LL-L "Language varieties" 2004.08.24 (04) [E]

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From: daniel prohaska <danielprohaska at bluewin.ch>
Subject: LL-L Language varieties

Críostóir Ó Ciardha wrote:
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2004.08.19 (10) [E]

>>>Dan Ryan-Prohaska wheag writes:
>>>"Originally the London dialect was Eastern Saxon, thus very southern in
>>>character. Strong influence, probably through continuous migration into
>>>the city, from other dialect regions caused many southern forms to be
>>>replaced with midland, west country and northern forms."

Críostóir:
>>Do you have any examples of the original Eastern Saxon dialect of London
>>and of the forms that replaced it? I was under the impression that London
>>was solidly Midland-speaking by 1400, so the Saxon, West Country and
>>Northern forms cannot have survived that long.

Leyve Críostóir,
I can't provide you with any just yet. I'm working from memory for the most
part as I'm moving house and most of my books are packed away or still in
the old flat. But I'll make a mental note and post whatever I find when I
review my stuff.

What I meant with northern, is not so much 'Northern' but 'north' of London,
i.e. Midland etc.

West Country forms are pronunciations like [wVn] for 'one', South West ModE
<vixen> for OE <fyxen>; ME <eggys> for ME <eyren> is Northern or Danelaw
area.

Usual giveaways for Saxon forms rather than Anglian are the earlier
developments of words like <right> etc. Where the nature of OE fracture and
its ME monophthongal reflexes are concerned - but again I'd need my books
for that.

Dan

john feather  wrote:

>>>Dan wrote:
>>>"Interestingly enough the traditional dialect boundaries are still very
>>>close to the ones that were established in the Old English period."

>On a related point one often reads that there is still a marked difference
>between the language of the Danelaw (the area roughly north and east of a
>line between London and Chester - say Liverpool if you don't know where
>Chester is) and the rest of England. I tested this using the 90 entries
>(words and pronunciations collected over the period 1948-61) in the OUP's
>"Atlas of English Dialects" and found only a couple of things which were
>close to this pattern, and they were French borrowings. The old
>Northumbrian area tends to be rather different linguistically but
>everywhere else is pretty mixed up. Maybe if I'd been looking at other
>linguistic boundaries I'd have found a different result.

I agree. The older traditional dialect boundaries I was talking about were
referring to the phonological aspect of dialect development of English,
whereas what you were talking about has more to do with the spread of
lexical (and some grammatical) influence of Danish and Norwegian in the
British Isles.

So depending on what you focus on may yield very different results.
Dan

Bill Wigham

>>Dan & Al:
>>Thanks for a very interesting view of the varieties of language that
>>many of us focused on.  I have read that the coastal tribes that moved to
>>Britain were under considerable pressure from Germanic tribes allied with
>>King Etsel.  Your reasoning for the ancestors of a modern England sounds
>>equally possible, however.
>>Cheers,
>>Bill Wigham

Dear Bill,
I always like to consider more down-to-earth reasons for mass emigrations,
like social strife, shortage of resources etc. than the half-legendary and
mystified "King What's-his-name" did "this-and-that", though more often than
not there is a historical truth that needs to be weeded out of the various
accounts.

Dan

----------

From: Dan Prohaska <daniel at ryan-prohaska.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties"

John, ta very much fort he below - it's great and just what I wanted!!! I
know what a bummer it can be to punch in all of that, but it's very much
appreciated. Thanks.
Dan

John Duckworth wrote:

>>Dan Prohaska said:
>>>"My family's from north Manchester. My granddad grew up as a
>>>Lancashire dialect speaker and I still remember hearing sentences from
>>>him such as "wur asta bin?" "where have you been?" And his using "tha"s
>>>and "thi"s, as well as "thisen" (and not thisel)."

>>Curious that you mention the form _thisen_ as being North Mancunian; I
>>really did think that it never occurred in Lancashire (or indeed in modern
>>Greater Manchester).

>>Prestonians too would say (and some aged in their 50s perhaps can still be
>>heard saying) _wur asta bin ?_ for 'where have you been?' I often used to
>>hear 'where?' pronounced as _weer ?_ The two forms seemed interchangeable,
>>but I wonder whether there was something of a generation difference, with
>>older people saying _weer ?_

Do you think it might have something to do with stress? That 'wur' might be
a weak for and 'weer' a strong one?

>>Dan also asked:

>>>"Have you got any ideas on dialect literature or linguistic material
>>>concerning the Lancashire dialects? Maybe you could
>>>point me to some."

>>I used to have quite a lot of books on Lancashire dialect, and literature
>>in the dialect, but I think they were all left in some exotic location or
>>other that I was living in. I will rack my brains and my notes and see
>>what I can come up for you.

>>Dan also said:

>>> "I'd also be very interested in a description of your own dialect:
>>>specific vocabulary and idioms, grammatical forms such as the paradigm of
>>>'to be' and 'to have' and the other modal auxiliary verbs, plural of
>>>nouns when they differ from standard English etc. "

>>I have no objection, and I could give this a try, but I can't really call
>>It my dialect as I have hardly even retained a norhern accent, yet alone
>>dialect! I spent most of my childhood abroad, though that did mean that I
>>was more aware of the dialect whenever I did return to Preston.

<<No time like the present, so here is the Verb 'to be' in Prestonian.

>>Singular
>>First Person :                ah'm [ am ]
>>Second Person :               thas [©£az]; older th'art [©£a:rt]
>>Third Person :    Masc. :     his [iz]
>>Third Person :    Fem.        shiz [shiz] (older: (h)oos [u:z] )
>>Third Person      Neut.       its [its]
>>Plural
>>First Person :                wer / wur [wər]
>>Second Person :               yer [jər]
>>Third Person :                ther [©£ər]

>>Note that the older form _th'art_ (<thou art>) was pronounced with an open
>>back unrounded vowel, as in 'Standard' English _art_ [I can't seem to
>>reproduce the IPA symbol to represent this.] I have also heard the initial
>>consonant of the word pronounced unvoiced [¥èa:rt].

[.....]

----------

From: Dan Prohaska <daniel at ryan-prohaska.com>
Subject: Language varieties

>>John Duckworth  wrote:

>>Here are two poems by Samuel Laycock (1826-1893), who was born on a small
>>hill farm near Marsden, Yorkshire, moved to Stalybridge (Cheshire), and
>>then
>>to Oldham (then Lancashire; now Greater Manchester) and finally ended his
>>days in Blackpool, on the Lancashire coast. He was not well educated at
>>all,
>>learning to read and write at Sunday school, and went to work in a wool
>>factory at the age of nine. He later worked in the cotton factories, until
>>the cotton famines of the 1860's made many workers redundant. The
>>privations
>>of the famine were an inspiration to him, and he became a poet, eventually
>>having his work published in book-form. He also worked as a librarian and
>>a
>>photographer amongst other things. I think you will agree that the second
>>poem particularly is very poignant.

Dear John,

Thanks fort he Samuel Laycock poems. I already know them :-)  Actually I'm
quite sure we've both got the same booklet, with the annotations and all. My
aunty Carol who's from Oldham has made a wonderful recording of them and I
enjoy listening to Samuel Laycock's poetry read out by a true Lanky dialect
speaker. My favourite is "Eawr Sarah's getten a chap".

Alas, both book and tape are still in my other flat packed away and I won't
get at them until early October.

Thanks again,
Dan

----------

From: Dan Prohaska <Daniel at ryan-prohaska.com>
Subject: "Language varieties" [E]

>>Sandy Fleming wrote:
>>I always say that the main characterictics of American English speech are
>>derived from the southwestern dialects of England (Somerset, Dorset,
>>Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Hampshire and some of Oxfordshire) so it
>>doesn't surprise me.

I think what you say is more or less generally accepted by American Engliah
dialectology, but it must also be remembered that the South West today
preserves linguistic forms that have since been lost in other varieties. It
may well be that features we perceive as typically south western today, may
have bee more widely used in the past.

Dan

Henno Brandsma wrote:
>>I've read in a book by Joergensen on Island North Frisian, which has some
>>old differences with the mainland varieties, that he believed the
>>islanders to be a relic of the older Anglians that would have moved to the
>>islands around the 6th century. But this is speculation, I suppose.

Henno,

I don't believe this to be true. Frisian and Anglian, despite their
similarities are distinct enough to see that this cannot be the case. The
Island North Frisians appear to have settled on the islands between 700 and
800 AD coming from East Frisia. What we know is that the islands had been
abandoned for the duration of about 150 years. Island North Frisian shows
distinctly East Frisian forms and typically Frisian monophthongal reflexes
of Proto-Germanic diphthongs *au and *ai - even in distribution. The Anglian
development was quite different, and we are talking relatively early
developments here.

One reason that Joergensen may have put forth this theory is that the
product of de-rounding of earlier short */y/ (< PGmc *u + i-umlaut) in
Island North Frisian is /i/ and not, as in the rest of Frisian /e/. This
simply points to the Frisians emigrating to the isles before the rest of the
Frisian speaking area underwent the change from */y/ to */ö/ to /e/ (or */y/
> */i/ > /e/).

It is safe to assume that Germanic (Ingvaeonic) speakers from this area took
part in the colonisation of Britain, maybe even left the islands down to the
last person, but the Island North Frisians were themselves immigrants who
settled on the abandoned islands.

Dan

Glenn Simpson wrote:

>>The Angles themselves came from what is now Denmark and the
>>border area of Germany. The Anglian tongue itself also
>>appears to have emerged from old scandanavian or is
>>strongly influenced by it.

There may have been a few points where "Continental Anglian" may have had
contact with early Scandinavian or features had been passed on to it through
another dialect ("Jutish"??), but nothing at all points towards a closer
relationship of Anglian with Scandinavian than with Saxon.

>>Of course late-old English
>>and middle English were also heavily influenced by
>>Dane and Norse. Just makes you wonder whether
>>English/Northumbrian etc is really part of the
>>lowlands region? Perhaps we should be examining links
>>with our scandanavian cousins a lot more than is the
>>case. Just thrown this into the melting pot.

Examining links with Scandinavian is always worthwhile and the two Germanic
language groups have many common features, but it is safe to say that any
dialect of Old English and this can be said of ModEnglish as well, is firmly
rooted in the Lowlands context, both linguistically and culturally.

>>Oh, the influence of Frisian also seems to be down
>>played.

I beg to differ. I get the impression that the connection between Old
Frisian and Old English is often over emphasised. Don't get me wrong, they
are closely related and it would surprise me if some speakers of the
Ingvaeonic dialects that were to become Frisian did not participate in the
colonisation of Britain, but it cannot be said of Frisian that it has a
(detectably) stronger or even equal influence on the development of colonial
Ingvaeonic (what were to become the OE dialects) than Continental Saxon.

Dan

John Duckworth wrote:

>>Concerning the two Lancashire dialect poems I presented to the list, David
>>asked:

>>>"I'd be interested in how the 'eaw'  which appears in several words is
>>>pronounced."

>>You would get a good approximation of this sound _eaw_ (as long as you are
>>not from Australia or New Zealand) if you make the _e_ of _bet_ and follow
>>it with _w_. It sounds to me like the Dutch _ui_ sound, by the way, as in
>>_Spui_.

This pronunciation is still very much heard, also in the regional colloquial
variety of standard English.

Older dialect forms from Bolton for example have a monophthongal reflex of
ModE /aU/ which is SAMPA [{:] (long 'ash') also heard sometimes in
non-dialect speech. In Manchester it seems to be somewhat raised to [E:],
and I've even heard it nasalized [E:~], especially by women - a sound
generally perceived as very 'vulgar' and ugly. (See my earlier comment on
'cotton mills' and voice projection).

Dan

----------

From: Dan Prohaska <daniel at ryan-prohaska.com>
Subject: LL-L "Phonology" 2004.08.18 (07) [E]

D.M.Pennington wrote:

>>What is"standard English"?

I define Standard English as the spoken form of written Standard English.

>>A "standard" grammar there may well be, but can one say that there is a
>>"standard" pronunciation?

No there is no such thing. But there are regional as well as national
varieties of Standard English.

>>Some citizens of the UK maintain that RP is "standard".

Well RP is nowadays associated with the pronunciation of aristocracy and the
upper classes and considered posh and affected. It would not call this RP,
but I refer to it as the 'hyperlect'.

It think one can speak of RP it the phoneme distribution is the one found in
the system established as Standard British English - even if realisation may
vary a ittle regionally. For example Northern RP having [@] rather than [V]
in words such as 'but' and 'luck' - thus distinguishing more colloquial
'luck' [U] from 'look' [U], which in traditional dialect have remained
separate in [lUk] and [lu:k] (also maintained in colloquial speech
sometimes).

john feather wrote:

>>Glenn wrote:

>>>I've been doing research & it seems
>>>clear that modern English .. is more closely related to Anglian than
>>>saxon, although there are overlaps of course. The Angles
>>>themselves came from what is now Denmark and the
>>>border area of Germany. The Anglian tongue itself also
>>>appears to have emerged from old scandanavian or is
>>>strongly influenced by it.<

>>I'd like to know more about this. What do we know about Continental
>>Anglian?

As I indicated in an earlier post, I don't think much can be said about
'Continental Anglian' except that the area was settled, most likely by
Ingvaeonic  speakers (perhaps?) and that some, or more, or all of these took
part in colonising Britain. Whether the dialect they were speaking was
already called "Anglian" or whether it was a term for a region, or a ruling
class or some other form of designation we cannot say today, only that the
name was used in the newly established colony as a name for the population
and language of larger northern part of the land.

The Old English dialects called Anglian most likely developed their
distinguishing features in Britain. So there is no one continental dialect
which can be considered the parent dialect of Anglian, but it was rather a
levelled colonial amalgam of several dialects. The situation is no different
for the Saxon dialects of Old English.

Compare the dialectal situation of America. With the exception of maybe
Newfoundland (and probably not even that), no American English dialect can
be traced back to a single region in England. The colonial English which
became American English was a levelling of various dialects.

>>What features are still detectable in English? How would you set about
>>making a quantitative comparison with Saxon features?

Well the only thing that can say something is word geography, but there are
no absolutes here I'm afraid.

Dan

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