English` is a common core. It is realized only in the different forms of the language that we actually hear or read.

Six kinds of varieties of the English language:

• regional

• education and social standing

• subject matter

• medium

• attitude

• interference

Regional varieties:

- it is regional dialects

- in the course of time, with poor communications and relative remoteness, such dispersion results in dialects becoming so distinct that we regard them as different languages. It was reached by the Germanic dialects that are now Dutch, English, German, Swedish. It hasn`t been reached with the dialects of English that have resulted from the regional separation of English-speaking communities both within the British Isles and throughout the world.

- regional variation seems to be realized usually in phonology (we generally recognize a different dialect from a speaker`s pronunciation before we notice that his vocabulary is also distinctive)

- there are indefinitely many dialects of English

- examples: American E, Irish E, Scottish E, Canadian E, Australian

E, New Zealand E

Education and social status:

- within each of the dialect areas, there is considerable variation in speech according to education and social standing

- uneducated (can be indentified with the regional dialect) and educated speech (it moves from dialectal usage to a form of

English that cuts across dialectal boundaries)

- we can distinguish standard and non-standard English

- educated English refers to standard English

- educated English is mainly used by government agencies, the learned professions, the political parties, the press, the law court and the pulpit

- there is an important polarity of uneducated and educated speech

- uneducated English refers to social dialects

Standard English

- uniformity throughout the world is greatest in what is from most viewpoints the relatively unimportant matter of spelling - even though printing houses in all English-speaking countries retain a tiny area of individual decision, there is a basically a single system, with two minor subsystems

- the one is the subsystem with British orientation with distinctive forms in only a small class of words: colour, centre, leveled etc. It is used in all English speaking countries expect the United States. - the two is the American subsystem with forms like: color, center, level etc.

- in Canada in most areas the British system is used but some publishers follow the American subsystem or some a mixture - in grammar and vocabulary, Standard English presets somewhat less of a monolithic character National standards of English

• British and American English

- they are overwhelmingly predominant both in the number of distinctive usages and in the degree to which these distinctions are `institutionalized`

- grammatical differences are few but some are widely known: AmE has two past participles foe `get` and BrE only one in BrE the indefinite pronoun `one` is repeated in co-reference where AmE uses `he`

- lexical examples of difference are numerous; some of them:

BrE AmE

railway railroad

tap faucet

autumn fall

valves tubes

• Scotland, Ireland

- Scots is perhaps nearest to the self-confident independence of BrE and AmE, though the differences in grammar and vocabulary are rather few

- Irish English is also regarded as independent of BrE by educational and broadcasting services

• Canadian English

- sth between BrE and AmE, to a large extent it is closer to AmE; The United States, as a larger community than Canada, has an enormous influence on the smaller, not least in language.

- the problem of vocabulary

- the most famous feature of CanE: A nice day, eh?; `eh` at the end of the sentence, similar to question tag but more universal

- great vowel shift: i -> ei -> aI ; au -> eu -> au

• South Africa

- it is in remote from the day-to-day impact of BrE and AmE

- South African English in educated use is virtually identical with

BrE, but in vocabulary there are considerable differences - firstly colonized by the Dutch, later Boers called farmers; they settled there and discovered more in South Africa

- Boers spoke Afrikaans, fought against the invaders; the British using old-fashioned terror – commanda

- apartheid comes from Afrikaans, meaning system of racial segregation

• East & West Africa

- the majority of white people spoke Afrikaans

- English minority spoke Bantu languages

- there were few white people

- after the World War II they become independent and faced the problem of the choice of language

- in East Africa they chose English as an official language of

business, education and general communication

- West African English is spoken in West Africa

- in contrary to Australia and New Zealand where English became standard, in Africa English doesn`t really resemble standard English or any of them; but grammar and vocabulary are standard; but there are grammar and pronunciation problems

- they don`t distinguish between long and short vowels - they translate their own expressions into English wedding bells – invitation for a wedding be in state – be pregnant give cola – offer a bribe

have longlegs – be an influential person

- no distinction between countable and uncountable nouns

• Australia

- Australia English is undoubtedly the dominant form of English in Accent – a type of pronunciation characteristic to a specific group of people.

Cockney accents: Cockney speakers have a distinctive accent and dialect, and occasionally use rhyming slang.; the extensive glottalisation e.g. cat [‘kæʔt]. Monophthongisation; It concerns words with a diphthong /aʊ/; is h-dropping at the beginning of some words; is g-dropping. It occurs in words like: talking; Cockney speech is full of vocalisation of /l/.

Creole is a pidgin which has become the mother tongue of a community,” and therefore has native speakers. Vocabulary is extensively borrowed from other languages, but the grammar often shares few traits with the languages that contributed vocabulary. Grammar and syntax are as fully developed as any other longestablished tongue.

Dialect - a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. A dialect is distinguished by its vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation.

Isogloss - is the geographical boundary of a certain linguistic feature, such as the pronunciation of a vowel, the meaning of a word, or use of some syntactic feature. Major dialects are typically demarcated by groups of isoglosses.

Langue (French, meaning "language") and parole (meaning "speech") are linguistic terms used by Ferdinand de Saussure. Langue describes the social, impersonal phenomenon of language as a system of signs, while parole describes the individual, personal phenomenon of language as a series of speech acts made by a linguistic subject.

Jargon is language that is specific to a particular profession or a particular group of people who share a common interest.

Oftentimes, though not always, only people from these professions or groups know the meaning of their own jargon. Jargon can be informal or formal, depending on the profession or the group. Pidgin is a language with a reduced range of structure and use, with NO native speakers.” It grows up among people who do not share a common language but who want to communicate with each other. "Pidgin" involves situations in which a population speaks several different languages and is required to communicate on a regular basis, but none of the languages of the population has primacy over the others.

Register has to do with the style of one's language: formal as opposed to informal, serious as opposed to easygoing, friendly and familiar as opposed to more respectful and distant. A register can also reflect the specific style of language one uses. For example, one could speak or write in a business register, a scientific register, a legal-law register, or an academic register.

Received Pronunciation is the accent of Standard English in England, with a relationship to regional accents similar to the relationship in other European languages between their standard varieties and their regional forms.

"RP" stands for "Received Pronunciation", the traditional name for the standard British English accent. "Received" really means "accepted in good society", which shows the prescriptive social character of the original concept. Today, "RP" is used to refer to the pronunciation usually taught to foreigners -unlike the other English accents it is not associated with any one georgraphical area, and can be heard spoken as a prestige accent thoughout the British Isles. "GA"or "General American", (or AE-American English) is the accent spoken by the majority of Americans, namely those who do not have a noticeable Eastern or Southern accent.

Standard English is the literary dialect used in formal writing and in the speech of well educated persons. It descends from the West Saxon dialect of Old English, specifically the dialect of London. Non-standard English includes many regional dialects, whose grammatical forms and words ( such as ain't and varmint, for example) are not exactly incorrect but are unsuited to formal discourse

Social dialect (sociolect) – depends on your social status, class and education; types: standard and non-standard.

Regional dialect – language of people who live in some region; types: rural and urban.

An idiolect is the dialect of an individual person at one time. This term implies an awareness that no two persons speak in exactly the same way and that each person’s dialect is constantly undergoing change—e.g., by the introduction of newly acquired words. Most recent investigations emphasize the versatility of each person’s speech habits according to levels or styles of language usage.

Spelling differences

1. in words of more than one syllable ending in –our in BrE, AmE omits the u:

AmE BrE

-ize CRITICISE -ise

-or BEHAVI-OUR -our

- og CATALOG-OGUE - ogue

-er CENTER/ CENTRE -re

-ense DEFENSE-CE -ence

2. in verbs ending with an unstressed syllable vowel + consonant, the British double the final consonant before –ing and –ed:

canceling cancelling traveled travelled

programing programming

3. nouns ending in –ogue in BrE are shortened to –og in AmE: catalog catalogue

dialog dialogue

4. one large group in which we have option

-ize -ise/ize

-ization -isation/ization criticize criticize/criticize regularize regularize/regularize

baptize baptize/baptise

5. in words like theater, -er in AmE is often equivalent to –re in BrE:

center centre

kilometer kilometer

liter litre

theater theatre

6. some words spelled –ense in AmE have –ence in BrE:

defense defence

license licence

7. there are some spelling differences that are unique to particular words:

check cheque draft draught gage gauge curb kerb mold mould plow plough Political/cultural differences

- different political concepts

- different stages of education

-universities

-British have Halloween that comes from America

BrE AmE

Parliament Congress

Oxbridge Ivy League

Groundhog Day

Synonyms

1. different names for the same item

BrE AmE

sweets candy cot crib

nappy diaper

holdall carryall

2. you can use these terms interchangeably (preferred

word or comprehensible for the other nation)

BrE AmE

luggage baggage

jumper sweater post mail

3. British words can be used in America but never

American words in Britain

BrE AmE

coffin casket queue line bath bathtub

4. British adopts American words

BrE AmE

ice ice cream line track tin can

eraser rubber

5.British adopt new meaning

BrE AmE

caravan caravan/trailer pharmacy pharmacy chemist`s drugstore

a car

American and British have different names of parts of the car

BrE

AmE

windscreen windshield

side light parking light

wing mirror side mirror

accelerator = sth that speeds up gas pedal

AmE BrE ax/axe axe

baggage luggage baptize baptize/ise bathtub bath

behavior behaviour

canceling cancelling

can tin

candy sweets

caryyall holdall casket coffin catalog catalogue center centre check cheque color colour

commuter season ticket holder conductor guard

curb kerb

criticize criticize/ise

defense defence dialog dialogue diaper nappy

divided highway dual carriageway

draft draught

drugstore chemist`s elevator lift

engineer driver favor favour freight goods gage gauge gas, gasoline petrol gearshift gear lever

gray grey hood bonnet holdall carryall humor humour ice cream ice

kilometer kilometre labor labour license licence

license plate number plate line queue liter litre mail post

mold mould

muffler silencer

one-way ticket single ticket

overpass flyover pajamas pyjamas

phonograph gramophone programing programming radio wireless

round-tripticket return ticket

rubber eraser

skeptical sceptical story storey

subway underground sweater jumper theater theatre

tire tyre track line

traveling travelling

truck lorry

the Antipodes

- the differences in pronunciation, vocabulary were broken - the local phenomena: British people would see strange animals and they took names for them from the Aborigins: kangaroo, koala - weak education: in most cases people who went there were poor educated; occurrence of slang expressions, these from BrE are still to be found in Australian English but no longer in BrE

- the problem of local culture: different civilizations

- interference from other languages e.g. from the Dutch colony

- it is the place of mainly convicts from London midlands

- pronunciation close to Cockney or Midlands

- in Australian language there are words with different meanings than in standard BrE

• New Zealand

- New Zealand English is more like BrE than any other nonEuropean variety, but it now feels the powerful influence of Australia and – to small degree – of the USA.

• India

- a part of the British empire from the early 18th century

- Indian English: strange collocations, different idioms

- we have people who spoke English perfectly and also those less educated, speaking English with mistakes; their English is nonstandard

- General Pronunciation in India is different

- vocabulary is the major problem

- in contrary to Africa, British didn`t invest in education - the English noticed that it would be impossible to control the country without help of local people so they took most important posts and the lower post were occupied by Indians so they learned

English from the upper class English people and imitated them

- Indian English is a strange mixture

- after World War II when India gained independence there were

14 languages that were official

- it is standard now but with some interference of local languages

• West Indies (Jamaica, Barbados)

- there was English as a second language

- pidgins and creoles

Pidgin- a simplified language that develops as a means of communication between 2 or more groups that do not have a language in common; it's not the native language of any speech community; it's learned as a second language; may be built from words, sounds, or body language from multiple other language; have low prestige with respect to other language; very simplified language: grammar very simple, no inflections, no ending; it started in China, then was transported to Africa and America Creole- a mixture of various languages; consists of words inherited from the parent lang.; can be regarded as degenerate variants or dialects of their parent lang.

- Lingua Franca was used when an Indian sailor came to Africa and spoke to Arabs

- Pidgin: the Atlantic group (Caribbean creoles); no native speakers Creoles: the Pacific group (islands of the Indian origin); native speakers

- there are no longer pidgins, there are creoles

- features of creoles and pidgins: simplification of grammar, some strange structures instead of cases, special use of pronouns, spelling closer to pronunciation Pronunciation and Standard English

- all the regional and national variants, that approximate to the status of standard, are remarkable primarily in the trivial extent to which even the most firmly established, BrE and AmE, differ from each other in vocabulary, grammar and spelling.

- however, pronunciation distinguishes one national standard from another most immediately and completely, and links in a most obvious way the national standards to the regional varieties - uIn BrE, `Received Pronunciation` (RP) comes close to enjoying the status of “standard”

Varieties according to subject matter

- varieties involved in a discourse are sometimes referred to as

`registers` and `jargons`

- the speaker has the repertoire of varieties and habitually switches to the appropriate one as occasion arises

- the use of a specific variety of one class frequently presupposes the use of a specific variety of another

- a register is a variety of a language used for a particular purpose or in a particular social setting

- jargon is terminology which is especially defined in relationship

to a specific activity, profession, group, or event

Varieties according to medium

- we have to varieties: spoken and written

- the use of a written medium normally presumes the absence of the person to whom the piece of language is addressed; it imposes the necessity of a greater explicitness: the careful and precise completion of a sentence, rather than the odd word, supported by gesture, and terminating when the speaker is assured by word or look that his hearer has understood

- the devices we use to transmit language by speech e.g. stress, rhythm, intonation, tempo, are impossible to represent in a written text. The writer has often to reformulate his sentences if he is to convey fully and successfully what he wants to express within the orthographic system Varieties according to attitude

- they are often called `stylistic`

- we distinguishes two styles: formal and informal

- it`s the choice of linguistic form that proceeds from our attitude to the hearer (or reader), to the subject matter, or to the purpose of our communication

Varieties according to interference

- it refers to the trace left by someone`s native language upon the foreign language he has acquired e.g. the Frenchman who says: `I am here since Friday` is imposing a French grammatical usage on English

- some interference varieties are so widespread and of such long standing that they may be thought stable and adequate enough to be regarded as varieties of English in their own right

After the World War I we saw the influence of American culture upon the British culture

- music: jazz

- Hollywood: American actors speaking American accent

- American literature: Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner

- we have more and more American linguists: H.L. Mencken – a journalist who wrote the 1st description of “the American

Language”

- American vocabulary replacing the British one

BrE AmE wireless radio pajamas pyjamas skeptical skeptical

story storey tire tyre

skillful skilful fulfill fulfil gypsy gipsy

inquiry enquiry

Morphology differences

AmE BrE

received  gotten/got got

stricken struck (only in idioms)

proved/proven proved

wed wedded

learned (regular form) learn (irregular form)

Grammar differences

1. the American word gotten, as a past participle of get:

2. AmE has a useful construction to refer to a period of time

The tour lasted from May through August. (AmE)

The tour lasted from May to August. (BrE)

3. in BrE the collective nouns such as team, audience, the public can be treated as singular or plural, whereas the singular is normal in

AmE

The committee has voted in favour of the bill

4. AmE has a preference for the subjunctive verb with verbs like

insist, recommend, suggest and avoids verb `should`

I suggested he do (AmE)

I suggested he should do (BrE)

5. AmE uses adverbs instead of adjectives

It`s real nice (AmE)

It`s really nice (BrE)

6. the use of `like` as a conjunction instead of `as if`

It seems like we have made another mistake. (AmE)

It seems as if we have made another mistake. (BrE)

7. in AmE the past tense is used rather than the perfect for the recent past he just came (AmE)

he has just came (BrE)

8. let`s not don`t let us

9. help + inf help + to inf

10.August 2nd 2nd August

11. in AmE `will` almost never used

will shall

12. You have a car, haven`t you?  BrE

You have a car, don`t you?  AmE

13. in the summer in supper

in the hospital in hospital

14. - in BrE indefinite pronoun `one` is repeated in co-reference where AmE uses `he`

15. no shift of tenses in Reported Speech he said he came yesterday (AmE)

he said he had come yesterday (BrE)

Linguistic features:

- spelling

- gram mar

- lexicon

- accent

Structural features:

- discourse features

- layout (paragraphs, stanzas, letter) Extra linguistic features:

- cultural info

- historical info

- names

Variety of English:

1. common core of English

2. classification

- regional dialects

- educational (standard/non standard) & social status (AmE, BrE,

AusE, SAfrE, WAfrE)

BrE - StBrE & non-standard Br Englishes; StBrE - standard

pronunciation & non-standard pronunciation

- subject matter (register & jargons)

- attitude: when we use language we have such one about the speaker, writer, the subject and the list (very colloquial, very formal) - medium: we have such two in English: langue (an abstract way of thinking) ad parole (is what we use) (spoken English, written English) - interference: certain influence of sb`s native language upon the other language that sb uses English as a Native language;

English as 2nd language;

English as FL (foreign language)

General American pronunciation

- American were moving so they were mixing.

- In the south (Texas) there is another accent which they keep because they stayed in one place. People were moving from villages to big cities.

- People not moving from York to Yorkshire keep their accent.

American borrowed many words from Dutch (spooky, cookies, boss).

- They also met French who lived in Louisiana (bureau, prairie, cent). Spanish lived in the South. Germans lives in Pennsylvania (AngloGerman mixture).

- New Amsterdam – New York.

- Indian words: tomahawk, squaw, wigwam

- new species of plants, animals (robin, creek, corn)

- 90% of people came from British Isles so they spoke English

- 10% of people spoke other languages (French, Spanish)

- John Adams suggested creating an American academy which could be an institution for controlling the new language (after the country turned to industry)

- Noah Webster: a lawyer educated in Yale; wrote a number of books on AmE language and he is known for making Standard AmE; American English started to be more and more different; “The

American Spelling Book”; he published the first good dictionary: “The American Dictionary of the English Language”: a coursebook used in American schools to teach children reading and writing, he shows differences in American spelling (AmE:BrE; color-colour, centercentre, jail-gad, ax-axe); he divided multisyllabic words into syllables and children kept repeating and held all the syllables

- emigrants brought other words: spaghetti, pasta

- then the language moves to the West

- American films in cinemas (cinema that people from Europe could hear); American English as the world language (music, literature, films) trunk

windshield

boat windscreen

vacuum cleaner

I think

One lexeme has different meanings:

BrE

bill (banknot, rachunek)

note vest

underground, tube it`s five past twelve it`s five to twelve in front of / behind from Monday to Friday

I live in High Street fill in the document hoove

I guess

AmE

check

bill

undershit

subway

it`s five after twelve

it`s five of twelve

in back of

Monday through Friday

I live in Main Street fill out the document -songs played in AmE

- email, truck – AmE

Black English Vernacular

- most widely known in the South

- now it is social (it used to be racial – English used by black people)

- they had to learn a common language on plantations

- simplified English (grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation) - blues, jazz, music

- now we have farmer and educated people so it`s no longer connected with race