Sounds of English Worldwide

Raymond Hickey

Malden, MA: Wiley- Blackwell. xxiii + 408 pages.

This book offers an overview of the sound systems of all major varieties of English as spoken throughout the world. Beginning with a survey of the history and contexts of global varieties of English, this book first guides readers through the spread of English starting from the colonial era through to the present day. The second section of the book broadly considers developments in the English-speaking world, accounting for factors and scenarios that have impacted regional changes in English, including language shift, diaspora, and the use of English in non-anglophone contexts.

Contents

I Language and Variation

1 Studying variation in sound

    1.1 Introduction
    1.2 The view from the sound system
    1.3 Standards, supraregional varieties and vernaculars
    1.4 Research trends in variety studies
    1.5 Data sources and analysis

2 The sound system of English

    2.1 Phonetics and phonology
    2.2 Vowels
    2.3 Consonants
    2.4 Prosody
    2.5 Connected speech

3 Sound change in English

    3.1 Analysing change
    3.2 Trends in present-day varieties

II The Spread of English

1 The colonial period

    1.1 The British Empire
    1.2 Settlement of colonies
    1.3 The slave trade
    1.4 Migration between colonies
    1.5 Internal migration

2 Transported dialect features

    2.1 Early stages and their effects
    2.2 Language contact
    2.3 Language shift
    2.4 Relic areas and endangered varieties
    2.5 Loss of transported features

3 English in the world today

    3.1 The two hemispheres
    3.2 Major anglophone areas
    3.3 Dialects and standards
    3.4 Regional epicentres

III Regions and Countries

1 England

    1.1 Standard Southern British English
    1.2 London and the Home Counties
    1.3 The South and South-West
    1.4 East Anglia
    1.5 The Midlands - East and West
    1.6 The North - Lower, Central and Far North

2 The Celtic Regions

    2.1 Scotland
    2.2 Wales
    2.3 Ireland
    2.4 Isle of Man

3 Europe

    3.1 Channel Islands
    3.2 Gibraltar
    3.3 Malta

4 North America

    4.1 United States
    4.2 Canada

5 The Caribbean

    5.1 Caribbean creoles
    5.2 Eastern Caribbean
    5.3 Western Caribbean
    5.4 Caribbean Rim

6 Africa

    6.1 West Africa
    6.2 East Africa
    6.3 Southern Africa

7 The South Atlantic

8 Asia

    8.1 South Asia
    8.2 South-East Asia
    8.3 East Asia

9 Australasia

    9.1 Australia
    9.2 New Zealand

10 The Pacific region

    10.1 Polynesia
    10.2 Melanesia
    10.3 Micronesia
    10.4 Ogasawara Islands

11 Pidgins and creoles

    11.1 English-lexifier pidgins and creoles
    11.2 Creoles: theories of origin
    11.3 The sound systems of pidgins and creoles

12 World Englishes and second-language varieties

Outlook

Appendix A Timeline for varieties of English

    I Within Britain
    II Northern Hemisphere
    III Southern Hemisphere
    IV Movements within the Anglophone world

Appendix B The history of English

    B.1 Old English (450-1066)
    B.2 Middle English (1066-1500)
    B.3 Early Modern English (1500-1700)
    B.4 Late Modern English (1700- 1900)
    B.5 Recommended reading

Appendix C Transcription conventions

Appendix D Lexical sets and extensions

Glossary

References

Linguistic journals

Index