The Language of Dialect Writing

doi:10.1017/9781009205443.016

13 - The Language of Dialect Writing

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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 October 2025

Javier Ruano-García

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Merja Kytö and

Erik Smitterberg

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Merja Kytö: Affiliation:
Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
Erik Smitterberg: Affiliation:
Uppsala Universitet, Sweden

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Summary

This chapter explores the language of dialect writing in the history of English. It surveys the complexities underlying the social and linguistic interactions between (non-)standard varieties with examples of literary dialect and dialect literature written between 1500 and 1900 that are now available in the Salamanca Corpus. It is shown that such evidence provides useful insight into the history of forms that remain underexplored, while it vividly reflects changing ideologies about dialect variation. In this regard, this chapter draws on third-wave sociolinguistic models to illustrate that the combination of frameworks such as enregisterment and indexicality with quantitative analysis of dialect writing can prove beneficial in reconstructing linguistic ideas about dialects and ascertaining shifting indexicalities, while it informs our understanding of the social meaning of dialect variation in the past.

Keywords

literary dialect dialect literature Early Modern English Late Modern English spelling lexis grammar enregisterment indexicality

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Type: Chapter
Information: The New Cambridge History of the English Language
Documentation, Sources of Data and Modelling
, pp. 326 - 356

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009205443.016 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2025

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