John Benjamins Publishing Company
The enregisterment of Northern English
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Joan C. Beal
Abstract
In this chapter, we discuss the processes whereby northern varieties of English became recognised and evaluated as distinct from others. The theoretical framework for the chapter will be that of indexicality and enregisterment, the latter term defined by Agha as a set of “processes through which a linguistic repertoire becomes differentiable within a language as a socially recognisable register of forms” (2003: 231). After outlining this framework and its implications for historical sociolinguistics, we provide a diachronic account of evidence for the enregisterment of northern varieties from the fourteenth century onwards. The chapter concludes with a case study of the enregisterment of Yorkshire dialects in the nineteenth century, based on a corpus of dialect literature, literary dialect and metalinguistic comment.
Abstract
In this chapter, we discuss the processes whereby northern varieties of English became recognised and evaluated as distinct from others. The theoretical framework for the chapter will be that of indexicality and enregisterment, the latter term defined by Agha as a set of “processes through which a linguistic repertoire becomes differentiable within a language as a socially recognisable register of forms” (2003: 231). After outlining this framework and its implications for historical sociolinguistics, we provide a diachronic account of evidence for the enregisterment of northern varieties from the fourteenth century onwards. The chapter concludes with a case study of the enregisterment of Yorkshire dialects in the nineteenth century, based on a corpus of dialect literature, literary dialect and metalinguistic comment.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- List of contributors ix
- The North of England and Northern English 1
-
The North of England
- The enregisterment of Northern English 27
- The Great Vowel Shift in the North of England 51
- Morphosyntactic features of Northern English 71
- The history of present indicative morphosyntax from a northern perspective 99
- Northern English 131
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Locations within the North
- Tyneside 161
- Sunderland 183
- Carlisle and Cumbria 205
- Sheffield 227
- Middlesbrough 251
- Lancashire 271
- Manchester English 293
- Language attitudes and divergence on the Merseyside/Lancashire border 317
-
The North
- Borders and boundaries in the North of England 345
- The East Midlands 369
- The West Midlands 393
- Between North and South: The Fenland 417
- The north above the North 437
- Non-native northern English 459
- Index 479
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- List of contributors ix
- The North of England and Northern English 1
-
The North of England
- The enregisterment of Northern English 27
- The Great Vowel Shift in the North of England 51
- Morphosyntactic features of Northern English 71
- The history of present indicative morphosyntax from a northern perspective 99
- Northern English 131
-
Locations within the North
- Tyneside 161
- Sunderland 183
- Carlisle and Cumbria 205
- Sheffield 227
- Middlesbrough 251
- Lancashire 271
- Manchester English 293
- Language attitudes and divergence on the Merseyside/Lancashire border 317
-
The North
- Borders and boundaries in the North of England 345
- The East Midlands 369
- The West Midlands 393
- Between North and South: The Fenland 417
- The north above the North 437
- Non-native northern English 459
- Index 479
