Varieties of English By the same author AN INTRODUCTION TO OLD ENGLISH ENGLISH SOUND·CHANGES THE HARLEY L YRICS (editor) SELECTIONS FROM LAYAMON'S BRUT (editor) A HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE ENGLISH DlALECTS THE MODERN UNIVERSITY THE LANGUAGE OF DICKENS THE LANGUAGE OF SHAKESPEARE WORDS IN EVERYDA Y LlFE Varieties of English G. L. BROOK Emeritus P,oftsso, ofEnglüh Lanpag, anti Mulinlai &tglüb Li'"a'ur, Unitlmity 0/ Manehll"' Second Edition palgrave macmillan © G. L. Brook, 1973, 1979 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission First edition 1973 Reprinted 1974, 1977 Second edition 1979, 1984 Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS L TD London and Basingstoke Companies and representatives throughout the world Transferred 10 digilal prinling 2002 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Brook, George Leslie Varieties of English - 2nd ed. 1. English language - Variety I. Tide 420 PEI072 ISBN 978-0-333-23976-6 ISBN 978-1-349-63707-2 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-63707-2 Contents 7 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION 7 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 8 PHONETIC SYMBOLS 9 Introduction I I 2 Dialects 26 3 Idiolects 55 4- Registers 81 5 Slang 122 6 Usage 7 Our Changing Language FURTHER READING INDEX Preface to the First Edition THE aim ofthis book is to show how varied is the language that we use every day. The varieties examined fall into three cate gories, which can be associated with groups of speakers, with individuals, and with the occasion respectively. I have through out been concerned with the English language as it is today and no previous knowledge of the his tory of the English language is assumed, but I hope that the book will be of use to students at colleges of education and universities and in the upper forms of schools as weIl as to the general reader. I ho pe too that those who are learning to use English as a second language will find here some help in the task that they have undertaken. My thanks are due to the Librarian and Governors of the John Rylands Library, Manchester, for permission to use material from my article 'Va rieties of English " pu blished in the Bulletin ofthe John Rylands Lihrary, LI (1968-9) pp. 271-91, and to the editors of Leeds Studies in English for permission to use material from my article 'The Future of English Dialect Studies' in volume 11, n.s. (1968) pp. 15-22 of that journal. I am indebted too to my wife, who has read the proofs and ad vised me on many points., to Mrs Beryl Gaffin, who has typed successive drafts of the book with patience and skill, to Miss SheilaRalphs for adviceon Italianloan-words, and to my present and former students, especially Mr John Turner and Mrs·Linda Berman, for keeping me informed about what they are doing to the English language today. February 1972 G. L. B. Preface to the Second Edition IN this edition I have made a number of minor corrections and some additions to the list of books recommended for further reading. September 1977 G. L. B. List of Abbreviations A.E. American English B.E. British English C.O.D. TIte Concise Oxford Dütionary C.U.P. Cambridge U niversity Press M.E. Middle English M.U.P. Manchester University Press O.E. Old English O.E.D. TIte Oxford Englisk Dictionary O.F. Old French O.U.P. Oxford U niversity Press S.P.E. The Society ror Pure English Phonetic Symbols THE letters p, b, t, d, k, g; f, v, s, z, h, w; I, r, m, n have their usual English values. The symbols given below are pronounced like the italicised letters in the key-words which follow. CONSONANTS tJ church J shoe d3 gem 3 measure 9 sing ~ German ich 9 think x German ach a then j J'Ou Nt. when ? The glottal stop, as in Cockney butter VOWELS i: see :>: saw 1 sit u: soon e set u put a: cat A butter a: father father ;) :> hot ;): bird DIPHTHONGS AND TRIPHTHONGS el da)' :>1 btry OU go I;) here ai m)' &;) there au found u;) poor :>;) four ai;) fire au;) power Square brackets are used to enclose phonetic symbols. A. colon after a phonetic symbol indicates vowel-Iength. A short vertical stroke above the line indicates that the following syllable is stressed, as in [tJa'taizm;)nt]. I Introduction FROM time to time popular books on English grammar are published with titles like 1s 11 Good Englisk?, and even more frequently newspapers publish letters from readers who express their loathing of this or that feature of pronunciation or syntax. From such publications one might gain the impression that there are only two varieties of English - the good and the bad - but this is a serious over-simplification. Many criticisms of linguistic habits arise from a failure to realise that there are many varieties of English and to recognise the characteristics of each variety. Thus, conversation is sometimes criticised because it does not conform to the rules of the written language, and British readers have condemned Americans because they choose to write in American rather than in British English. A very common cause of bad speaking or writing is the use of the wrong variety for a particular occasion: talking like a book, or using slang on a formal occasion, or failing to use slang on an informal occasion. Other critics recognise the existence of British and American English as varieties, each with its right to exist, but raise an outcry if there is any sign of borrowing from one variety into the other. Attempts to resist such borrowing are pointless and doomed to failure. J ust as English has borrowed words from many different languages, words and usages will continue to be bor rowed from one variety of English into another. Such borrow ing can be carried out clumsily with incongruous results, but that is not a good reason for trying to avoid it altogether. Another group of ill-founded criticisms results from a failure to recognise that a variety of English may have several subdivi sions. Many letters to newspapers condemn as American impor tations linguistic constructions that are simply vulgarisms, which an educated American would avoid just as firmlyasan educated Englishman would.