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Article In: English World-Wide: Online-First Articles

The morpho-syntax of standard scottish English

Questionnaire-based insights

 | Leipzig University
ORCiD logo with link | University of Bamberg
 | University of Bamberg
 | University of Bamberg
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
Abstract
With empirical research on Standard Scottish English showing a bias towards phonology, the aim of the current study is to contribute to the morpho-syntactic documentation of this variety. Relying on Standard Southern British English for comparison, we concentrate on four eWAVE features on which the varieties have been noted to diverge: (i) youse as a second person plural pronoun, (ii) extended uses of the progressive, (iii) epistemic mustn’t, and (iv) quotative like. We use questionnaire data, where respondents indicate how many speakers in their home country use a particular feature. Ratings are elicited from 43 English and 61 Scottish participants (mostly university students) for two usage contexts, (informal) speech and (semi-formal) writing. Our findings corroborate expert ratings in eWAVE and show that the reported currency of all features is higher in Standard Scottish English, albeit to varying degrees. Our study draws attention to the complementary potential of questionnaire data in World Englishes research.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Standard Scottish English: An underdocumented variety
  • 3.Morpho-syntactic features: Background
    • 3.1Yous(e)
    • 3.2Extension of the progressive to stative verbs
    • 3.3Epistemic mustn’t
    • 3.4Quotative like
    • 3.5Summary
  • 4.Method and data
    • 4.1Questionnaire design and administration
    • 4.2Participants
    • 4.3Statistical analysis
  • 5.Results
    • 5.1Yous(e) as a second person plural pronoun
    • 5.2Extended use of the progressive
    • 5.3Epistemic mustn’t
    • 5.4Quotative like
  • 6.Summary and discussion
  • 7.Methodological conclusion: BSLVC data in research on varieties of English
    • 7.1Limitations
    • 7.2Advantages
  • Notes
  • Author queries
  • Sources
  • References
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