RT Journal Article SR Electronic(1) A1 Anderwald, Lieselotte YR 2001 T1 Was/Were-variation in non-standard British English today JF English World-Wide VO 22 IS 1 SP 1 OP 21 DO https://doi.org/10.1075/eww.22.1.02and PB John Benjamins SN 0172-8865, AB 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., UL https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/eww.22.1.02and