UNIT 1 – INTRODUCTION

STANDARD ENGLISH IN THE WORLD

Standard English is the kind of English that books are written in. Books, newspapers, magazines and nearly everything
else that appears in print in the English-speaking world are written in Standard English.

This type of English is called ‘standard’ because it has undergone standardization, which means that it has been
subjected to a process through which it has been selected, codified and stabilized, in a way that other varieties have
not.

However, English Standard was not a selected one. It acquired its status gradually and in an organic way. The
ancestor of modern Standard English developed in and around the Royal Court in London, among the aristocracy
and ruling elite. Because the elite were concentrated in London, this pre-Standard English was a dialect of a
predominantly London-area type. But because it was associated with a group of people who were of mixed
geographical origins, this court dialect showed signs, from the very earliest records that we have, of being a mixed
dialect. The dialect was from the very beginning an upper social class dialect which was not associated with the
common workers and peasants.

So no committees were involved in deciding which dialect of English was to be standardized. The upper classes quite
naturally wrote in their own dialect, and then were in a position to impose this way of writing on society at large.
Even today, although Standard English is the kind of English in which all native speakers learn to read and write,
most people do not actually speak it. Standard English is probably not the native dialect of more than about 15% of
the population of England. And most of that 15% will be concentrated towards the top end of the social scale, so
that Standard English is still quite clearly a social dialect.

As far as codification is concerned, Standard English is the variety whose grammar has been described and given
public recognition in grammar books and dictionaries, with its norms being widely considered to be ‘correct’ and
constituting ‘good usage’. Dictionaries also present norms for spelling. Stabilization means that this type of
codification has the effect of ensuring that the varieties takes on a relatively uniform and somewhat stable form.
However, this uniformity and stability are only relative. The Standard English used in different parts of the native
English-speaking world differs noticeably from one place to another.

It is important to stress that the codification and distinctiveness of Standard English do not extend beyond grammar
to any other areas of language usage. There is no necessary connection, for instance, between the opposition
between standard and nonstandard, and the opposition between formal and informal.

Standardization does not extend to pronunciation either. There is no such thing as a Standard English accent.
Standard English has nothing to do with accent, and in principle it can be spoken with any pronunciation.

1.1 Models of English

There are three types of countries in the world in terms of their relationship to the English language.

• Nation-states in which English is a native language (ENL) > people have English as their mother-tongue
o Australia, Canada or Ireland
o Inner Circle Englishes
• Countries where English is a foreign Language (EFL) > people do not speak English natively and where, if
they speak English, they use it to speak to foreigners.
o Poland, Spain, China
• Countries where English is a second language (ESL) > English is not typically spoken as a mother-tongue, but
it has some kind of governmental or other official status
o India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Kenya, among others.

This distinction between ENL, EFL and ESL is by no means absolute. Some varieties of English, for example, have an
interesting recent history of transition from ESL to ENL status. For instance, we can call South Ireland English (SIrEng)
a shift variety, meaning that it is the result of relatively recent language shift.
Of the ENL varieties that are typically used as models in EFL teaching, there are two which have figured most
prominently. Traditionally, schools and universities in Europe have taught the variety of English which is often
referred to as ‘British English’. As far as grammar and vocabulary are concerned, this generally means Standard
English as it is normally written and spoken by educated speakers in England.

As far as pronunciation is concerned, it means something much more restrictive, for the RP (Received Pronunciation)
accent which is taught to foreigners is actually used by perhaps only 3-5 per cent of the population of England. Like
Standard English, RP accent has its origins in the south-east of England, but it is currently a social accent associated
with the BBC, the public schools in England, and with members of the upper-middle and upper-classes. We shall
refer to the combination of British Standard English grammar and vocabular with the RP accent as English English
(EngEng).

The other form of Standard English that is widely taught to students is North American English (NAmEng), meaning
English as it is written and spoken by educated speakers in the United States of America and Canada.

The exposure to and/or the recognition of the legitimacy of these two varieties of Standard English in English
language-learning is likely to bring with it certain problems. Both those teachers wishing to insist on a rigid use on
only, and those wishing to permit use of both varieties need to be quite clear about which forms occur in which
variety.

Of course, NAmEng and EngEng are by no means the only ENL varieties which are used as models in EFL teaching.
EFL students in many parts of Asia and Africa are much more likely to come into contact with Australian English
(AusEng), New Zealand English (NZEng), or South African English (SAfEng) than with EngEng or NAmEng.

Not only is ENL used as a model in EFL teaching, there has also been a history of employing ENL varieties as teaching
models in ESL countries, with some speakers of ESL varieties demonstrating something of an inferiority complex with
respect to ENL.

English now has more non-native than native speakers, and that English is widely used in the modern world as a
lingua franca. For that reason, it has been suggested that it may not make too much sense always to insist on close
adherence to native-speaker models, especially where these cause difficulties.

In fact, it may be that there are developing in some parts of the world varieties that we can call ELF – English a lingua
franca. If there is, or were to be, a European ELF, we can expect that it would probably lack features which ELF
learners typically find difficult to acquire, and have features corresponding to points where English differs from most
other European languages.

1.2 The spread of English

The English language developed out of Germanic dialects that were brought to Britain. By mediaeval times, this
Germanic language had replaced the original Celtic language of Britain in nearly all of England, as well as in southern
and eastern Scotland. Until the 1600s, however, English remained a language spoken by a relatively small number
of people in the world, and was configured geographically to the island of Britain.

It was not until the 17th century that the English language began the geographical and demographic expansion which
has led to the situation in which it finds today, with more non-native speakers than any other language except
Chinese.

This expansion began in the late 1600s, with the arrival of English-speakers in the Americas – North America,
Bermuda, the Bahamas, and the Caribbean – and the importation of English, from Scotland, into the northern areas
of Ireland. Subsequently, during the 1700s, English also began to penetrate into southern Ireland and Cornwall.
During the 1800s, English began making serious inroads into Wales and in the Highlands and islands of Scotland.

It was also during the 1800s that the development of Southern Hemisphere varieties of English began. During the
early 19th century, large-scale colonization of Australia began to take place and, at a slightly later date, New Zealand,
South Africa and the Falkland Islands. The South Atlantic islands of St Helena and Tristan da Cunha also acquired
English-speaking populations during the 1800s, as did Pitcairn Island and, subsequently, Norfolk Island in the South
Pacific.

These patterns of expansion, settlement and colonization have had an effect on the relationships, similarities and
differences between the varieties of English which have grown up in different parts of the world.

These differences and similarities are most obvious at the level of pronunciation. Varieties of English around the
world differ relatively little in their consonant systems, and most differences can be observed at the level of vowel
systems. Even here, differences are not enormous. The most distinctive varieties in terms of their vowel systems
are:
• those of Scotland and Northern Ireland
• those of the Caribbean

Lexically and grammatically, the split between the ‘English’ and ‘American’ types are somewhat neater, with USEng
and CanEng being opposed on most counts to the rest of the English-speaking world.

1.3 The nature of native overseas Englishes

One very interesting question for linguists is why the native forms of English which have developed outside Britain
are like they are. One obvious factor has to do with linguistic change. All languages and dialects change through
time. Some changes have taken place since settlement in the English of particular overseas territories, and, equally,
some changes have taken place in Britain which have not taken place in all or any of the new territories.

Another factor is language contact. In the new territories, speakers of English came into contact with indigenous
languages from which they acquired words, as well as with other European languages.

Finally, dialect contact was very important. In the new colonies, speakers of different regional varieties of English
from different parts of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland came into contact with one another and, in a generation
or two, this gave rise to new varieties which were essentially mixtures of features from different homeland dialects.
Dialect mixture also led to a levelling out of many dialect differences: there is much less regional variation in the
overseas than there is in England and in Scotland.

KINDS OF LANGUAGE VARIETIES

1. Factors accounting for variability

There are several factors that explain the variability among speakers regarding pronunciation:

• Personal factors:
o Age and sex: differences between the pronunciation of younger and older generations, and
between men and women
o Social class: a certain social class may have features that are different from the rest of the speakers
o Educational background
o Profession or role
o Personality: a speaker may avoid vulgarisms in certain environments
o Attitudes to language and to other speakers
o Age of accent acquisition: if it is acquired after childhood a speaker is likely to avoid normal
features of faster speech
o Frequency with which a speaker uses a word: less frequently used words tend to change less than
more frequently used words
o Feeling of correctness: a speaker may think that the pronunciation of a word by a teacher is the
correct one.
• Situational factors:
o The social relationship between speaker and hearer
o The topic the speaker is talking to or writing about
o In what place the conversation is taking place
o The purposes for which the speaker is using the language
2. Kinds of variability

English is very varied. There are considerable regional and social variations within the English language in different
parts of the British Isles as well as in other parts of the world. These social and geographical kinds of language are
known as dialects. Dialects have to do also with the grammatical forms that are used together with any regional
vocabulary that is employed. Standard English is the dialect with the greatest prestige in UK, although linguistically
speaking is not superior to all the other non-standard varieties.

A dialect can be spoken with any kind of accent. Your accent is the way you pronounce English when you speak.
Furthermore, the relationship between social and regional variation can also be applied to accents. The higher a
person is on the social scale, the less regionally marked will be his or her accent. Some people, trying to climb the
social scale modify their accent in the direction of RP and assign wrongly certain pronunciations. (hypercorrections)

There are differences of pronunciation which can only be explained in terms of the combination of accent and dialect
for one particular speaker: idiolect. It can be defined as the way he/she speaks within the overall system of particular
language.

In addition to regional and social accents (and dialects), English has different styles, which are used in different social
situations. Changes in pronunciation then are conditioned by speakers’ perception of the situation in which they are
speaking, especially how formal or informal they feel it to be. In formal situations, speakers tend to articulate more
slowly and carefully. On the contrary, in informal situations, speakers will be more likely to speak quickly and less
carefully. Most differences, however, have to do with words rather than changes in pronunciation. Those words
used in a very formal situation are often referred as slang.

There is another kind of variation within English which has to do with the subject or topic being talked or written
about. Kinds of language that reflect the ‘about’ are known as registers. They also show who is member of a group
or not. Outsiders often react to this by calling insiders’ registers jargon. We will call them, “technical, or non-technical
registers”.

There are differences of pronunciation which cannot be explained in terms either of change over time or of speech
style but in terms of the speaker’s preference for the pronunciation of some sounds over others. Those sounds are
said to be in free variation.

INTRODUCTION TO TRANSCRIPTION PRACTICE

Symbols and transcription

In 1889 linguists developed a special system of symbols for representing pronunciation, known as the International
Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). The complete system has symbols for transcribing all speech sounds – not only those of
English – together with a set of marks called diacritics which help the transcriber to make subtle distinctions between
sounds of any language.

Scholars of a particular language adopt the IPA symbols to represent the phonemes of their language according to
two principles:

• Using the phonetic symbols of the most frequent allophones (even if they are non-Roman symbols)
• Replacing then those non-Roman symbols by Roman symbols where these are not already in use, what is
called Romanization. The most common allophone of RP for the initial word red is a voiced post-alveolar
approximant [ɹ]. However, as the nearest Roman symbol ‘r’ is not used to represent any other phoneme in
English, /r/ is the symbol to this phoneme in English.

Since the phonemic symbols do not have to show precise phonetic quality, it is possible to choose among several
possible symbols to represent a particular phoneme. In the case of English, there are various systems of phonetic
transcription in use, many of them follow the principles of the IPA. The differences between them are very mild, and
they mostly affect to the transcription of vowels.
We loosely call ‘phonetic transcription’ the way of representing the sounds of a language in writing. However, we
should talk about two main kinds of transcriptions:

• Broad (also known as phonemic or phonological) transcription, where every speech sound is identified as
a single phoneme, and represented with the appropriate symbol.
o Symbols are enclosed between slant lines
o Ten > /ten/
• Narrow (also called phonetic or allophonic) transcription, which provides additional information about the
exact qualities of the speech sounds.
o Symbols and diacritics are enclosed in square brackets
o Ten > [thẽn]
UNIT 2: ENGLISH ACCENTS IN THE BRITISH ISLES

Introduction: Kinds of differences on comparing accents

In the present course we will describe the existing accents as they are nowadays. In order to do so, two main kinds
of differences in pronunciation can be examined:

• Systemic (or phonological) differences > Accents may differ in their phonemic inventory, i.e., in the number
or identity of the phonemes they use.
o Most accents have two vowel phonemes in the close back area (/uː/ and /ʊ/), but in Scottish
English there is only one phoneme, the first one.
• Realizational (or phonetic) differences >
o Accents may show differences in the phonetic realization of a given phoneme.
▪ the vowel in the word kit is different in Australian English from its counterpart in RP
o There are also cases where one variety has allophones which another does not have, or a different
range of allophones
▪ In Irish English /l/ is usually clear in all environments whereas in RP two different
allophones can be distinguished, clear and dark.

There are two other kinds of pronunciation differences that are also relevant:

• Phonotactic distribution differences > Accents may differ in the environments in which particular
phonemes do, or do not, occur. In other words, a phoneme has a distribution in one accent that is different
from the same phoneme’s distribution in another accent.
o the phonotactic distribution of the consonant /r/ varies in rhotic (GA) and non-rhotic accents (RP).
o Yod-dropping phenomenon, that is, the elision of /j/ when preceded by an alveolar stop can be
considered a phonotactic distribution
▪ new [nuː] instead of [njuː],
o Similarly, ‘neutralization’ whereby in certain phonetic environments some phonemes contrast in
one variety but not in another
▪ In New Zealand English Mary and merry are homophonous although they are
phonemically distinct in RP.
• Lexical distribution differences > Accents often vary in the phonemes they select for the lexical
representation of certain words of morphemes.
o A particular set of words is pronounced X in one accent and Y in other accents.

The variability described so far refers to individual sounds – and especially to vowels –, however, variability between
accents also includes differences in suprasegmental features, such as stress or intonation. For example, as opposed
to RP in Welsh accents there is a tendency for unstressed syllables to be higher in pitch than stressed syllables.

DESCRIPTION OF ENGLISH ACCENTS IN THE BRITISH ISLES

In Britain there is no succession of distinct accents, but an accent continuum, a gradual changing of pronunciation
from the southwest of England to the North of Scotland. However, in order to describe regional variation, it is
convenient to speak of accents as if they were clearly-defined different entities.

1. RP ENGLISH

1.1. Historical and Social Background

The spelling of English was mainly fixed in the 18th century but the spoken language has always been subject to
change due to several reasons:

• Age > there are clear differences between the speech used by the younger and the older generations
• Communication > the speech of all communities did not develop in the same way or at the same time,
especially when communications between regions were poor
• External influence > foreign invasion influenced the sounds of particular geographical areas
All these causes, together with political and economic reasons and the fact that since the 16th century there was a
social preference of one kind of pronunciation over the others, made the pronunciation of the south-east of England
the most prestigious regional accent within UK. Little by little this accent became finally fixed as the speech of the
upper class in the 19th century. Pronunciation became a marker of position in society and, therefore, the ruling class
and those who want to be socially accepted by them make use of this prestigious accent.

Nowadays the percentage of the population that uses this accent is ridiculously small; however, some prestige is still
attached to it.

1.2 Phonetic Symbols Used in Our Transcription of RP English

1.2.1 Vowels

In the 18th century there was a historic loss of /r/ before consonants or pause (R-Dropping), which led to the
development of the central vowel /ɜː/ and centring diphthongs /ɪə, eɪ, ʊə/ in RP and other non-rhotic accents.

Besides, in RP the falling-closing diphthongs (namely /aɪ, eɪ, ɔɪ, aʊ, əʊ/) may be followed by /ə/ within a word in slow
careful speech, as in fire, loyal, power and lower (/aɪə, eɪə, ɔɪə, aʊə, əʊə/), respectively. This vocalic sequence has
traditionally been known as triphthong.
We will transcribe them as a single unit /aɪə, eɪə, aʊə/ when possible. However, bear in mind that in spoken and
rapid speech there is a general tendency to weaken, or even omit the second element. A phenomenon usually called
smoothing.

• This phenomenon particularly affects to the triphthongs /aɪə, eɪə, aɪə/ with the resulting /aːə, eːə, aːə/.
• Two special cases are worth mentioning:
o The smoothed version of /əʊə/ results in a long monophthong phonetically similar to [ɜː].
Perceptually it sounds like two schwas together [əə] or a long one [əː].
o The smoothing of the triphthong /ɔɪə/ occurs less often ([ɔːə]), and indeed, it is controversial.
• Although all the sequences of the three elements of /aɪə, eɪə, ɔɪə, aʊə/ can also be reduced to long
monophthongs, we do not recommend getting that far in your transcription practice, unless it is indicated,
or in particular words such as the smoothed version of the word our /aː/.
• Remember that smoothing doesn’t necessarily erase the [ɪ] or [ʊ] in the middle of the triphthong
completely. In some cases, those vowels are heard in a very faint debilitated form, to the extent that it
might be difficult to say if they are pronounced at all or not.

1.2.2 Consonants

Bear in mind that…

• In RP /t/ is often substituted by a glottal stop /?/ in certain environments (a phenomenon called T-
glottalling). A number of conditions must be satisfied
o /t/ must be followed by a consonant other than /h/
o /t/ must be preceded by a sonorant (voiced nasals, approximants and vowels)
o /t/ must be in the coda of the syllable
• Yod-dropping in RP is a variable in the environment of a preceding /l, s, z, θ/, and it is consistently retained
after /t, d, n/.
o There was an Early Yod-Dropping in RP in the folling environments:
▪ After palatals (including /ʧ/ and /ʤ/)
▪ /r/
 ▪ clusters with /l/, as in chute /ʧut/, grew /gru/ or glue /glu/.

2. SCOTTISH ENGLISH

2.1 Historical and Social Background

Until 18th century, the people in the Highlands of Scotland were mainly Gaelic-speaking. Although Gaelic was once
spoken in parts of the Lowlands as well, the people in most of those areas have spoken a Germanic language since
at least the 7th century when Anglo-Saxons captured Edinburgh. They spoke a northern dialect of Old English. By the
times of James VI of Scotland (who became James I of England, the version of this language spoken in Scotland had
become known as Scottis, although it managed to survive as a vernacular language, called today Scots. Besides, since
the Union of Parliaments in 1707, a different type of English was re-introduced from the south of England, but much
influence by Scots; it is this that is now described as Scottish English. Therefore, Scottish English is not uniform in
pronunciation, grammar or vocabulary.

3.2 Pronunciation in Scottish English

Scottish English refers to the varieties of English spoken in Scotland. The pronunciation of Standard Scottish English
is difficult to understand for those non-native speakers who are only familiar with RP or GA.

3.2.1 Vowel system

The main phonological difference between RP and Standard Scottish English vowels is the loss of systemic
durational difference between long and short vowels in Scottish English. Consequently, the contrasts
• /ɑː/ and /æ/ is pronounced /a/
• /uː/ and /ʊ/ is pronounced /u/
• /ɔː/ and /ɒ/ is pronounced /ɔ/

Thus pairs of words such as Pam and Palm, pull and pool, and cot and caught are homophonous in this accent.
Duration will not be marked in transcription exercises.

In relation to vowel duration, all vowels – except /ɪ/ and /ʌ/ which are always short –, are longer in the cases below
than in the rest of phonetic environments:
• Before voiced fricatives: /v/, /ð/ and /z/
• Before /r/
• Word-finally (even if a suffix is added, as in agreed)

Another significant systemic difference is that the loss of non-prevocalic /r/ that occurred in RP (with the resulting
development of central vowel /ɜː/ and the centring diphthongs (/ɪə, eə, ʊə/) did not take place in Scottish English.
Therefore, the central vowel /ɜː/ was substituted by the presence of different vowels followed by /r/. Thus, words
such as girl, term, (or heard), word or hurt are usually pronounced with /ɪr/, /ɛr/ and /ʌr/ (the last two words), in
that order.
• /ɜː/ > /ɪr/ girl
• /ɜː/ > /ɛr/ term, heard
• /ɜː/ > /ʌr/ word, hurt

Concerning diphthongs:

• the RP centring diphthongs /ɪə/, /eə/ and /ʊə/ correspond to a sequence of vowels plus /r/ in this variety.
o /ɪə/ > /ir/
o /eə/ > /er/
o /ʊə/ > /ur/
• there is a clear tendency to phonological monophthonging in Scottish English. The RP diphthongs /eɪ/ and
/əʊ/ in words like bay and go are monophthongs in Scottish English, that is, /e/ and /o/, in that order.
o /eɪ/ > /e/
o /əʊ/ > /o/
• Therefore, there are only three diphthongs in Scottish English:
o /ʌi/ (or /ae/ depending on the context)
o /ʌu/
o /ɔi/
3.2.2 Consonant system

Scottish English consonantal system is very conservative.

• It retains the phonemes /x/ in the coda of certain words, as loch

• It retains /ʍ/ in wh-words like in which, with the result of a new phonological contrast between /w/ and
/ʍ/ (were vs. where).

It is worth mentioning that /t/ is often substituted by a glottal stop (/?/) in non-initial environments. As it is merely
optional, it is not compulsory to show it in our transcription exercises.

As regards phonetics, five key features can be pointed out in Scottish English:

• Voiceless plosives are often unaspirated in stressed initial position

o Pie [p=]
• A glottal stop ([?]) can be inserted before the oral closure of voiceless plosives, what is called glottal
reinforcement (or glottalization), in word- and syllable-final positions
o Lot [lɔ?t]
o It will be not shown in our phonemic transcription exercises as it is considered allophonic.
• /r/ tends to be:
o a post-alveolar approximant [ɹ] (as in lord)
o or an alveolar flap [ɼ] mainly between vowels (‘V_V, as in carry)
• /l/ is dark in all environments, as in lily [ɫ], [ɫ]
• Others:
o /t, d/ may be dental rather than alveolar in many varieties of Scottish English
3.2.3 Prosody

Intonation > the intonational system of Scottish English shows important regional variability. For instance, Edinburgh
English is fairly similar to RP one whereas in Glasgow speakers tend to mark stress on syllables using a fall in
intonation instead of a rise.

Rhythm > some studies point out the tendency in Scottish English to prefer open syllables. For instance, in the word
weekend the syllabification would be wee kend, or in Saint Andrews Sain tandrews

Accentuation > certain words are stressed in Scottish English differently from RP-
• in particular those ending in -ize (and some -ate) place the stress on the syllable containing the suffix
o organize, instead of organize

3.2.4 Others: Phonotactic/lexical distribution differences

Four features are the main phonotactic/lexical distribution differences between RP and Scottish English, namely:

• Rhoticity: Scottish English is a rhotic accent, that is, /r/ does occur in a wide variety of phonetic contexts,
including pre-consonantal and word-final positions. Consequently, R-insertion does not take place in
connected speech.
• /e/ tends to be used instead of /i/ at the end of words like happy or coffee (words with unstressed
orthographical final -y, -ie, and -I, and also -ee, -ey, and -ea).
• Words which in RP have /ɑː/ before the voiceless fricatives (/θ, f, s/) as in laugh, path…, or before clusters
of nasal plus another consonant, as in dance, plant, can’t, have /a/
• In many Scottish accents there is a consistent replacement of the unstressed vowel schwa by /ɪ/ within a
word, as in pilot, wanted, letter or centre. It seems to occur in checked syllables of content words after the
stressed syllable
o This will be the only phonetic environment in which it should be marked in our transcription
practice exercises.
• Furthermore, when there is an unstressed orthographic a it is usual to hear an opener vowel /ʌ/ instead of
schwa in word-final as in mamma or sofa,
• Yod-dropping is usual after /l/ in the sequence /ju/, and for most speakers it also occurs after /s/, as in lure
/lur/ or suit /sut/. Yod will be dropped in both cases in the transcription practice exercises.
• There is no initial H-dropping in Scottish English, except in auxiliaries and unstressed pronouns.

UNIT 3 – ENGLISH ACCENTS IN NORTH AMERICA

1. GENERAL AMERICAN ENGLISH

1.1 PRONUNCIATION IN GENERAL AMERICAN (GA)

General American (GA) is usually defined as the form of American English that has not marked regional features.
However, it is not a single unified accent. For this reason, we will only study the GA accent from the Central Eastern
area.

1.2.1 Vowel system

The tendency to lengthen traditionally short vowels results in the loss of distinctive duration between long and short
vowels. As a consequence, American systems of representing pronunciation rarely if ever have length markers.

There are two major areas of phonological difference between RP and GA:

• The phoneme /ɒ/ does not exist in GA, and therefore it is mostly substituted by /ɑ/, and sometimes /ɔ/.
• The presence of rhoticity in vowels: be aware that all GA vowels are characterized by r-colouring (having
an r resonance) when they are followed by the letter r in the spelling.
 RP GA PHONETIC COMMENTS
/iː/ /i/
/ɪ/ /ɪ/
/e/ /ɛ/
/æ/ /æ/
/ʌ/ /ʌ/
/ɑː/ /ɑ/ or /æ/ When the RP vowel /ɑː/ is followed by the phoneme /r/ it corresponds to
/ɑr/ in GA: large > /lɑrʤ/
Read below for more differences
/ɒ/ /ɑ/ (sometimes Read below for more differences
/ɔ/)
/ɔː/ /ɔ/ Read below for more differences
/ʊ/ /ʊ/
/uː/ /u/
/ɜː/ /ɝ/ We will only use the symbol /ɝ/ in transcription practice when the r-colouring
is fairly evident, as in the vowels when it occurs followed by /r/, as in girl.
/ə/ /ə/ (and /ɚ/ When the schwa is followed by /r/, as in better, we will use the symbol /ɚ/
(instead of /ər/) in transcription practice.
/aɪ/ /aɪ/
/eɪ/ /eɪ/
/ɔɪ/ /ɔɪ/
/aʊ/ or /ɑʊ/ /aʊ/
/əʊ/ /oʊ/
/ɪə/ /ɪ/ (+/r/) When the RP diphthong /ɪə/ is not followed by the phoneme /r/ it
corresponds to /iə/, as in idea > /aɪdiə/
/eə/ /ɛ/ (+/r/) It can also be transcribed /er/ (or even /eɪr/)
/ʊə/ /ʊ/ (+/r/) When the RP diphthong /ʊə/ is not followed by the phoneme /r/ it
corresponds to /uə/, as in cruel > /kruə/

The sequences of closing diphthongs plus schwa (triphthongs), General American English follows the general
tendency in most rhotic accents, that is, the deletion of the schwa of a following /r/: /aɪr/, /eɪr/, /ɔɪr/, /aʊr/ and
/oʊr/, as in fire, layer, coir, flour, and sower) instead of smoothing (or deletion of the second element).

1.2.2 Consonant system

The overall number of consonant phonemes is the same in the two accents, with the exception of the presence of
/ʍ/ in wh-words in many speakers of GA, which leads to a new phonological contrast between /w/ and /ʍ/ (were
vs. where).

Concerning phonetics, three main features can be pointed out in General American consonants (they won’t be
marked in phonemic transcriptions):

• /t/ can be pronounced in many different ways:

o Glottal replacement or glottalling: the pronunciation of /t/ in GA as a glottal stop [?] is widely
used where preceded by a stressed syllable and it is followed by /n/
▪ Button > [bʌ?n]
o T-tapping > the pronunciation of /t/ as a quick tap accompanied by voicing
▪ It has to be in at the end of a syllable with a preceding sonorant (vowels, /r/ or /n/)
▪ /t/ has to be followed by a vocalic sound, or a syllabic /.
• authority, better, party

• /r/ tends to be pronounced:

 o as an approximant with a great retroflexion [ɻ]
o as an alveolar tap [ɼ] in intervocalic position when the first syllable is stressed: Mary

• /l/ is generally fairly dark [ɫ] in all positions, except when it occurs before stressed front vowels (or /j/), as
in latter.

• Others: Absence of glottal reinforcement before voiceless obstruent consonants /p, t, k, ʧ/

1.2.3 Prosody

Stress: Notice that the suffixes -ary, -ery (or-erry), -ory, and -mony usually have a strong vowel in GA instead of the
weak vowel (or vowel elision) found in RP, as in customary (/ɛ/), blackberry /ɛ/, conservatory /ɔ/, and testimony /oʊ/

1.2.4 Others: Phonotactic/lexical distribution differences

• Rhoticity: GA is a rhotic accent > R-insertion does not take place in connected speech in GA.

• /i/ is used instead of /ɪ/ at the ends of words like tidy.

• /æ/ and /ɑ/ incidence:

o the words half, rather, banana and can’t have /æ/ in GA instead of the RP /ɑː/

o words spelled with a followed by r(r)y, or r(r)i are usually pronounced in GA /ɛ/ instead of RP /æ/,
like in marry, married, Larry, larynx

o Many foreign words spelled with ‘a’ which have /æ/ in RP are pronounced with /ɑ/ in GA, as in
Milan.

o When the RP /ɑː/ is not followed by /r/ is pronounced /æ/ in GA.

• /ɒ/, /ɔ/, and /ɑ/ incidence:

o Most common words spelled with ‘o’ which have /ɒ/ in RP are pronounced with /ɑ/ in GA
▪ Cod, doll, John, top
o Exceptions:
▪ Words spelled with ‘o(u)’ followed by a voiceless fricative or before voiced velar sounds
that have /ɒ/ in RP, usually have /ɔ/ in Ga as the most common pronunciation, as in cough,
often, wrong, or dog.
• Before voiceless velar sounds, both pronunciations are equally heard in GA:
clock, or lock.

▪ Many foreign words spelled with ‘o’ which in RP have /ɒ/ are pronounced with /oʊ/, as
in Carlos.

▪ When the RP /ɔː/ is not followed by /r/, the vowel /ɔ/ usually occurs in GA, as in tall,
saw, autumn, daughter

▪ the words of (strong form), what, and was (strong form) have /ʌ/ in GA instead of the
RP /ɒ/.

• Other vowels
o Many words with ‘er’ in the spelling and that have /ɑː/ followed by /r/ in RP, have /ɝ/ in GA, as in
clerk, or derby.
 o Words which have /ʌ/ followed by /r/ in RP are pronounced with /ɝ/ in GA, as in worried, courage,
furrow or hurry.

• Yod-dropping > GA extended the cases

o it is also observed after all coronal consonants /l, s, z, θ, t, d, n/ as in lure [lur] or suit [sut] in
stressed syllables

• Yod-coalescence > in the case of weak syllables the tendency is towards a fusion of phonemes as in situate,
education, issue or brilliant.
o /t, d, s, l/ + /j/ > /ʧ, ʤ, ʃ, ʎ/

4. BRITISH ENGLISH AND NORTH AMERICAN ENGLISH: BEYOND PRONUNCIATION

4.1 GRAMMATICAL DIFFERENCES

4.1.1 The Verb

4.1.1.1 Morphology

1. Inflectional. In NAmEng, a number of irregular verbs have become regularized, while remaining irregular in
EngEng:

In many instances, it is only the voicing of the past tense morpheme -(e)d which has been changed to regularize
the verb:

In some irregular EngEng verbs, there is a vowel change from /i/ in the present to /ɛ/ in the past and past participle
forms.

In a few instances, the NAmEng forms are more irregular then the EngEng forms:

NAmEng also uses dived, fitted and sneaked for the past tense: He dove/dived in head first.

Gotten can also be used in all meanings except for ‘have’ in NAmEng: We have gotten home late again.

2. Derivational.

One way of making or ‘deriving’ new verbs is to add a verb-forming suffix or prefix onto a noun or an adjective:
symbol > symbolize.

In NAmEng some affixes are used on classes of words or with particular sense of words where thy would not be
used in EngEng.
-ify: citify, humidify
 -ize: burglarize, hospitalize

Another way is by simply changing a word’s grammatical class, e.g. using a noun as a verb. This process is common
to both varieties, with innovations spreading rapidly from one to the other.

4.1.1.2 Auxiliaries

1. Modal auxiliaries.

Shall is rarely used in NAmEng, except in legal documents or very formal styles

Should, as well as expressing obligation and tentativeness, in EngEng can also have a hypothetical sense when it
occurs in a main clause with a first person subject followed by a conditional clause. In NAmEng would is used
instead in such sentences:

Would. USEng has two uses for this modal that are much less usual in EngEng.

Would can be used in expressing a characteristic or habitual activity in USEng:

When I was young, I would go there every day

While in EngEng would cannot be used to express a hypothetical state if this is already signalled by the verb or by a
conditional clause, in any USEng dialects would can be used in this way in informal speech:

Must. The negative of epistemic must is can’t in southern EngEng

In USEng, the most common negative of epistemic must is must not. However, mustn’t can be epistemic in past
perfect:

Use(d). In questioning or negating sentences with them modal used to, EngEng can treat used to either as an
auxiliary, or as a lexical verb requiring do for these constructions. In USEng, used to is treated only as a lexical verb,
which is becoming increasingly the case in EngEng.
Ought to. USEng rarely uses this auxiliary in questions or negated forms. Instead, should is used:

Dare and need. Both of these auxiliaries are rare in USEng and usual occur in set phrases, and they are treated as
lexical verbs in negating and questioning:

Mayn’t. The contracted form of may not is only found in EngEng, and fairly rarely even there.

2. Do can be used for polite commands or requests: Do go on! This use is much less common in USEng, where
please would be used instead.

3. Have. Traditionally, EngEng has distinguished between the grammatical behaviour of main verb have in dynamic
senses as ‘receive’, ‘take’, ‘experience’, which behaves like a full verb, as in NAmEng:

and stative have, where the meaning indicates an ongoing state involving possession, where, unlike in NAmEng,
have does not require do-support:

Nowadays, the stative forms with do-support typical of NAmEng are beginning to be used in EngEng also.

4. In NAmEng, univerted response questions are very common:

4.1.1.3 Verb phrase substitutions with do

In both EngEng and NAmEng, lexically empty do can substitute for a simple finite verb phrase. Do is inflected for
tense and person in such substitutions:

John likes classical music and Mary does too.

However, EngEng, and NAmEng differ in the use of do substitution with an auxiliary. In EngEng do substitution can
occur after most auxiliaries. In NAmEng, do cannot be used in such instances. Instead of substitution, a deletion
process is used whereby both the verb and its object are deleted. Also, if there are two aspectual auxiliaries, the
second can be deleted. EngEng can also employ this deletion process.
There are certain constructions even within finite verb phrases in which do-substitution cannot occur or is unusual
in EngEng: when the passive voice is used; when the progressive aspect is used; and when ‘semi-auxiliaries’
(happen to, be going to, etc) are used.

4.1.1.4 Verb phrases

1. Certain verbs, like give, show, tell, brink take two objects, a direct object and an indirect object. The indirect
object can occur with a preposition after the DO, or it can occur before the DO without a preposition:

When the DO is a pronoun, USEng requires the order DO + preposition + IO, as does southern EngEng:

When both the DO and IO are pronouns, EngEng allows both orderings.

In passive versions of double-objects, there are two possible nouns which can be subjects – the DO or the IO of the
active version:

The book was given to Mary by John

Mary was given the book by John

In USEng, when the active DO is used as the passive subject, the IO must occur with a preposition:
 The book was given to Mary by John
*The book was given Mary by John

2. The verb like may take an infinitive clause or an -ing clause as its object:

In EngEng the -ing participle construction is preferred.

When the object of like is a clause and the subject of that clause is not coreferential with the subject of like, then a
for…to infinitive can be used in USEng.

3. In EngEng the copular verbs seem, act, look, and sound can be followed directly by an indefinite noun phrase. In
USEng, these verbs must be followed by the preposition like. Seem can also be followed by the infinitive to be:

4. Come and go may be followed by another verb either in a to + infinitive construction or conjoined by and:

When come and go are uninflected, to and and are often dropped in USEng:

NAmEng is also much more likely than EngEng to delete to after help when followed by another verb:

5. When the verb order is followed by a passive verb, to be is often deleted in USEng:

6. The verb want can be followed directly by the adverbs in and out in USEng.

Also, want can be used in the sense of ‘need’ in EngEng with an inanimate subject: This house wants painting;
which cannot be done in NAmEng.

7. The verb wonder can be followed by a finite clause introduced by if, whether or a wh-relative pronoun in both
varieties, although in EngEng it can also be followed by that.
8. The verb decide can be used as a causative verb in EngEng:

In USEng, decide cannot be used as a causative; instead, a periphrastic phrase must be used: That made him decide
to go.

9. There are few verbs in EngEng and USEng which differ in the prepositions or prepositional adverbs they collate
with:

10. In EngEng, the negative form of the first person plural imperative, let’s, can be either let’s not or, more
informally, don’t let’s. Only let’s not is used in standard USEng.

11. In formal styles, the subjunctive is used more often USEng than in EngEng in that- clauses after verbs of
ordering, asking, etc. and in conditional clauses. Both varieties can replace the subjunctive in such sentences with
that…should + infinitive or with to + infinitive.

12. Clauses representing hypothetical situations are often introduced by if.

If I had been there, I could have fixed it

In EngEng, hypothetical clauses can also be formed without using if by inverting the subject and verb of first
auxiliary:
Had I been there, I could have fixed it

Such constructions are considered very formal in USEng.

13. There is a strong tendency in NAmEng to use simple past tense forms for recently completed events where
EngEng would use the present perfect:

4.1.2 The Noun Phrase

4.1.2.1 Morphology

1. Certain noun endings are more productive in USEng than in EngEng:

-cian: mortician, beautician
-ee: retiree, interviewee
-ery: eatery, bootery
-ster: teamster, gamester
2. For a few words, the derivational ending or the base word that the ending is put on to is different:

3. Verbs can be used as nouns. Again, this tends to occur more in USEng than in EngEng:

4.1.1.2 Noun class

1. Collective nouns such as team, faculty, family, government, etc. often take plural verb agreement and plural
pronoun substitution in EngEng but nearly always take singular agreement and singular pronoun substitution in
USEng.

There is a tendency in EngEng to stress the individuality of the members, which is reflected in plural verb
agreement and pronoun substitution, whereas USEng strongly tends to stress the unitary function of the group,
which is reflected in singular verb and pronoun forms.

2. Count versus mass nouns

Lettuce has characteristics of both a count and mass noun in EngEng, but it is only a mass noun in many varieties of
USEng:

Sport is a count noun in both varieties but it can also be used as an abstract mass noun in EngEng:

Accommodation/-s is an abstract mass noun in both varieties, but it is invariably plural in USEng:

3. Zero Plurals. Some nouns retain the same form for singular and plural

Shrimp can take a zero plural in USEng but must take a normal plural in EngEng:
Inning has the plural form innings in USEng. In EngEng, the singular form is innings and it has a zero plural:

When quantitatives nouns such as thousand, million, etc. are used as modifiers and preceded by a cardinal
number, they do not take plural inflection in either variety:

However, when the modified noun is deleted, in EngEng the plural form of the quantitative noun can be used,
while in USEng only the singular can be used:

4.1.2.3 Articles

1. There are a number of count nouns in both varieties which do not require an article when used in an abstract-
generic sense. However, there are a few such nouns which have this property in one variety but not the other:

2. When referring to events in the past, EngEng does not require the definite article before the phrase next day.
This construction is more usual in written EngEng:

3. EngEng does not use the definite article in the phrase in future in the meaning ‘from now on’. While USEng does:

4. In temporal phrases beginning with all, the definite article can optionally appear before the noun in EngEng: all
afternoon and all the afternoon are equally acceptable. In USEng, the construction without the articles is by far the
more frequent.

5. In phrases beginning with half followed by some unit of measure, EngEng usually requires an indefinite article
before the unit of measure. In USEng, the indefinite article can also come before half:
4.1.2.4 Order of attributes

1. In newspapers, EngEng generally places personal attributes after the person named, whereas in USEng the
attributes tend to precede the name, often without a definite article:

2. For names of rivers:

4.1.2.5 Pronouns

1. The indefinite pronoun one occurs in EngEng in formal and educated usage, both spoken and written, while in
NAmEng it is usually found only in formal written style. You is used instead of one in informal styles of both
varieties:

2. EngEng uses both reciprocal pronouns each other and one another, while USEng mainly uses each other.

3. Possessive pronouns have two forms in both varieties: a modifier form and a nominal form:

In EngEng, the nominal form can be used as a locative when referring to someone’s living quarters, while in USEng
the modifier form with noun is used in such cases:

4.1.3 Adjectives and Adverbs

1. In some varieties of USEng, a comparative adjective can be used in the phrase all the ADJ for emphasis or
intensification: IS that all the better you can do? EngEng, any is used instead: Can’t you do any better?

2. The adjective real is sometimes used as an adverb in informal USEng as in a real good meal. EngEng and more
formal USEng have the adverbial really in such instances as: a really good meal.

3. The comparative adjective different is usually followed by from in EngEng, while in USEng it is more usually
followed by than:
4. Adverb placement is somewhat freer in USEng than in EngEng.
• EngEng: They will never agree to it
• USEng: They never will agree to it, or They will never agree to it.

5. The adverbs yet and still cannot occur with the simple past tense in EngEng, but they can do so in USEng:

6. When the verb to be is used with the meaning ‘to go’ or ‘to come’, the pronominal place adverbs here and there
can be deleted in EngEng, but not in USEng:

• EngEng and CanEng Has the milkman been yet?

• USEng Has the milkman been here yet?

7. While both varieties use first of all, only USEng regularly uses second of all, third of all, etc. in such passages.

8. The adverb momentarily means ‘for a moment’ in both varieties. However, in USEng it can also mean ‘in a
moment’:

9. Adverbs ending in -ward in EngEng denote directional motion while those endings in -wards can denote manner
of movement as well. In USEng -ward no longer has a purely directional denotation. NAmEng has the forms toward
and towards (identical). EngEng only has towards

10. Ever can be used as an intensifier in both varieties, but in different context. In EngEng it is commonly used with
the intensifier so before adjectives:

In NAmEng, ever can be used informally to intensify verbs in exclamations which have subject-verb inversion:

14. NAmEng has two usages of over:

1. Over can mean ‘again’ >

a. This is no good – I’ll have to do it over
2. It has a locative usage, meaning my place
a. We’re having a party – why don’t you come over?

EngEng uses round in this sense.

4.1.4 Prepositions

1. There are a few prepositions which differ in form in the two varieties:
2. Some differ which are used identically in most context in both EngEng and USEng differ in usage in certain contexts:

a) Difference in preposition used:

i. In phrases indicating duration of time, EngEng uses for where NAmEng has a choice of for or in:

ii. EngEng speakers use the preposition at, meaning ‘time when’, with holiday seasons, as at the
weekend, at Christmas. USEng speakers generally use over and on in such cases.

iii. In USEng the preposition through can mean ‘up to and including’, as in Monday through Friday. In
EngEng the ‘inclusiveness’ must be stated separately if ambiguity is possible: Monday to Friday
(inclusive).
iv. In expressing clock-time, EngEng uses the prepositions to and past the hour while USEng also can
use of, till, and after.

v. In and on have some differences in non-temporal contexts:

b) Difference in presence of a preposition:

i. The preposition (usually on) is often often omitted in USEng before a specific date or day of the
week that indicates a time removed from the present.

ii. The preposition can be deleted in USEng before temporal nouns indicating repetition or habitual
action:

iii. In phrases denoting a period of time from or after a given time, the preposition from is often
deleted in EngEng:

iv. In EngEng, there is a difference in meaning between:

 v. In EngEng, the preposition from can be deleted after the verbs excused and dismissed, something
not possible in USEng.

3. In interrogative structures involving how+ certain adjectives, many varieties of USEng employ the preposition of.
Such structures are not possible in EngEng.

4. Where an inanimate concrete object is designated as having a concrete object in, on, round or off it, the
coreferential pronoun it can be deleted from the prepositional phrase in EngEng, but not in USEng:

4.1.5 Subordinators

1. The complex subordinators as…as and so…as are used with different frequencies in the two varieties.

In cases where as…as is preferred in EngEng and used at the beginning of a clause, the first as may be dropped:

2. In EngEng, the adverbs immediately and directly can function as subordinators.

4.2 SPELLING AND PUNCTUATION DIFFERENCES

4.2.1 Standard Spellings

 4.2.2 ‘Sensational’ Spellings

4.2.3 Punctuation

1. British English usage favours having a lower-case letter for the first word of a sentence following a colon:

There is only one problem: the government does not spend sufficient money on education

whereas American usage more often favours a capital letter:

There is only one problem: The government does not spend sufficient money on education.

2. Normal British usage is to have a full stop after a closing quotation mark:

We are often told that ‘there is not enough money to go round’.

while American usage has the full-stop before the closing quotation marks:
 We are often told that ‘there is not enough money to go round.’

4.3 Vocabulary differences

There are thousands of words which either differ in total meaning, or in one particular sense or usage, or are
totally unknown in other variety. These differences can be divided into four main categories:

1. Same word, different meaning

2. Same word, additional meaning in one variety.

3. Same word, difference in style, connotation, frequency of use.

4.3.1 Lexical Americanization

Originally NAmEng words have been finding their way into other forms of English, quite often replacing indigenous
words.

UNIT 4 – SOUTH AFRICAN ENGLISH

1. Pronunciation in South African English

South African English is the English dialect spoken as the first language by South Africans. A distinction can be made
among:

• Mild English accent > close to RP, and associated to upper classes
 • Broad English accent > spoken by the working class and by speakers of an Afrikaans descent who speak
English as a second language.
• General English accent > representative of middle classes
o This is the accent we will represent in transcription practice exercises

1.1 Vowel system

There are no noticeable differences of phonemic inventory from RP.

Phonetically, it is worth mentioning that the phoneme /ɪ/ has two allophonic variations:

• A close front vowel [ɪ] occurs:

o Before and after velar consonants /ŋ/, /k/ and /g/
o Before /ʃ/
o for some speakers before /ʒ/, /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ as well
o in word-initial position, as in
▪ tick [tɪk]
▪ big [bɪg]
▪ dish [dɪʃ]
▪ hit [hɪt]
▪ it [ɪt]
It is always restricted to stressed sounds

• A more centralized or central vowel [ə] occurs elsewhere

o Limb [ləm]
o Dinner ['dɪnə]
o Bit [bət]
This sound is heard in stressed as well as unstressed syllables

RP South African English PHONETIC COMMENTS

/iː/ /iː/
/ɪ/ /ɪ/ Different phonetic realizations in complementary distribution, as
explained above.
/e/ /e/
/æ/ /æ/
/ʌ/ /ʌ/
/ɑː/ /ɑː/
/ɒ/ /ɒ/
/ɔː/ /ɔː/
/ʊ/ /ʊ/
/uː/ /uː/
/ɜː/ /ɜː/
/ə/ /ə/
/aɪ/ /aɪ/
/eɪ/ /eɪ/
/ɔɪ/ /ɔɪ/
/aʊ/ /aʊ/ (or/ɑʊ/)
/əʊ/ /əʊ/
/ɪə/ /ɪə/
/eə/ /eə/
/ʊə/ /ʊə/
As a non-rhotic accent, smoothing in triphthongs must be quite common. Therefore, do not forget to show
smoothing in your transcription practice exercises.

1.2 Consonant system

No relevant phonological variation in the consonant system between RP and South African English, with the
exception of the presence of a velar fricative /x/ in words borrowed from Afrikaans or German.

Phonetic consonant features:

a) No aspiration of /p, t, k/ in stressed word-initial position [p=, t=, k=] as in pin, tin, kin
b) /t/-Tapping (with voicing): Tendency to pronounce intervocalic /t/ as voiced tap [ɾ], as in better (in the
environment 'V_V)
c) /r/ is usually an alveolar tap [ɾ], very noticeable in intervocalic position, and with the environment of a
preceding velar plosive or /θr/, as in sorry, great or thread.
d) /l/ cannot be considered dark in any environment in most of the varieties of South African English.
e) Others:
a. There is an audible release of both plosives in plosive clusters, as in doctor.
b. Lack of T-glottalling

1.3 Prosody

• Tempo & Pitch: the tendency towards strengthening final unstressed syllables at the end of an intonation
unit in which the nuclear tone is rising.
• Syllabic consonants: there is a trend in Broad accents of keeping the schwa that precedes /n/ or /l/ in words
like listen /'lɪsən/ or middle /'midəl/.

1.4 Others: Phonotactic/lexical distribution differences

The next features are the main phonotactic/lexical distribution differences between RP and South African English:

• Rhoticity: South African English is mostly a non-rhotic accent. Nevertheless, R-insertion does NOT take
place in connected speech

• /i/ tends to be used instead of /ɪ/ at the end of words like many (words with unstressed orthographic final
-y, -ie, -ee, -ey and -ea)

• Weak Vowel Merger > use of the vowel /ə/ rather than /ɪ/ in non-final position (that is, before a consonant)
of all unstressed syllables of content words, as in buses, naked or cabbage. Nevertheless, the vowel /ɪ/ is
usually heard when the following consonant is velar, as in building, or in prefixes as in explained.

• Words which in RP have /ɑː/ before clusters of nasal plus another consonant (as in dance, plant…) usually
have /ɑː/. Furthermore, words which in RP have /ɑː/ before the voiceless fricatives (/θ, f, s/) as in laugh,
path, half also have /ɑː/ in South African English.

• Yod-dropping: it is much the same of that of England. In the case of /s/, it is often omitted when followed
by /j/ in stressed syllables, as in suit or assume.

• Yod-coalescence: /t/ and /d/ followed by /j/ in stressed syllables are pronounced /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ (as in duke
or tube) in Broad accents.

UNIT V – OTHER ENGLISH ACCENTS: BEYOND THE STANDARD

1. ENGLISH-BASED PIDGINS

Whenever someone other than a small child attempts to learn another language, certain processes which stem from
the imperfect learning ability will almost always occur. In particular, in the speech of such adult language learners,
the language is question will be, to different degrees, simplified and mixed

Simplification can be understood as involving chiefly regularization and loss of redundancy.

 • Regularization means treating irregular forms as if they were regular, such as saying I buyed rather than I
bought.
• Loss of redundancy often involves the omission of grammatical material which is repeated elsewhere or is
not absolutely necessary for conveying the message intended, as when saying she like instead of she likes.

Mixing is a term which refers to the way in which language learners introduce elements from their own language
into the language they are attempting to learn.

Typically, moreover, adult learners’ language will also be reduced. Because they do not know so much of the
language, and because they use it for a more restricted range of purposes, they will control fewer words, fewer
grammatical constructions and fewer idiomatic and fewer stylistic devices.

When a language experiences such simplification, we can say that it has been subjected to the process of
pidginization. In certain rather special social situations, it can happen that an extremely simplified, mixed and
reduced form of language of this type comes to be very useful as a means of communication between groups of
people who have no native language in common. It may then, over time, develop a fixed form with norms that are
shared by large number of speakers which can subsequently be passed on to and learned by others. Such a language
is referred to as a pidgin.

A development of this type occurred in West African, where a regularized, Africanized, reduced form of English,
acquired initially from limited contacts with sailors and traders, became useful as a lingua franca among different
groups of the indigenous population. This language is mixed – there are elements in its pronunciation, grammar and
vocabulary which are due to indigenous African languages; it is simplified or regularized – there are fewer
grammatical irregularities than in English; and it is reduced – it would not be adequate for all the uses that a native
speaker would want to put a language to, which is, however, of no significance, since it has no native speakers.

2. ENGLISH-BASED CREOLES

In certain rather exceptional social circumstances, it can happen that a pidgin language acquires importance and it
can become the most important or even sole language of a community and be passed on to the next generation of
children for whom it will be their native language.

When a pidgin language takes a full range of social functions in this way and acquires native speakers, it is known as
a creole. Like a pidgin, a creole is still, relative to its source language, simplified (regularized) and mixed. It is,
however, no longer reduced. Because the language now has to be used for all the purposes a native speaker needs
to use a language for, the reduction that took place during pidginization has to be repaired by a process of expansion.
This expansion process is known technically as creolization. During creolization, vocabulary is developed and
expanded, grammatical devices and categories are added to, and the language acquires a wide range of styles.

3. DECREOLIZATION

In many parts of the world, speakers of other English-based creoles have had much with speakers of English itself.
Where such contact has been considerable, a process of decreolization has normally occurred. What this means is
that the creoles were influenced by English and became less different from it. this process involved the creole
languages undergoing differing amounts of complication and purification. Complication reintroduced certain
irregularities from English, and counteracted the simplification that had occurred during pidginization. And
purification removed certain of the elements from African and other languages that had resulted from the mixing
that took place during pidginization.

4. POST-CREOLES AND MESOLECTAL VARIETIES

In places like Jamaica where there is a social dialect continuum, with Standard English at the top, an English-based
creole at the bottom, and intermediate varieties in between, it is usual to refer to the most standard ‘top’ varieties
as acrolects, the intermediates varieties as mesolects, and the ‘deepest’, most creole-type as basilects.
It is believed by most experts that American Black Vernacular English, the kind of USEng spoken by lower-class Black
Americans and sometimes referred to in the USA as African-American English may represent a historical English-
based creole in the last stages of decreolization.