/Americandialects/MidAtlhome.html