%0 Journal Article %A Anderwald, Lieselotte %T Was/Were-variation in non-standard British English today %D 2001 %J English World-Wide %V 22 %N 1 %P 1-21 %@ 0172-8865 %R https://doi.org/10.1075/eww.22.1.02and %I John Benjamins %X In this article, the past tense system of the verb to be in modern informal spoken British English is investigated. Variation is endemic, but an in-depth investigation across individual dialect areas shows that three generalization strategies can be distinguished. Of these, two lead to a straightforward simplification of the system (was-generalization and were-generalization respectively), whereas the dominant mixed type has remorphologized the Standard English (StE) number distinction and replaced it by a distinction according to polarity. A cognitive explanation is advanced for the pervasiveness of this at first glance rather complicated system. %U https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/eww.22.1.02and