Written representation of dialect: with case studies from 20th century Glasgow fiction

Abstract

This thesis deals with and analyses the fictional representation of Glaswegian dialect, and brings to bear on that central issue techniques and concepts from linguistics and from the structure and history of -English. It also pays attention more tangentially to ideological and cultural connotations of matters of dialect.

A prominent feature of the dissertation is a characterisation - at all relevant linguistic levels - of the linguistic features of Glaswegian speech, and of the fictional representation of written Glaswegian (with accompanying close analyses of representative extracts).

The detailed contents of the thesis deal with the following topics: the relation between language varieties and their components, the different ideological evaluations of the standard variety, the discourse dimension of spoken and written language, the diachronic development of Standard English and Lowland Scots, a synchronic structural description of Glaswegian (including its representation in writing in relation to standard and Scots spelling), and a theoretical model for the analysis of written fictional Glaswegian The source material used for exemplification and analyses is drawn from a range of 201 century Glasgow novels and from some short stories.

There is an appendix of word lists. The thesis is also accompanied by materials incorporated in a loose leaf folder inside the back cover. These materials constitute a collection (for ease of reference) of all passages analysed throughout the thesis.