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Theme XI. Regional varieties of the English vocabulary.

1. Standard English, variants & dialects 2. Five groups of dialects in Britain. Cockney, the regional dialect of London. 3. Accent. Received pronunciation. 4. American English. Historical Americanisms. Difference in voc-ry & pronunciation, grammar, spelling. 5.Canadian , Australian & Indian variants. Peculiarities in phonetics, grammar, spelling & vocabulary.

1. Standard English - the official language of Great Britain, of schools & universities, used by the press, radio & TV & spoken by educated people may be defined as literary language. Dialects- are varieties of the English language peculiar to some districts & having no normalized literary form. Regional varieties possessing a literary form are called variants. 2. In Great Britain there are two variants - Scottish English & Irish English & 5 main groups of dialects: Northern, Midland, Eastern, Western & Southern.

3. Received pronunciation --- BBC English 1. Chinese is spoken by 7000 bn people English is spoken by 400 bn people People who speak English fall into 3 groups: 1) those who have learned it as a native language 2) those who have learned it as a second language( in a bilingual society) 3) those who are forced to use it for practical purposes. English is considered to be learned because of: a) simplicity of forms ( nr. cases, etc) b) flexibility ( water n- water v) c) openness of vocabulary( lots of borrowings from other languages)

Every group contains up to ten dialects. Cockney is the regional dialect of London. It exists on two levels: a) as spoken by the educated lower middle classes( some derivations in pronunciation only) b) as spoken by uneducated class (that differs in pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary & syntax) Cockney [w]-[v]; very-wery; vell-well; [f] [v]- [0] [0] thing- fing; father- faver; w-v labio--- labio-dental; r-indicates the length of the vowel( for other dialects too) hear- art( aspirated-non aspirated) The most marked feature in vowel sound is the substitution of the diphong [ei] for [ai] e.g. day, face, rain, way,[ dai fais rain wai] voc-ry ; set expressions--- up the pole (drunk); you'll get yourself disliked(remonstrance protest to a person behaving very badly)

Cockney is lively & witty & its vocabulary is imaginative & colourful. Rhyming slangs ( words are substituted by other rhyming with them) Boots---daisy roots; hat- tat; head- loaf of bread; wifetrouble & strife( angry, conflict, violent, disagreement) Dialects are mainly preserved in rural communities in the speech of elderly people. For the most part dialect in literature has been limited to speech characterization of personages in books. It is remarkable for its conservatism: many words becoming very old & are still kept in standard English. In spite of this dialects are developed further on wholly more than the various standard languages.

English is the most widely spoken language on Earth (China - in the number of the people who speak it). English is the language of business, technology, sport, aviation, computer. 75% of world's mail & 60% of the worlds telephone calls. It has the largest vocabulary-500.000 words & 300.000 technical terms. Cockney expressions; jumping Jack = back; Gregory peck-= neck; German bands- =hands; North & south - =mouth; boat race- =face; mince pies-= eyes; plats of meat- =feet; I suppose- =nose.

Queens of English - is a prestigious accent of those who are at the top of social scale. So public school graduates speak RP, about 3-4% of all Englishmen speak RP. 4.American English These 2 kinds of English are very similar. There are a few differences of grammar & spelling & rather more differences of vocabulary. Pronunciation is sometimes very different, but most British and American speakers can understand each other. Grammar differences;

US Gr.Br. US G. B. Apartment flat second floor 1st floor Cab taxi French fries chips garbage /trash rubbish Candy sweets gas(oline) petrol Check bill(restaurant) high way main road Closed(cabinet) cupboard intersection crossroads Cookie biscuit mad angry Corn maize mail post Crazy mad motor engine Elevator lift movie film/picture Fall autumn pats/pant strousers First floor ground floor store shop Sidewalk Pavement subway underground Potatoe chips crisps truck lorry Railroad railway vacation holiday(s) Round trip returned( ticket) zipper zip

Pronunciation [a:]---[a] [a:sk] --- [ask] spelling ize---ise/ ize aluminum- aluminium center- centre defensedefence labor- labour program- programme traveler- traveller r---- is very back analyze- analyse cataog-catalogue check - cheque (bank) color- colour ( more words differ) honor-honour jewelry- jewellery pajamas- pyjamas practice- practise(v) theater- theatre tire- tyre( of a car)

5.Canadian, Australian & Indian variants ( phonetics, spelling-, grammar & vocabulary) It is natural that the English language is not used with uniformity in all parts of the world. The English language has some peculiarities in Wales, Scotland & America. Grammatically Past Indefinite is replaced by Present Perfect; Will- is used for all the persons; Present Continuous with a future meaning is used twice frequently in BE as in the American, Canadian & Australian variants; Infinitive constructions are used more rarely in AE &BE & Au E; Passive constructions on the contrarymore frequent in AE;

AuE - kangaroo, kaola, dingo, gum-tree; AE- junior & senior high school ---CnE-composite high school; AuE- boomerang, AE- drug-store, CnE- float house. Canadian English is influenced by both AE & BE but it has some specific features of its own. Especially Canadian words are called Canadianisms. They are not very frequent outside Canada except "shack"(hut), "fathom"to explain.

Many of the words of a specific country (Australia, India, etc.) denote local animals, plants, weather conditions, social relation, trades & conditions of labour. The local words for new notions penetrate into the English language and later can become international. e.g. (India) bungalow n, sahib n, sari n, jute n, khaki a, mango n, nabob n, pyjamas n-all these words have become international.

The English think they have the right to criticize the other variants as the speakers "call" English as their own. That's why American, Canadian & Australian English have developed standards of their own. Pronunciation differs from state to state & place to place. Americans think that there will be a time when American standard will be spoken even in Britain and will be given the status of Literary Standard.

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