The concept and essence of dialects

study of dialects offersa fascinating approach to learning about language. Ideally, by learning abouthow language varies geographically and socially, students will come tounderstand at least two basic facts about language: 1) that language changesover time, and 2) that language use is linked to social identity.variation, ordialect diversity, reflects the fact that languages change over time and thatpeople who live in the same geographical area or maintain the same socialidentity share language norms; in other words, they speak the same dialect.Although dialects differ geographically and socially, no dialect is betterstructurally than another. While many people believe there to be only onecorrect form of a language, what is standard actually varies from dialect todialect. For example, the normal Southern pronunciation of the word pin doesnot differ from the pronunciation of the word pen. But because other dialectsmake a distinction between the vowels i and e preceding the nasalsound /n/, speakers of those dialects may assess the Southern pronunciation asincorrect instead of simply different. Judging someone’s pronunciation (orgrammar or word choice) as wrong may lead to unwarranted judgments about theirintelligence or ability. [5; 154]

A dialect is a specificvariety of English that differs from other varieties in three specific ways:lexis (vocabulary), grammar (structure) and phonology (pronunciation oraccent). English dialects may be different from each other, but all speakerswithin the English-speaking world can still generally understand them. Aspeaker from Newcastle-upon-Tyne, for instance, might pepper his speech withlocalized vocabulary, such as gan for “to go” or clarts for“mud”. He may often use regional grammatical constructions, such as thepast tense constructions I’ve went and I’ve drank or thereflexive pronouns mysel, yoursel, hissel etc. In addition he probablyuses a range of local pronunciations. For all these reasons he could bedescribed as a Geordie dialect speaker.are a huge number of dialects ofEnglish. First, they are the result of expansion of the British Empire, andthen the influence of the U.S. government around the world.The most commondialects of English – British, based in the southern UK. The second – is theU.S., based on well Mid-American.about 70% of native English speakers living inthe U.S., this is the language option is becoming dominant in the study ofEnglish as a foreign language, although the previous tutorials and speech werelargely based on the British version.