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Drawing on data from well-known actors in popular films and TV shows, this reference guide surveys the representation of accent in North American film and TV over eight decades. It analyzes the speech of 180 film and television performances from the 1930s to today, looking at how that speech has changed; how it reflects the regional backgrounds, gender, and ethnic ancestry of the actors; and how phonetic variation and change in the 'real world' have been both portrayed in, and possibly influenced by, film and television speech. It also clearly explains the technical concepts necessary for understanding the phonetic analysis of accents. Providing new insights into the role of language in the expression of North American cultural identity, this is essential reading for researchers and advanced students in linguistics, film, television and media studies, and North American studies, as well as the larger community interested in film and television.
The Atlas of North American English provides the first overall view of the pronunciation and vowel systems of the dialects of the U.S. and Canada. The Atlas re-defines the regional dialects of American English on the basis of sound changes active in the 1990s and draws new boundaries reflecting those changes. It is based on a telephone survey of 762 local speakers, representing all the urbanized areas of North America. It has been developed by Bill Labov, one of the leading sociolinguists of the world, together with his colleagues Sharon Ash and Charles Boberg. The Atlas consists of a printed volume accompanied by an interactive CD-ROM. The print and multimedia content is also available onli...
The Handbook of Dialectology provides an authoritative, up-to-date and unusually broad account of the study of dialect, in one volume. Each chapter reviews essential research, and offers a critical discussion of the past, present and future development of the area. The volume is based on state-of-the-art research in dialectology around the world, providing the most current work available with an unusually broad scope of topics Provides a practical guide to the many methodological and statistical issues surrounding the collection and analysis of dialect data Offers summaries of dialect variation in the world's most widely spoken and commonly studied languages, including several non-European languages that have traditionally received less attention in general discussions of dialectology Reviews the intellectual development of the field, including its main theoretical schools of thought and research traditions, both academic and applied The editors are well known and highly respected, with a deep knowledge of this vast field of inquiry
The English Language in Canada examines the current status, history and principal features of Canadian English, focusing on the 'standard' variety heard across the country today. The discussion of the status of Canadian English considers the number and distribution of its speakers, its relation to French and other Canadian languages and to American English, its status as the expressive medium of English Canadian culture and its treatment in previous research. The review of its history concentrates on the historical roots and patterns of English-speaking settlement that established Canadian English and influenced its character in each region of Canada. The analysis of its principal features compares the vocabulary, pronunciation and grammar of Canadian English to standard British and American English. Subsequent chapters examine variation and change in the vocabulary and pronunciation of Canadian English, while a final chapter briefly considers the future of Canadian English.
The first edited volume to document and analyse early audio recordings of the English language.
This textbook approaches the history of English from a theoretical perspective. The book provides a brief chronological overview describing the way in which the English language has changed over time from Old English to Modern English, while subsequent parts adopt a theoretical focus that is thematically organised to deal with the question of how and why English changed in the way it did, including a part addressing some specific contact-induced changes and key topics such as English as a Lingua Franca. Supported throughout with information boxes with empirical studies, the examples given are all drawn from English, but boxes with examples from other languages tie the development of the English language into changes in other contexts and settings. This book is an ideal resource for undergraduate students of the English Language and historical linguistics.
Environmental history has traditionally told the story of Man and Nature. Scholars have too frequently overlooked the ways in which their predominantly male subjects have themselves been shaped by gender. Seeing Nature through Gender here reintroduces gender as a meaningful category of analysis for environmental history, showing how women's actions, desires, and choices have shaped the world and seeing men as gendered actors as well. In thirteen essays that show how gendered ideas have shaped the ways in which people have represented, experienced, and consumed their world, Virginia Scharff and her coauthors explore interactions between gender and environment in history. Ranging from colonial...
The Italian diaspora throughout the world navigate and negotiate various complex and multidirectional language dynamics. In order to account for the sociolinguistic processes that have taken place, this book provides a detailed observation of these linguistic dynamics from the point of view of the Italian diaspora in Bedford, in the UK. This study on the language behaviour of three generations of Italian residents in Bedford provides empirical data on, and highlights the importance of, the sociolinguistic examination of English in service encounters. What comes to light in most of the cases analysed, is that audience design has a proven influence on the choice of language and repertoire with...
The Handbook of English Pronunciation presents a comprehensive exploration of English pronunciation with essential topics for applied linguistics researchers and teachers, including language acquisition, varieties of English, historical perspectives, accent’s changing role, and connections to discourse, technology, and pedagogy. Provides thorough descriptions of all elements of English pronunciation Features contributions from a global list of authors, reflecting the finest scholarship available Explores a careful balance of issues and topics important to both researchers and teachers Provides a historical understanding of the importance of pronunciation and examines some of the major ways English is pronounced today throughout the world Considers practical concerns about how research and practice interact in teaching pronunciation in the classroom
The new edition of this classic text chronicles recent breakthrough developments in the field of American English, covering regional, ethnic, and gender-based differences. Now accompanied by a companion website with an extensive array of sound files, video clips, and other online materials to enhance and illustrate discussions in the text Features brand new chapters that cover the very latest topics, such as Levels of Dialect, Regional Varieties of English, Gender and Language Variation, The Application of Dialect Study, and Dialect Awareness: Extending Application, as well as new exercises with online answers Updated to contain dialect samples from a wider array of US regions Written for students taking courses in dialect studies, variationist sociolinguistics, and linguistic anthropology, and requires no pre-knowledge of linguistics Includes a glossary and extensive appendix of the pronunciation, grammatical, and lexical features of American English dialects