The Morphology of English Dialects: Verb-Formation in Non-standard English

by Lieselotte Anderwald

• ISBN13: 9780521884976
• ISBN10: 0521884977
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-04-27
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• More Book Details

Summary

Where do dialects differ from Standard English, and why are they so remarkably resilient? This new study argues that commonly used verbs that deviate from Standard English for the most part have a long pedigree. Analysing the language use of over 120 dialect speakers, Lieselotte Anderwald demonstrates that not only are speakers justified historically in using these verbs, systematically these non-standard forms actually make more sense. By constituting a simpler system, they are generally more economical than their Standard English counterparts. Drawing on data collected from the Freiburg English Dialect Corpus (FRED), this innovative and engaging study comes directly from the forefront of this field, and will be of great interest to students and researchers of English language and linguistics, morphology and syntax.

Table of Contents

List of figures	p. xii
List of maps	p. xiv
List of tables	p. xv
Preface and thanks	p. xvii
Acknowledgement of sources	p. xviii
Introduction	p. 1
The past tense - a descriptive approach	p. 1
Terminology: strong-weak vs. irregular-regular	p. 3
Classification of strong verbs	p. 5
Ablaut series, vowel gradation	p. 5
Dental suffix	p. 6
Abstract formal identity	p. 7
Standard vs. non-standard English	p. 12
Materials employed	p. 13
Past tense theories	p. 17
Introduction	p. 17
Chomsky and Halle (1968)	p. 18
Lexical Phonology and Morphology	p. 21
Optimality Theory	p. 26
Stochastic Optimality Theory	p. 32
Psycholinguistic theories	p. 33
Connectionist approaches	p. 36
Network model	p. 38
Natural morphology	p. 40
Universal morphological naturalness	p. 40
Language-specific morphological naturalness	p. 42
Criticism	p. 45
Compatibility with other models	p. 45
Conclusion	p. 46
Naturalness and the English past tense system	p. 49
General features of the English verb system	p. 49
Dominant features	p. 51
Standard English verb classes	p. 51
Verb class 1: PRES ≠ PAST ≠ PPL	p. 52
Vpres ≠ Vpast ≠ Vppl	p. 53
<-en>-participle	p. 53
Verb class 2: PRES ≠ PAST = PPL	p. 55
Vpres ≠ Vpast = Vppl	p. 55
No vowel change	p. 57
Verb class 3: PRES = PPL ≠ PAST	p. 58
Verb class 4: PRES = PAST ≠ PPL	p. 58
Verb class 5: PRES = PAST = PPL	p. 59
Summary	p. 59
The central characteristics	p. 61
Non-standard verb paradigms as test cases	p. 61
New non-standard weak verbs	p. 62
New non-standard strong verbs	p. 62
Different non-standard strong verbs	p. 63
Two- instead of three-part paradigms	p. 63
One- instead of two-part paradigms	p. 65
Summary	p. 65
Sellt and knowed: non-standard weak verbs	p. 66
Introduction	p. 66
Data from FRED: what to count?	p. 68
Regional comparison	p. 69
Individual verbs	p. 70
Northern features	p. 73
Past tense gaed and gi'ed	p. 73
Past tense tellt and sellt	p. 73
Southern features	p. 77
Past tense runned	p. 77
Past tense gived	p. 78
Past tense knowed, growed, blowed and throwed	p. 79
Historical dialect data	p. 81
Past tense drawed	p. 82
Relative frequencies	p. 83
Western feature	p. 84
Past tense seed	p. 84
General features	p. 87
Past tense knowed	p. 87
Past tense catched	p. 89
Verb classes	p. 91
Statistical models	p. 92
Comparison with COLT	p. 95
Summary	p. 96
Drunk, seen, done and eat: two-part paradigms instead of three-part paradigms	p. 98
Introduction	p. 98
'Bybee' verbs	p. 98
History	p. 101
Past tense forms of begin	p. 103
Past tense forms of drink	p. 105
Past tense forms of sink	p. 106
Past tense forms of sing	p. 107
Past tense forms of ring	p. 108
Historical dialects	p. 109
Data from FRED	p. 110
Verbs	p. 110
Singular vs. plural?	p. 110
Regions	p. 111
Comparison with COLT	p. 113
Cognitive explanation	p. 114
Past tense seen	p. 120
Introduction	p. 120
History	p. 120
Historical dialects	p. 121
Data from FRED	p. 121
Conclusion	p. 125
Past tense done	p. 125
Introduction	p. 125
History	p. 126
Previous studies	p. 127
Historical dialects	p. 127
Data from FRED	p. 129
Data from COLT	p. 132
Done in American English	p. 133
Cognitive explanation	p. 134
Counterexamples: past tense eat, give and see	p. 136
Introduction	p. 136
Past tense eat	p. 136
History	p. 137
Historical dialects	p. 137
Data from FRED	p. 138
Conclusion past tense eat	p. 140
Past tense give	p. 141
History	p. 141
Historical dialects	p. 141
Data from FRED	p. 142
Past tense see	p. 144
Historical dialects	p. 144
Data from FRED	p. 144
Data from COLT	p. 145
Conclusions	p. 146
Chapter conclusion	p. 147
Come and run: non-standard strong verbs with a one-part paradigm	p. 149
Past tense come	p. 149
Introduction	p. 149
History	p. 150
Regular development	p. 150
Standard English past tense came	p. 153
Historical dialects	p. 158
Data from FRED	p. 163
Data from COLT	p. 165
Summary and explanation	p. 166
Past tense run	p. 168
Introduction	p. 168
History	p. 168
Present tense	p. 168
Past tense	p. 174
Historical dialects	p. 176
Data from FRED	p. 176
Procedure	p. 176
Quantification	p. 178
Data from COLT	p. 179
Cognitive explanation	p. 179
Chapter conclusion	p. 180
Conclusion: supralocalization and morphological theories	p. 183
Summary of findings	p. 183
Supralocalization?	p. 185
Morphological theories revisited	p. 188
Rules vs. representations	p. 188
The role of frequency	p. 191
Accounting for diachronic developments	p. 191
Non-standard data	p. 194
Summary	p. 197
Verb classification	p. 198
SED localities and list of counties	p. 205
Bibliography	p. 207
Index	p. 216
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