Variable Grammars: Verbal Agreement in Northern Dialects of English (Linguistische Arbeiten)

Main description: One of the conspicuous characteristics of the northern dialects of Britain and Ireland is variation in verbal agreement, especially the use of plural verbal -s. Once a mark of a consistent, categorical grammatical system in the traditional dialects of the area, today verbal -s appears in highly complex, hybrid variation patterns in the modern vernaculars. This corpus-based study explores continuities and discontinuities between the dialects involved, and discusses the implications of such hybrid variable sytems for a usage-based theory of grammatical competence The northern dialects of Britain and Ireland have verbal agreement patterns that differ radically from those of Standard English: the children is singing vs. they are singing vs. they sing and dances . This so-called 'Northern Subject Rule' (agreement with adjacent personal pronoun subjects, but invariable verbal -s everywhere else), attested since the time of Middle English, was once a consistent, categorical grammatical system in the older dialects. It continues in the modern vernaculars in the form of complex variable systems, amalgamated from traditional dialectal patterns, Standard English forms, as well as modern supraregional vernacular influences. This study explores the variable use of verbal agreement forms in Scotland, northern England and Ulster, based on data ranging from the mid-20th century »Survey of English Dialects« up to dialect recordings of the 1990s. In analysing continuities and discontinuities between the different dialects involved, it also raises questions of a theoretical nature: what are the implications of these hybrid, variable systems for a usage-based theory of grammatical competence? Die Verbkongruenz in den nördlichen britischen Dialekten weicht auffällig vom Standardenglischen ab. Doch was in älteren Formen dieser Dialekte ein in sich geschlossenes System mit kategorischer Geltung war, tritt in modernen Varietäten stets variabel und in einer Vielfalt von Mischformen auf. Die Arbeit untersucht anhand von Korpora Kontinuitäten und Unterschiede zwischen den Dialekten dieser Region und diskutiert die Bedeutung solcher hybrider, variabler Systeme für eine Theorie der grammatischen Variation. List of maps List of figures List of tables List of abbreviations Acknowledgments 1. Introduction 1.1. Data and method 1.2. The Northern Subject Rule: descriptive problems 2. Theoretical accounts of verbal agreement variation 2.1. Proposed formal analyses of the NSR 2.2. Theoretical approaches to variation 2.3. A usage-based approach 3. History and origins of the NSR 3.1. The development of the NSR from Middle English 3.2. The Origins: Old English affix reduction and analogical spread 3.3. The Scandinavian hypothesis 3.4. The Celtic hypothesis 4. Verbal agreement in the SED 4.1. The data 4.2. An overview 4.3. Non-NSR agreement patterns 4.4. The Northern Subject Rule in the SED 5. Verbal agreement in the NITCS 5.1. The data 5.2. Pronominal subjects 5.3. Full NP subjects 5.4. Existential there 5.5. Conclusions: agreement in Northern Irish English 6. Verbal agreement in FRED 6.1. The data 6.2. Pronominal subjects: present tense verbs 6.3. Pronominal subjects: was/were levelling 6.4. Existentials and -r levelling 6.5. Full NP subjects 7. Conclusions Appendixes A. Varbrul multivariate analysis methods 1. Maximum likelihood regression analysis 2. Significance testing with Varbrul 3. Dependency and interaction between factor groups 4. Clustering speakers B. SED data lists C. NITCS data tables D. FRED data tables References Index Over the past few decades, the book series Linguistische Arbeiten [Linguistic Studies], comprising over 500 volumes, has made a significant contribution to the development of linguistic theory both in Germany and internationally. The series will continue to deliver new impulses for research and maintain the central insight of linguistics that progress can only be made in acquiring new knowledge about human languages both synchronically and diachronically by closely combining empirical and theoretical analyses. To this end, we invite submission of high-quality linguistic studies from all the central areas of general linguistics and the linguistics of individual languages which address topical questions, discuss new data and advance the development of linguistic theory. Lukas Pietsch. Originally Presented As The Author's Thesis (doctoral - Freiburg) Under The Title: Subject-verb Agreement In Northern Dialects Of English. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [199]-212) And Index. The book series Linguistische Arbeiten (LA) publishes high-quality work in linguistics that addresses current issues in synchrony and diachrony, theoretically or empirically oriented.