Some Basic Problems of Lexicography.

At different stages of this work the lexicographer is confronted with different problems. Some of these refer to any type of dictionary, others are specific of only some or even one type. The most important of the former are:

1. the selection of lexical units for inclusion;

2. their arrangement;

3. the setting of the entries;

4. the selection and arrangement (grouping) of word-meanings;

5. the definition of meanings;

6. its illustrative material;

7. supplementary material.

LECTURE 13

THEME: VARIANTS AND DIALECTS OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.

Every language allows different kinds of variations: geographical or territorial, perhaps the most obvious, stylistic, the difference between the written and the spoken form of the standard national language and others.

For historical and economic reasons the English language has spread over vast territories. It is the national language of England proper, the USA, Australia, New Zealand and some provinces of Canada. It is the official language in Wales, Scotland, in Gibraltar and on the island of Malta.

The Main Variants of the English Language.

It is natural that the English language is not used with uniformity in the British Isles and in Australia, in the USA and in New Zealand, in Canada and in India,etc. The English Language also has some peculiarities in Wales, Scotland, in other parts of the British Isles and America.

Modern linguists distinguishes territorial variants of a national language and local dialects. Variants of a language are regional varieties of a standard literary language characterized by some minor peculiarities in the sound system, vocabulary and grammar and by the their own literary norms. Dialects are varieties of a language used as a means of oral communication in small distinctive features of pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary.

It is over half a century already that the nature of the two main variants of the English language, British and American (BE and AE) has been discussed. Some American linguists, H.L.Mencken for one, speak of two separate languages with a steady flood of linguistic influence first (up to about 1914) from Britain to America, and since then from America to the British Isles. They even proclaim that the American influence on British English is so powerful that there will come a time when the American standard will be established in Britain. Other linguists regard the language of the USA as a dialect of English.

Still more questionable is the position of Australian English (AuE) and Canadian English (CnE).

The difference between the English Language as spoken in Britain, the USA, Australia and Canada are immediately noticeable in the field of phonetics. The few phonemes characteristic of American pronunciation and alien to British literary norms can as a rule be observed in British dialects.

The dissimilarities in grammar like AE gotten, proven for BE got, proved are scarce. For the most part these dissimilarities consist in the preference of this or that grammatical category or form to some others. Infinitive constructions are used more rarely in AE than in BE and AuE and passive constructions are, on the contrary, more frequent in America than in Britain and in Australia.

Since BE, AE and AuE have essentially the same grammar system, phonetic system and vocabulary, they cannot be regarded as different languages. Nor they can be referred to local dialects; because they serve all spheres of verbal communication in society, within their territorial area they have dialectal differences of their own; besides they differ far less than local dialects. Another consideration is that AE has its own literary norm and AuE is developing one. Thus we must speak of three variants of the English national language having different accepted literary standards, one spoken in the British Isles , another spoken in the USA, the third in Australia. As to CnE, its peculiarities began to attract linguistic attention only some 20 years ago. The fragmentary nature of the observation available makes it impossible to determine its status.

Speaking about the lexical distinctions between the territorial variants of the English language it is necessary to point out that from the point of view of their modern currency in different parts of the English-speaking world all lexical units may be divided into general English , those common to all the variants and locally-marked, those specific to present-day usage in one of the variants and not found in the others.

Lexical Differences of Territorial Variants.

When speaking about the territorial differences of the English language philologists and lexicographers usually note the fact that different variants of English use different words for the same objects. Thus in describing the lexical differences between the British and American variants they provide long lists of word pairs like

BE AE

Flat apartment

Underground subway

Lorry truck

Pavement sidewalk

Post mail

Tin-opener can-opener

Government administration

Leader editorial

Teaching staff faculty

One of the best known Southern dialects is Cockney, the regional dialect of London.

The contribution of the Scottish dialect is very considerable.

A great deal in this process is due to Robert Burns who wrote his poems in Scottish English< and to Walter Scott who introduces many Scottish words into his novels.

Local dialects are varieties of the English language peculiar to some districts and having no normalized literary form. Regional varieties possessing a literary form are called variants. In Great Britain there are two variants, Scottish English and Irish English, and five main groups of dialects: Northern, Midland, Western and Southern.. Every group contains several dialects.

According to E.Patridge and H.C.Wylde Cockney exists on two levels. As spoken by the educated lower middle classes it is a regional dialect marked by some deviations in pronunciation but few in vocabulary and syntax.. As spoken by the uneducated, Cockney differs from Standard English not only in pronunciation but also in vocabulary, morphology and syntax.

The differences in pronunciation between American dialects are most apparent, but they seldom interfere with understanding. Distinctions in grammar scarce. The differences in vocabulary are rather numerous, but they are easy to pick up. Cf., e.g. Eastern New England sourmilk cheese, Inland Northern Dutch cheese, New York City pot cheese for Standard American cottage cheese (творог).

It is necessary to mention that American English is based on the language imported to the new continent at the time of the first settlements, that is on the English of the 17^th century. The first colonies were founded in 1607, so that the first colonizers were contemporaries of Shakespeare, Spenser and Milton. Words which have died out in Britain, or changed their meaning may survive in the USA. Thus, I guess was used by Chaucer for I think.