English World-Wide - Volume 32, Issue 3, 2011

The process of right dislocation (RD) has long been recognized in English as a primarily vernacular feature available to speakers of all varieties, but concrete sociolinguistic discussion about its frequency of occurrence and which factors constrain its use are rare. Moreover, English has variants which repeat the operator either before or after the dislocated noun phrase (NP) or pronominal particle, e.g. She’s got a very good degree has Julie, which makes it unlike most of the languages with comparable RD forms. These variants are either ignored completely in RD literature or considered on their own. The present analysis aims, therefore, to provide a holistic view of RD strategies. Starting with a classification of the various RD strategies used in the North of England, where this variant is most often reported to be found, this paper will present a quantitative analysis of RD in a corpus of York speech. The analysis will demonstrate that, while RD forms are used by York speakers (young and old, male and female), with respect to overall frequency RD is in fact far more rare than reports make it out to be, and that its social distribution is rather unexpected in some respects.

This paper explores the linguistic and social factors behind the acquisition of glottal variation in English /t/ by native Polish speakers living in Manchester, UK. It investigates the speech of 40 Polish adults of varying levels of English language proficiency, who have been in Manchester for varying lengths of time, in order to establish what might be encouraging or prohibiting the acquisition of this widespread linguistic feature. Using quantitative sociolinguistic methods, factors such as level of English, length of residence, age, gender, motivation and attitude are considered in accounting for the variation in acquisition. Findings suggest that in addition to level of English and length of residence effects there is a fairly robust gender difference, with women tending to use glottal variants more frequently than men. This gender difference is explored in more detail with reference to a gender as practice type approach.

Professional female comedians frequently face harassment from male fellow performers and from male audience members who take a sexist attitude, essentializing women as psychologically and temperamentally unsuited to the profession of comedy. This paper examines a strategy that African American female comedians employ to overcome the obstacles they face in performing before mixed gender African American audiences. While implementing features that emphasize their African American and female identity, the comedians direct their performances toward women in the audience, employing features and practices comparable to those researchers associate with close female friends in conversation. Intensive use of a strategy that includes taking stances such as confidence sharing and using gendered terms to directly address female audience members establishes solidarity with the women who are listening. Having a large portion of the audience as allies discourages the occurrence of sexist harassment.

This article examines the emergence of local identity and language use in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar, from its annexation in 1704 to the present day. Contrary to popular opinion, it shows that the founding population of British Gibraltar was divided along racial and linguistic grounds, and only in the 19th century evolved into a cohesive Spanish-speaking community, before its subsequent development into the bilingual English- and Spanish-speaking society of the present day. Through the analysis of census data, reportage and colonial government records, the article shows that the Dynamic Model of Postcolonial English in Schneider (2007) aptly captures the spread of English knowledge on the Rock. The population’s persistent attachment to its British identity, and its framing of Gibraltar English as a variety of British English, are however theoretically problematic. The article concludes that local identity and language use are dependent as much on the territory’s relationship with Spain as the United Kingdom.