The central aim of the Diversity Model is to offer a principled account for how varieties arise at one location and continue to co-exist. The motivation for the model was the recognition that there are many areas of the anglophone world where vernacular and less vernacular varieties of English are found together. As both the Dynamic Model by Schneider and the New Dialect Formation model by Trudgill deal with the rise and development of single varieties in a historically unilinear manner, it was felt that a further set of generalisations, organised as a coherent model, was necessary to capture the further developments of varieties. In both Schneider’s and Trudgill’s model there is a final stage, labelled ‘focussing’ and ‘differentiation’ respectively, and in some respects the present Diversity Model is intended to deal with the later continuation of varieties in new anglophone locations after their initial establishment.

Basic characteristics of the Diversity Model

1) It is not linear and not unidirectional and can deal with rises and falls. It can cope with cyclic developments in the history of varieties.

2) It is sensitive to external sociopolitical and sociocultural factors.

3) It caters for multiple varieties at one location by incorporating the key notions of supraregionalisation and vernacularisation.

4) It rejects the binary distinction of dialect and standard and replaces it by a continuum between two extremes of maximal and minimal vernacularity.

5) It is sensitive to level of language and distinguishes between a phonetic standard of a variety bundle and a written standard of a larger arena.

6) It operates with the notion of stigma to account for the survival, or not, of originally local forms in non-vernacular, supraregional varieties.

Furthermore, with reference to the New Dialect Formation model it should be stressed that the Diversity Model

1) is non-deterministic

2) does not appeal to markedness

3) stresses the scalar nature of varieties

4) is focussed on external linguistic developments but with an interface to internal structural factors

5) does not assume any geographical homogeneity of varieties in a country or region

The diversity model recognises the following stages:

1) INITIATION, the linguistic contours of a nascent variety become apparent

2) DIVERSIFICATION, typically through supraregionalisation or vernacularisation

3) CO-EXISTENCE, typically of vernacular and supraregional varieties

4) CONTINUATION, either forwards or return to a cycle

The following is a link to a PowerPoint presentation which sets out the Diversity Model and discusses many details with examples from different anglophone locations.

Diversity Model (PowerPoint presentation)

References

Hickey, Raymond 2013. ‘Supraregionalisation and dissociation’, in: J. K. Chambers and Natalie Schilling (eds) Handbook of Language Variation and Change. Second edition. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 537-554.

Hickey, Raymond 2014. A Dictionary of Varieties of English. Malden, MA: Wiley- Blackwell