Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Grammar
P Trudgill (1994) Dialects. London: Routledge.
A Hughes et al. (2005) English accents and dialects
(4th ed). London: Hodder Arnold. Chapter 2
J Cheshire (1982) Variation in an English dialect.
Cambridge: CUP.
Grammatical differences
• Rather like phonetic differences in that
– We are comparing with RP as a standard
– We will avoid making value judgments
– But note that nonstandard grammar is often
denegrated
• Less like phonetic differences in that we have
differences of
– System
– Distribution
– Incidence
– Realisation
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Grammar differences between
two dialects
1. Differences of grammar system
Additional distinctions (very rare); distinctions “missing”
2. Differences of distribution
equivalent morphemes/grammatical devices, but the
contexts in which they occur differ
3. Differences of incidence
equivalent morphemes, but in particular constructions, a
different morpheme is chosen
4. Differences of realisation
equivalent morphemes, but the realisation differs
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Grammatical systems
• “Grammar” can refer to everything from
morphology to syntax
• “Morphology” in English mostly refers to suffixes,
but there are a few cases of “ablaut” (strong
verbs, irregular plurals)
• Typical morphosyntactic phenomena in English
include: number (N and V), tense (V), agreement
(only in present tense verbs), case (only in
pronouns)
• “Syntax” refers to issues about word order
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1. The verb to be
RP: several several SW
am am is be
is is is be
are are is be
was were was wor
were were was wor
am not ain’t / amn’t in’t bain’t
aren’t ain’t in’t bain’t
isn’t ain’t in’t bain’t
wasn’t weren’t wan’t wan’t
weren’t weren’t wan’t wan’t
being being being bein’
have/has been Ø been been been
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4. Negation
• Multiple negation is widely found in
nonstandard dialects:
– I didn’t have no dinner
• “Double negative” is an inaccurate term;
linguists prefer “negative concord”
– She never told no one nothing.
• Negative concord was part of standard
dialect, but RP has diverged (not v.v.)
– cf other languages, eg French ne … pas
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4. Negation
Other aspects of negation vary across dialects:
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4. Negation
• no (or nae) rather than not
– He’ll no do that again in a hurry
• use of not after the pronoun, rather than n’t,
especially in questions
– I told you did I not? Are you not coming? Did he not
tell you?
– She’ll not go, I’ve not got one
• some non-modal/auxiliary verbs have a negative
form with n’t
– ???
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5. Participle forms
• Use of progressive or past partciple with
verbs like want, need
• Southern England, RP
– I want it washed, it wants washing
• Midlands, Northern England
– I want it washing, it wants washing
• Scotland, Ireland
– I want it washed, it wants washed
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6. Have
Have acts as both an auxiliary verb, and a full verb meaning ‘possess’
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6. Have
• Some dialects use the auxiliary properties even with the
full-verb have
– ie the * examples on previous slide are OK
• It also has a modal use (=‘must’) with mixed behaviour
– Do you have to go ~ ? Have you to go?
– I don’t have to go ~ ? I haven’t to go.
• Other differences surround use of phrases like
– Do you have ~ Have you got
– Did you have ~ Had you
• In some dialects, be also can take or requires auxiliary
do
– He do be a funny chap
– Do you be living here?
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7. Word order differences
• Order of direct and indirect objects
– Standard English has IO>DO
• She gave the man a book
• She gave him a book
• She gave him it
– Several dialects also allow:
• She gave it him (quite common)
• She gave it the man (common in North, * in South)
• She gave a book him (not common, but possible in North, esp with
contrastive stress)
• She gave a book the man (ditto)
• Alternate forms of particle verb constructions
(a) He turned out the light. Put on your coat. She took off her shoes.
(b) He turned the light out. Put your coat on. She took her shoes off.
– Both acceptable, but southerners prefer (b), northerners prefer (a)
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8. Relative pronouns
• Who ~ which ~ that as in
– That is the man… who did it; who(m) I saw
– that did it; that I saw
– That is the brick… which did it; which I saw
– that did it; that I saw; I saw
• Various dialects allow
– That is the man what done it
– which done it
– as done it
– at done it
– done it
• Whose often replaced by what’s or that’s
– That’s the man what’s son did it
– That’s the man what his son did it
– That’s the man that’s son did it
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Conclusion
• There are many other examples
• Many nonstandard features are common to
many dialects, though some other things are still
very particular
• Some could be analysed as lexical or even
phonetic examples
– no for not, ain’t for aren’t
• “Grammar” covers everything from morphology
to word order
• Not quite so easy to categorise
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