Part of
Grammatical Change in English World-WideEdited by Peter Collins
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 67] 2015
► pp. 297–334
Edited by Peter Collins
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 67] 2015
► pp. 297–334
Linguistic change in a multilingual setting
A case study of quotatives in Indian English
The study explores recent diachronic developments in quotative marking in Indian English, using variationist sociolinguistic methods. Drawing on data obtained from a multilingual community in the south of New Delhi, it reveals a highly diverse system of strategies employed to introduce direct speech. A closer inspection of underlying constraints reveals that such a system has undergone restructuring and sociolinguistic proliferation as a result of learners’ drive for creativity combined with the pressure to select context-appropriate linguistic forms that ensure successful communication in a multilingual setting. Keywords: quotatives; Indian English; linguistic change; direct speech; New Delhi
References
Bhatt, Rakesh M.
2004 Indian English: Syntax. In A Handbook of Varieties of English, Vol. 2: Morphology and Syntax, Bernd Kortmann, Kate Burridge, Rajend Mesthrie, Edgar W. Schneider & Clive Upton (eds), 1016–1030. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Blyth Jr., Carl, Recktenwald, Sigrid & Wang, Jenny
1990 I’m like, ‘Say what?!’: A new quotative in American oral narrative. American Speech 65(3): 215–227. 
Buchstaller, Isabelle
2006 Diagnostics of age-graded linguistic behavior: the case of the quotative system. Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(1): 3–30.
2011 Quotations across generations: A multivariate analysis of speech and thought introducers across 5 decades of Tyneside speech. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 7(1): 59–92.
2014 Quotatives. New Trends and Sociolinguistic Implications [Language in Society]. Malden MA: Wiley Blackwell.
Buchstaller, Isabelle & D’Arcy, Alexandra
2009 Localized globalization: A multi-local, multivariate investigation of quotative be like
. Journal of Sociolinguistics 13(3): 291–331.
Butters, Ronald R.
1982 Editor’s note. American Speech 55: 304–307.
Chambers, Jack K.
1995 Sociolinguistic Theory. Linguistic Variation and its Social Significance. Oxford: Blackwell.
Coppieters, René
1987 Competence difference between native and near-native speakers. Language 63(3): 544–573.
Cukor-Avila, Patricia
2002
She say, she go, she be like: Verbs of quotation over time in African American Vernacular English. American Speech 77: 3–31.
D’Arcy, Alexandra
2004 Contextualizing St. John’s youth English within the Canadian quotative system. Journal of English Linguistics 32(4): 323–345.
2012 The diachrony of quotation: Evidence from New Zealand English. Language Variation and Change 24(3): 343–371.
2013 Variation and change. In The Oxford Handbook of Sociolinguistics, Robert Bayley, Richard Cameron & Ceil Lucas (eds), 484–502. Oxford: OUP.
Davydova, Julia
2011 The Present Perfect in Non-native Englishes. A Corpus-based Study of Variation [Topics in English Linguistics]Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Forthcoming. Indian English quotatives in a real-time perspective. In World Englishes: New Theoretical and Methodoligical Considerations [Varieties of English around the World] Elena Seoane & Cristina Suárez-Gómez (eds) Amsterdam John Benjamins
Durham, Mercedes, Haddican, Bill, Zweig, Eytan, Johnson, Daniel Ezra, Baker, Zipporah, Cockeram, David, Danks, Esther & Tyler, Louise
2012 Constant linguistic effects in the diffusion of be like
. Journal of English Linguistics 40(4): 316–337.
Ferrara, Kathleen & Bell, Barbara
1995 Sociolinguistic variation and discourse function of constructed dialogue introducers: The case of be+like. American Speech 70(3): 265–290.
Ghosh, Rabindra & Roy, Kartik
1997 The changing status of women in India. Impact of urbanization and development. International Journal of Social Economics 24(7-8-9): 902–917.
Höhn, Nicole
2012 And they were all like ‘What’s going on?’ New quotatives in Jamaican and Irish English. In Mapping Unity and Diversity World-Wide [Varieties of English around the World G43], Marianne Hundt & Ulrike Gut (eds), 263–290. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
2013 Quotatives in the Jamaican Acrolect: Corpus-Based Variationist Studies of Vernacular Globalisation in World Englishes. Freiburger Dokumentenserver (FreiDok), [URL] (14 March 2014).
Hopper, Paul
1991 On some principles of grammaticalisation. In Approaches to Grammaticalization [Typological Studies in Language 19], Elisabeth Closs Traugott & Bernd Heine (eds), 17–35. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Joseph, Brian D. & Janda, Richard D.
2003 On language, change, and language change – or, of history, linguistics, and historical linguistics. In The Handbook of Historical Linguistics, Brian D. Joseph & Richard D. Janda (eds), 3–180. Oxford: Blackwell.
Koul, Omkar N.
2008 Modern Hindi Grammar. Springfield VA: Dunwoody Press.
Labov, William
1982 Building on empirical foundations. In Perspectives on Historical Linguistics, Winfred P. Lehmann & Yakov Malkiel (eds), 17. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Matras, Yaron
2009 Language Contact [Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics]. Cambridge: CUP.
Macaulay, Ronald
2001 You’re like ‘why not?’ The quotative expressions of Glasgow adolescents. Journal of Sociolinguistics 5(1): 3–21.
Meehan, Teresa
1991 It’s like, ‘what’s happening in the evolution of like’: A theory of grammaticalization. Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics 16: 37–51.
Mufwene, Salikoko S.
2001 The Ecology of Language Evolution. Cambridge: CUP.
2002 Competition and selection in language evolution. Selection 3(1): 45–56.
Rand, David & Sankoff, David
1990 GoldVarb: A variable rule application for the Macintosh. Montreal, Canada: Centre de Recherche mathématique, Université de Montréal.
Rickford, John, Buchstaller, Isabelle, Wasow, Thomas, Zwicky, Arnold & Traugott, Elisabeth Closs
2007 Intensive and quotative ALL: Something old, something new. American Speech 82(1): 3–31.
Romaine, Suzanne & Lange, Deborah
1991 The use of like as a marker of reported speech and thought: A case of grammaticalisation in progress. American Speech 66(3): 227–279.
Sankoff, Gillian, Thibault, Pierrette, Nagy, Naomi, Blondeau, Hélène, Fonollosa, Marie-Odile & Gagnon, Lucie
1997 Variation in the use of discourse markers in a language contact situation. Language Variation and Change 9: 191–217.
Siemund, Peter, Davydova, Julia & Maier, Georg
2012 The Amazing World of Englishes. A Practical Introduction. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Tagliamonte, Sali A.
2012 Variationist Sociolinguistics: Change, Observation, Interpretation. Malden MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
Tagliamonte, Sali A. & D’Arcy, Alexandra
2004
He’s like; She’s like: The quotative system in Canadian youth. Journal of Sociolinguistics 8(4): 493–514.
2007 Frequency and variation in the community grammar: Tracking a new change through the generations. Language Variation and Change 19(2): 199–217.
2009 Peaks beyond phonology: Adolescence, incrementation, and language change. Language 85(1): 58–108.
Tagliamonte, Sali A. & Hudson, Rachel
1999
Be like, et al. beyond America: The quotative system in British and Canadian youth. Journal of Sociolinguistics 3(2): 147–172.
Winter, Joanne
2002 Discourse quotatives in Australian English: Adolescents performing voices. Australian Journal of Linguistics 22(1): 5–21.
Winford, Donald
2003 An Introduction to Contact Linguistics. [Language in Society] Malden MA: Blackwell.
Cited by
Cited by 6 other publications
Choi, Jihyun Karen & Chloé Diskin-Holdaway
2022. The Acquisition of Quotatives and Quotative Be Like among Chinese L2 Speakers of English in Australia. Languages 7:2 ► pp. 123 ff. 
Davydova, Julia
2019. Quotative like in the Englishes of the Outer and Expanding Circles. World Englishes 38:4 ► pp. 578 ff.
Davydova, Julia
2022. The role of social factors in the acquisition of vernacular English: A variationist study with pedagogical implications. International Journal of Applied Linguistics 32:3 ► pp. 425 ff.
Deuber, Dagmar, Eva Canan Hänsel & Michael Westphal
2021. Quotative be like in Trinidadian English. World Englishes 40:3 ► pp. 436 ff.
Suárez‐Gómez, Cristina & Elena Seoane
2023. The role of age and gender in grammatical variation in world Englishes. World Englishes 42:2 ► pp. 327 ff.
[no author supplied]
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 16 november 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.