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9 - Insular Varieties of English in Britain

9.A Channel Islands

from Part I - English

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 October 2024

Susan Fox
Affiliation:
Universität Bern, Switzerland
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Summary

This section provides an overview of the English varieties spoken on the Channel Islands with a focus on the two largest islands of Jersey and Guernsey. Politically associated with the English Crown since the Norman Conquest, but primarily Francophone until the nineteenth century, Channel Island English has been shaped by a long history of linguistic contact between insular Norman French, standard French and several English varieties. Anglicisation became almost complete, however, in the second half of the twentieth century. Although the Channel Islands have not been studied extensively or continuously, the existing studies have revealed the great extent to which contact with Norman French has coloured the English spoken on Jersey and Guernsey. Despite the survival of some unique dialect features, these studies also show that processes of standardisation and levelling are well under way in Channel Island English, influenced by factors such as ongoing dialect contact, identity issues, education and changing social network structures. After a brief account of the socio-historical setting and today’s linguistic situation on the Islands, more recent research on variation and change in Channel Island English is presented, including a description of its most important phonological and morphosyntactic features.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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