Joan Beal

This bestselling text by Charles Barber, with updating contributions from Joan C. Beal and Philip A. Shaw, recounts the history of the English language from its remote ancestry to the present day. Using dozens of familiar texts, including the English of King Alfred, Shakespeare and Chaucer, the English language is explored in terms of where it came from, where it is going and the global impact it has had, taking into account the many varieties of English that now exist. Stimulating and interesting, it is not only written for specialists on language and linguistics, but also for general readers who take an interest in the subject.

Language and Region:provides an accessible guide to regional variation in Englishcovers topical issues including loss of regional diversity and attitudes to regional accents and dialectsexamines the use of dialect in media, advertising and the tourist industryoutlines the main linguistic characteristics of regional accents and dialects in terms of regional pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar.Affording hands-on practical experience of textual analysis, this book is essential reading for students of English language studies.

Language and Region:provides an accessible guide to regional variation in Englishcovers topical issues including loss of regional diversity and attitudes to regional accents and dialectsexamines the use of dialect in media, advertising and the tourist industryoutlines the main linguistic characteristics of regional accents and dialects in terms of regional pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar.Affording hands-on practical experience of textual analysis, this book is essential reading for students of English language studies.

Thomas Spence (1750-1814) was a native of Newcastle upon Tyne who is best known for his political writings, and more particularly for his radical `Plan' for social reform involving common ownership of the land. One hitherto neglected aspect of Spence's Plan was his proposal to extend the benefits of reading and of `correct' pronunciation to the lower classes by means of a phonetic script of his own devising, first set out and used in Spence's Grand Repository of the English Language (1775). The Grand Repository was one of many English pronouncing dictionaries produced in the late eighteenth century to satisfy the growing demands for a clear guide to `correct' pronunciation. It differs from its contemporaries firstly in that it was intended primarily for the lower classes, and secondly in that it is the only eighteenth-century pronouncing dictionary of English to use a truly `phonetic' script in the sense of one sound = one symbol. In this fascinating and unique account, Beal pays particular attention to the actual pronunciations advocated by Spence and his contemporaries with a view to reconstructing what was felt to be `correct' pronunciation in eighteenth-century Britain. With broad appeal to linguists and historians alike, this study highlights the importance of pronouncing dictionaries as a resource for the historical phonologist, and provides a valuable addition to the limited body of knowledge on eighteenth-century pronunciation.