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List of dialects of English

List page for English dialects

Top 3 List of dialects of English related articles
1 Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways to refer to two different types of linguistic phenomena:
  • One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. Under this definition, the dialects or varieties of a particular language are closely related and, despite their differences, are most often largely mutually intelligible, especially if close to one another on the dialect continuum. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors, such as social class or ethnicity. A dialect that is associated with a particular social class can be termed a sociolect, a dialect that is associated with a particular ethnic group can be termed an ethnolect, and a geographical/regional dialect may be termed a regiolect. According to this definition, any variety of a given language can be classified as "a dialect", including any standardized varieties. In this case, the distinction between the "standard language" and the "nonstandard" (vernacular) dialects of the same language is often arbitrary and based on social, political, cultural, or historical considerations or prevalence and prominence. In a similar way, the definitions of the terms "language" and "dialect" may overlap and are often subject to debate, with the differentiation between the two classifications often grounded in arbitrary or sociopolitical motives. The term "dialect" is however sometimes restricted to mean "non-standard variety", particularly in non-specialist settings and non-English linguistic traditions.
  • The other usage of the term "dialect", specific to colloquial settings in a few countries like Italy, France and the Philippines, carries a pejorative undertone and underlines the politically and socially subordinated status of a non-national language to the country's single official language. In other words, these "dialects" are not actual dialects in the same sense as in the first usage, as they do not derive from the politically dominant language and are therefore not one of its varieties, but instead they evolved in a separate and parallel way and may thus better fit various parties’ criteria for a separate language. Despite this, these "dialects" may often be historically cognate and share genetic roots in the same subfamily as the dominant national language and may even, to a varying degree, share some mutual intelligibility with the latter. In this sense, unlike in the first usage, the national language would not itself be considered a "dialect", as it is the dominant language in a particular state, be it in terms of linguistic prestige, social or political status, predominance or prevalence, or all of the above. The term "dialect" used this way implies a political connotation, being mostly used to refer to low-prestige languages, languages lacking institutional support, or those perceived as "unsuitable for writing". The designation "dialect" is also used popularly to refer to the unwritten or non-codified languages of developing countries or isolated areas, where the term "vernacular language" would be preferred by linguists.
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2 Variety (linguistics)
In sociolinguistics, a variety, also called an isolect or lect, is a specific form of a language or language cluster. This may include languages, dialects, registers, styles, or other forms of language, as well as a standard variety. The use of the word "variety" to refer to the different forms avoids the use of the term language, which many people associate only with the standard language, and the term dialect, which is often associated with non-standard varieties thought of as less prestigious or "correct" than the standard. Linguists speak of both standard and non-standard (vernacular) varieties. "Lect" avoids the problem in ambiguous cases of deciding whether two varieties are distinct languages or dialects of a single language.More
3 Pronunciation
Pronunciation is the way in which a word or a language is spoken. This may refer to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds used in speaking a given word or language in a specific dialect or simply the way a particular individual speaks a word or language.More
  (Redirected from English dialects)
Further information: List of countries by English-speaking population

Dialects are linguistic varieties that may differ in pronunciation, vocabulary, spelling and grammar. For the classification of varieties of English only in terms of pronunciation, see regional accents of English.

List of dialects of English Intro articles: 5
1 Vocabulary
A vocabulary, also known as a wordstock or word-stock, is a set of familiar words within a person's language. A vocabulary, usually developed with age, serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge. Acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the largest challenges in learning a second language.More
2 Spelling
Spelling is a set of conventions that regulate the way of using graphemes to represent a language in its written form. In other words, spelling is the rendering of speech sound (phoneme) into writing (grapheme). Spelling is one of the elements of orthography, and highly standardized spelling is a prescriptive element.More
3 Grammar
In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraints, a field that includes domains such as phonology, morphology, and syntax, often complemented by phonetics, semantics, and pragmatics.More
4 English language
English is a West Germanic language first spoken in early medieval England, which has eventually become the leading language of international discourse in the 21st century. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the area of Great Britain that later took their name, England. Both names derive from Anglia, a peninsula on the Baltic Sea. English is most closely related to Frisian and Low Saxon, while its vocabulary has been significantly influenced by other Germanic languages, particularly Old Norse, as well as Latin and French.More
5 Regional accents of English
Spoken English shows great variation across regions where it is the predominant language. This article provides an overview of the numerous identifiable variations in pronunciation; such distinctions usually derive from the phonetic inventory of local dialects, as well as from broader differences in the Standard English of different primary-speaking populations.More

Overview

Dialects can be defined as "sub-forms of languages which are, in general, mutually comprehensible."[1] English speakers from different countries and regions use a variety of different accents (systems of pronunciation) as well as various localized words and grammatical constructions; many different dialects can be identified based on these factors. Dialects can be classified at broader or narrower levels: within a broad national or regional dialect, various more localised sub-dialects can be identified, and so on. The combination of differences in pronunciation and use of local words may make some English dialects almost unintelligible to speakers from other regions without any prior exposure.

The major native dialects of English are often divided by linguists into three general categories: the British Isles dialects, those of North America, and those of Australasia.[2] Dialects can be associated not only with place but also with particular social groups. Within a given English-speaking country, there is a form of the language considered to be Standard English: the Standard Englishes of different countries differ and can themselves be considered dialects. Standard English is often associated with the more educated layers of society as well as more formal registers.

British and American English are the reference norms for English as spoken, written, and taught in the rest of the world, excluding countries in which English is spoken natively such as Australia, Canada, Ireland, and New Zealand. In many former British Empire countries in which English is not spoken natively, British English forms are closely followed, alongside numerous American English usages that have become widespread throughout the English-speaking world. Conversely, in many countries historically influenced by the United States in which English is not spoken natively, American English forms are closely followed. Many of these countries, while retaining strong British English or American English influences, have developed their own unique dialects, which include Indian English and Philippine English.

Chief among other native English dialects are Canadian English and Australian English, which rank third and fourth in the number of native speakers. For the most part, Canadian English, while featuring numerous British forms, alongside indigenous Canadianisms, shares vocabulary, phonology and syntax with American English, which leads many to recognise North American English as an organic grouping of dialects.[3] Australian English, likewise, shares many American and British English usages, alongside plentiful features unique to Australia and retains a significantly higher degree of distinctiveness from both larger varieties than does Canadian English. South African English, New Zealand English and Irish English are also distinctive and rank fifth, sixth, and seventh in the number of native speakers.

List of dialects of English Overview articles: 23
1 Mutual intelligibility
In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between languages or dialects in which speakers of different but related varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. It is sometimes used as an important criterion for distinguishing languages from dialects, although sociolinguistic factors are often also used.More
2 Accent (sociolinguistics)
In sociolinguistics, an accent is a manner of pronunciation peculiar to a particular individual, location, or nation. An accent may be identified with the locality in which its speakers reside, the socioeconomic status of its speakers, their ethnicity, their caste or social class, or influence from their first language.More
3 British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands in the North Atlantic off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Hebrides and over six thousand smaller islands. They have a total area of 315,159 km2 (121,684 sq mi) and a combined population of almost 72 million, and include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Channel Islands, off the north coast of France, are sometimes taken to be part of the British Isles, even though they do not form part of the archipelago.More
4 North America
North America is a continent entirely within the Northern Hemisphere and almost all within the Western Hemisphere. It can also be described as the northern subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Caribbean Sea, and to the west and south by the Pacific Ocean. Because it is on the North American Tectonic Plate, Greenland is included as part of North America geographically.More
5 Australasia
Australasia is a region which comprises Australia, New Zealand, and some neighbouring islands. The term is used in a number of different contexts including geopolitically, physiogeographically, and ecologically where the term covers several slightly different but related regions.More
6 Standard English
In an English-speaking country, Standard English (SE) is the variety of English that has undergone substantial regularisation and is associated with formal schooling, language assessment, and official print publications, such as public service announcements and newspapers of record, etc. It is local to nowhere: its grammatical and lexical components are no longer regionally marked, although many of them originated in different, non-adjacent dialects, and it has very little of the variation found in spoken or earlier written varieties of English. According to Trudgill, Standard English is a dialect pre-eminently used in writing that is largely distinguishable from other English dialects by means of its grammar.More
7 Education
Education is the process of facilitating learning, or the acquisition of knowledge, skills, values, morals, beliefs, and habits. Educational methods include teaching, training, storytelling, discussion and directed research. Education frequently takes place under the guidance of educators, however learners can also educate themselves. Education can take place in formal or informal settings and any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts may be considered educational. The methodology of teaching is called pedagogy.More
8 Register (sociolinguistics)
In sociolinguistics, a register is a variety of language used for a particular purpose or in a particular communicative situation. For example, when speaking officially or in a public setting, an English speaker may be more likely to follow prescriptive norms for formal usage than in a casual setting: for example by pronouncing words ending in -ing with a velar nasal instead of an alveolar nasal, choosing words that are considered more "formal", and refraining from using words considered nonstandard, such as ain't.More
9 Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country by total area. Its population of nearly 26 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Australia's capital is Canberra, and its largest city is Sydney. The country's other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.More
10 Canada
Canada is a country in the northern part of North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering 9.98 million square kilometres, making it the world's second-largest country by total area. Its southern and western border with the United States, stretching 8,891 kilometres (5,525 mi), is the world's longest bi-national land border. Canada's capital is Ottawa, and its three largest metropolitan areas are Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.More
11 Republic of Ireland
Ireland, also known as the Republic of Ireland, is a country in north-western Europe occupying 26 of 32 counties of the island of Ireland. The capital and largest city is Dublin, which is located on the eastern side of the island. Around 40% of the country's population of 4.9 million people resides in the Greater Dublin Area. The sovereign state shares its only land border with Northern Ireland which is part of the United Kingdom. It is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, with the Celtic Sea to the south, St George's Channel to the south-east, and the Irish Sea to the east. It is a unitary, parliamentary republic. The legislature, the Oireachtas, consists of a lower house, Dáil Éireann, an upper house, Seanad Éireann, and an elected President who serves as the largely ceremonial head of state, but with some important powers and duties. The head of government is the Taoiseach, who is elected by the Dáil and appointed by the President; the Taoiseach in turn appoints other government ministers.More
12 New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island and the South Island —and more than 700 smaller islands, covering a total area of 268,021 square kilometres (103,500 sq mi). New Zealand is about 2,000 kilometres (1,200 mi) east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and 1,000 kilometres (600 mi) south of the islands of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. The country's varied topography and sharp mountain peaks, including the Southern Alps, owe much to tectonic uplift and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, and its most populous city is Auckland.More
13 British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts established by England between the late 16th and early 18th centuries. At its height it was the largest empire in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power. By 1913 the British Empire held sway over 412 million people, 23% of the world population at the time, and by 1925 it covered 35,000,000 km2 (13,500,000 sq mi), 24% of the Earth's total land area. As a result, its constitutional, legal, linguistic, and cultural legacy is widespread. At the peak of its power, it was described as "the empire on which the sun never sets", as the sun was always shining on at least one of its territories.More
14 English-speaking world
Over two billion people speak English, making English the largest language by number of speakers, and the third largest language by number of native speakers. The United Kingdom and the United States with 67 million and 330 million respectively, have the most native speakers. Additionally, there are 29 million in Canada, 25.7 million in Australia, 5 million in New Zealand, and 5 million in Ireland.More
15 Indian English
Indian English (IE) is a class of varieties of the English language spoken in India, and among the Indian diaspora elsewhere in the world. English is used by the Indian government for some communication as a supplement to Hindi, the country's "official language of the Union", enshrined in the Constitution. English is an official language of 7 states and 5 Union Territories and also additional official language of 7 states and 1 Union Territory. English is also the sole official language of the Judiciary of India, unless a state Governor or legislature mandates the use of regional language, or the President has given approval for the use of regional languages in courts. Indian English originated from British English but is used by more people. In his book The English Language (1990) David Crystal observed, "British English is now, numerically speaking, a minority dialect, compared with American, or even Indian English."More
16 Philippine English
Philippine English is any variety of English native to the Philippines, including those used by the media and the vast majority of educated Filipinos. English is taught in schools as one of the two official languages of the country, the other being Filipino (Tagalog). Due to the highly multilingual nature of the Philippines, code-switching such as Taglish and Bislish is prevalent across domains from casual settings to formal situations.More
17 Canadian English
Canadian English is the set of varieties of the English language native to Canada. According to the 2016 census, English was the first language of more than 19.4 million Canadians or 58.1% of the total population; the remainder of the population were native speakers of Canadian French (20.8%) or other languages (21.1%). A larger number, 28 million people, reported using English as their dominant language. Of Canadians outside the province of Quebec, 82% reported speaking English natively, but within Quebec the figure was just 7.5% as most of its residents are native speakers of Quebec French.More
18 Australian English
Australian English is the set of varieties of the English language native to Australia.More
19 English language
English is a West Germanic language first spoken in early medieval England, which has eventually become the leading language of international discourse in the 21st century. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the area of Great Britain that later took their name, England. Both names derive from Anglia, a peninsula on the Baltic Sea. English is most closely related to Frisian and Low Saxon, while its vocabulary has been significantly influenced by other Germanic languages, particularly Old Norse, as well as Latin and French.More
20 North American English
North American English is the most generalized variety of the English language as spoken in the United States and Canada. Because of their related histories and cultures, plus the similarities between the pronunciation (accent), vocabulary, and grammar of American English and Canadian English, the two spoken varieties are often grouped together under a single category. Canadians are generally tolerant of both British and American spellings, with British spellings being favored in more formal settings and in Canadian print media.More
21 South African English
South African English is the set of English dialects native to South Africans.More
22 New Zealand English
New Zealand English (NZE) is the variant of the English language spoken and written by most English-speaking New Zealanders. Its language code in ISO and Internet standards is en-NZ. English is the first language of the majority of the population.More
23 Hiberno-English
Hiberno-English or Irish English is the set of English dialects natively written and spoken within the island of Ireland.More

Europe

English language in Europe

Dialects and accents of English spoken in the British Isles.

United Kingdom

England

English language in England:

Scotland

Wales

Isle of Man

Channel Islands

Gibraltar

Ireland

Extinct

Continental Europe

English language in Europe:

The Netherlands

Germany

Scandinavia

Sweden

Norway

Finland

Denmark

Mainland Denmark
Greenland

List of dialects of English Europe articles: 84
1 English language in Europe
The English language in Europe, as a native language, is mainly spoken in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Outside of these states, it has official status in Malta, the Crown dependencies, Gibraltar and the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia. In the Kingdom of the Netherlands, English has an official status as a regional language on the isles of Saba and Sint Eustatius. In other parts of Europe, English is spoken mainly by those who have learnt it as a second language, but also, to a lesser extent, natively by some expatriates from some countries in the English-speaking world.More
2 British English
British English (BrE) is the standard dialect of the English language as spoken and written in the United Kingdom. Variations exist in formal, written English in the United Kingdom. For example, the adjective wee is almost exclusively used in parts of Scotland, North East England, Ireland, and occasionally Yorkshire, whereas the adjective little is predominant elsewhere. Nevertheless, there is a meaningful degree of uniformity in written English within the United Kingdom, and this could be described by the term British English. The forms of spoken English, however, vary considerably more than in most other areas of the world where English is spoken, and so a uniform concept of British English is more difficult to apply to the spoken language. According to Tom McArthur in the Oxford Guide to World English, British English shares "all the ambiguities and tensions in the word 'British' and as a result can be used and interpreted in two ways, more broadly or more narrowly, within a range of blurring and ambiguity".More
3 English language in England
The English language spoken and written in England encompasses a diverse range of accents and dialects. The dialect forms part of the broader British English, along with other varieties in the United Kingdom. Terms used to refer to the English language spoken and written in England include: English English, Anglo-English and British English in England.More
4 Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation, the Queen's/King's English or Oxford English is the accent traditionally regarded as the standard for British English. For over a century there has been argument over such issues as the definition of RP, whether it is geographically neutral, how many speakers there are, whether sub-varieties exist, how appropriate a choice it is as a standard and how the accent has changed over time. RP is an accent, so the study of RP is concerned only with matters of pronunciation; other areas relevant to the study of language standards such as vocabulary, grammar and style are not considered.More
5 English language in Northern England
The English language in Northern England has been shaped by the region's history of settlement and migration, and today encompasses a group of related dialects known as Northern England English. Historically, the strongest influence on the varieties of the English language spoken in Northern England was the Northumbrian dialect of Old English, but contact with Old Norse during the Viking Age and with Irish English following the Great Famine have produced new and distinctive styles of speech. Some "Northern" traits can be found further south than others: only conservative Northumbrian dialects retain the pre-Great Vowel Shift pronunciation of words such as town, but all northern accents lack the FOOT–STRUT split, and this trait extends a significant distance into the Midlands.More
6 Cheshire dialect
The Cheshire dialect is an Northern English dialect spoken in the county of Cheshire in North West England. It has similarities with the dialects of the surrounding counties of Merseyside, Greater Manchester, Staffordshire, Shropshire, and Derbyshire.More
7 Cumbrian dialect
The Cumberland dialect is a local Northern English dialect in decline, spoken in Cumberland, Westmorland and surrounding northern England, not to be confused with the area's extinct Celtic language, Cumbric. Some parts of Cumbria have a more North-East English sound to them. Whilst clearly spoken with a Northern English accent, it shares much vocabulary with Scots. A Cumbrian Dictionary of Dialect, Tradition and Folklore by William Rollinson exists, as well as a more contemporary and lighthearted Cumbrian Dictionary and Phrase Book.More
8 Cumbria
Cumbria is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's county town is Carlisle, in the north of the county; the only other major urban area is Barrow-in-Furness on the south-western tip of the county.More
9 Barrovian
Barrovian is an accent and dialect of English found in Barrow-in-Furness and several parts of the town's wider borough in Cumbria, England. Although technically a subgroup of the Cumbrian dialect, Barrovian is distinct in having more in common with the Lancashire dialect and influences of immigrant groups from across the northern regions of the British Isles.More
10 Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness is a town in Cumbria, North-West England. Historically part of Lancashire, it was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1867 and merged with Dalton-in-Furness Urban District in 1974 to form the Borough of Barrow-in-Furness. At the tip of the Furness peninsula, close to the Lake District, it is bordered by Morecambe Bay, the Duddon Estuary and the Irish Sea. In 2011, Barrow's population was 57,000, making it the second largest urban area in Cumbria after Carlisle. Natives of Barrow, as well as the local dialect, are known as Barrovian.More
11 Geordie
Geordie is a nickname for a person from the Tyneside area of North East England, and the dialect used by its inhabitants, also known in linguistics as Tyneside English or Newcastle English. There are different definitions of what constitutes a Geordie. The term is used and has been historically used to refer to the people of the North East. A Geordie can also specifically be a native of Tyneside and the surrounding areas. Not everyone from the North East of England identifies as a Geordie.More
12 Tyneside
Tyneside is a conurbation of the urban areas on the north and south banks of the River Tyne in North East England. Centred on Newcastle upon Tyne, it incorporates the surrounding metropolitan boroughs of Gateshead, North Tyneside and South Tyneside. The population of Tyneside as published in the 2011 census was 774,891, making it the eighth most-populous urban area in the United Kingdom. In 2013, the estimated population was 832,469 and since then has significantly increased. Tyneside is considered to be the core conurbation of the Tyneside-Wearside metropolitan area.More
13 Hartlepool

Hartlepool is a port town in the Borough of Hartlepool, of which it is the administrative centre, in County Durham, England.More
14 Lancashire dialect
The Lancashire dialect or accent is Northern England's vernacular speech in the English county of Lancashire. The region is notable for its tradition of poetry written in the dialect.More
15 Lancashire
Lancashire is a ceremonial county and geographical area in North West England. The ceremonial county's administrative centre is Preston, while Lancaster is still the county town. The borders of the ceremonial county were created by the Local Government Act 1972 and enclose a population of 1,449,300 and an area of 1,189 square miles (3,080 km2).More
16 Mackem
Mackem, Makem or Mak'em is the informal nickname for residents of and people from Sunderland, a city in North East England. It is also a name for the local accent ; and for a fan, whatever their origin, of Sunderland A.F.C. It has been used by the people of Sunderland to describe themselves since the 1980s, prior to which it was mainly used in Tyneside as a disparaging exonym. Prior to the 1980s, the people of Sunderland were known as Geordies, in common with the rest of the North East. An alternative name for a Mackem is a Wearsider.More
17 City of Sunderland
The City of Sunderland is a metropolitan borough with city status in Tyne and Wear, North East England. It is named after its largest settlement, Sunderland, but covers a far larger area which includes the towns of Hetton-le-Hole, Houghton-le-Spring, and Washington, as well as a range of suburban villages.More
18 Manchester dialect
Mancunian is the accent and dialect spoken in the majority of Manchester, North West England, and some of its environs. It is also given to the name of the people who live in the city of Manchester.More
19 Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; the third largest in England after Greater London and the West Midlands. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the cities of Manchester and Salford. Greater Manchester was created on 1 April 1974, as a result of the Local Government Act 1972, and designated a functional city region on 1 April 2011.More
20 Northumbrian dialect
The Northumbrian dialect refers to any of several English language varieties spoken in the historic English region of Northumbria, which includes most of present-day North East England. This may include such varieties as:
  • Northumbrian Old English, an Old English dialect from which Early Scots is descended
  • Geordie, perhaps the most famous dialect of English spoken in the region, largely spoken in Tyneside, centered on Newcastle
  • Mackem, a dialect of English spoken in Wearside, centred on Sunderland
  • Smoggie, a dialect spoken in Teesside; an area at the southern tip of region which straddles the border of Yorkshire and County Durham
  • Pitmatic, an older slang or lexicon used in mining towns in Northumberland and Durham
  • Northumbrian dialect, a disappearing English dialect or Anglic language variety spoken in the counties of Northumberland and Durham which is closely related to Scots and Cumbrian.
More
21 Northumberland
Northumberland is a ceremonial county and historic county in North East England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the west, County Durham and Tyne and Wear to the south and the Scottish Borders to the north. To the east is the North Sea coastline with a path 103 kilometres (64 mi) long. The county town is Alnwick. The county is administered as a unitary authority by Northumberland County Council, headquartered in Morpeth.More
22 County Durham
County Durham is a ceremonial county in North East England. The county town is Durham, a cathedral city. During the Middle Ages, the county was an ecclesiastical centre, due largely to the presence, of St Cuthbert's shrine in Durham Cathedral, and the extensive powers granted to the Bishop of Durham as ruler of the County Palatine of Durham.More
23 Pitmatic
Pitmatic, colloquially known as "yakka", is an English dialect used in Northumberland and Durham counties of England.More
24 Mining community
A mining community, also known as a mining town or a mining camp, is a community that houses miners. Mining communities are usually created around a mine or a quarry.More
25 Scouse
Scouse is an accent and dialect of English associated with Liverpool and the surrounding county of Merseyside. The Scouse accent is highly distinctive; having been influenced heavily by Irish, Norwegian, and Welsh immigrants who arrived via the Liverpool docks, it has little in common with the accents of its neighbouring regions or the rest of England. The accent is named after scouse, a stew eaten by sailors and locals.More
26 Merseyside
Merseyside is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in North West England, with a population of 1.38 million. It encompasses the metropolitan area centred on both banks of the lower reaches of the Mersey Estuary and comprises five metropolitan boroughs: Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton, Wirral and the city of Liverpool. Merseyside, which was created on 1 April 1974 as a result of the Local Government Act 1972, takes its name from the River Mersey.More
27 Teesside
Teesside is a conurbation around the River Tees in the north of England. The name was initially used as a county borough in the North Riding of Yorkshire. It is common to see Teesside incorrectly spelt as "Teeside", with a single 's'. The term was initially for a smaller area but has came to be used for larger built up area, with more settlements that are also on the side of the Tees.More
28 Yorkshire dialect
The Yorkshire dialect is a dialect spoken in the Yorkshire region of northern England. The dialect has roots in Old English and is influenced by Old Norse. The Yorkshire Dialect Society exists to promote use of the dialect in both humour and in serious linguistics; there is also an East Riding Dialect Society.More
29 East Midlands English
East Midlands English is a dialect, including local and social variations spoken in most parts of East Midlands England. It generally includes areas east of Watling Street, north of an isogloss separating it from variants of Southern English and East Anglian English, and south of another separating it from Northern English dialects. This includes the counties of Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Rutland and Northamptonshire. Dialects of northern Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire usually share similarities with Northern English dialects. Relative to other English dialects, there have been relatively few studies of East Midlands English.More
30 West Midlands English
West Midlands English is a group of dialects of the English language.More
31 Black Country dialect
The Black Country dialect is spoken by many people in the Black Country, a region covering most of the four Metropolitan Boroughs of Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall and Wolverhampton. It also influences the accents of towns and villages in the rural counties to the north, south and west of the region. It is distinct from the Brummie dialect, which originates from the neighbouring city of Birmingham.More
32 Brummie dialect
The Brummie dialect, or more formally the Birmingham dialect, is spoken by many people in Birmingham, England, and some of its surrounding areas. "Brummie" is also a demonym for people from Birmingham. It is often erroneously used in referring to all accents of the West Midlands, as it is markedly distinct from the traditional accent of the adjacent Black Country, but modern-day population mobility has tended to blur the distinction. For instance, Dudley-born comedian Lenny Henry, Walsall-born rock musician Noddy Holder, Smethwick-reared actress Julie Walters, Wollaston-born soap actress Jan Pearson and West Bromwich-born comedian Frank Skinner, are sometimes mistaken for Brummie-speakers by people outside the West Midlands county.More
33 Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands, England. It is the second-largest city, urban area and metropolitan area in England and the United Kingdom, with roughly 1.1 million inhabitants within the city area, 2.9 million inhabitants within the urban area and 3.7 million inhabitants within the metropolitan area and lies within the most populated English district. Birmingham is commonly referred to as the Second city of the United Kingdom.More
34 Potteries dialect
Potteries is an English dialect of the West Midlands of England, almost exclusively in and around Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire.More
35 Staffordshire
Staffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands County and Worcestershire to the south, and Shropshire to the west.More
36 East Anglian English
East Anglian English is a dialect of English spoken in East Anglia. East Anglian English has had a very considerable input into the formation of Standard English, and probably contributed to the development of American English; it has also experienced multilingualism on a remarkable scale. However, it has received little attention from the media and is not easily recognised by people from other parts of the UK. East Anglia is not easily defined as its boundaries are not uniformly agreed upon.More
37 Norfolk dialect
The Norfolk dialect, also known as Broad Norfolk, is a dialect spoken in the county of Norfolk in England. While less widely and purely spoken than in its heyday, the dialect and vocabulary can still be heard across the county, with some variations. It employs distinctively unique pronunciations, especially of vowels; and consistent grammatical forms that differ markedly from standard English.More
38 Suffolk dialect
The Suffolk dialect is a dialect spoken in the East Anglian county of Suffolk, England. Like many English dialects, it is rapidly disappearing, due to the advent of increasing social and geographical mobility and the influence of the media. Despite this, there are still many people who profess some knowledge of Suffolk dialect, and there is an increasing number of young speakers who have a distinctive Suffolk accent, if not a dialect.More
39 English language in southern England
English in southern England is the collective set of different dialects and accents of the English spoken in Southern England.More
40 Cockney
A Cockney is a certain type of Londoner: particularly, from the East End of London or, traditionally, born within the sound of Bow Bells. Cockney also commonly refers to the distinctive dialect of English used in those areas of London, and now elsewhere among the working class of the home counties.More
41 London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom. The city stands on the River Thames in the south-east of England, at the head of its 50-mile (80 km) estuary leading to the North Sea. London has been a major settlement for two millennia, and was originally called Londinium, which was founded by the Romans. The City of London, London's ancient core and financial centre—an area of just 1.12 square miles (2.9 km2) and colloquially known as the Square Mile—retains boundaries that closely follow its medieval limits. The adjacent City of Westminster has for centuries been the location of much of the national government. Thirty-one additional boroughs north and south of the river also comprise modern London. The London region is governed by the mayor of London and the London Assembly.More
42 Estuary English
Estuary English is an English accent associated with the area along the River Thames and its estuary, including London. Phonetician John C. Wells proposed a definition of Estuary English as "Standard English spoken with the accent of the southeast of England". Estuary English may be compared with Cockney, and there is some debate among linguists as to where Cockney speech ends and Estuary English begins.More
43 Essex
Essex is a county in the south-east of England, north-east of London. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south and London to the south-west. The county town is Chelmsford, the only city in the county. For the purposes of government statistics, Essex is placed in the East of England region.More
44 Estuary English
Estuary English is an English accent associated with the area along the River Thames and its estuary, including London. Phonetician John C. Wells proposed a definition of Estuary English as "Standard English spoken with the accent of the southeast of England". Estuary English may be compared with Cockney, and there is some debate among linguists as to where Cockney speech ends and Estuary English begins.More
45 Home counties
The home counties are the historic counties of England that surround London. The counties generally included are Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent, Middlesex, Surrey, and Sussex. Other counties more distant from London—such as Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Hampshire and Oxfordshire—are also sometimes regarded as home counties due to their proximity to London and their connection to the London regional economy.More
46 Hampshire
Hampshire is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Winchester, England's former capital city. Its two largest cities, Southampton and Portsmouth, are administered separately as unitary authorities and the rest of the county is governed by a combination of Hampshire County Council and non-metropolitan borough councils.More
47 Portsmouth
Portsmouth is a port city primarily built on Portsea Island in the county of Hampshire, South East England. It is also known colloquially as Pompey, a nickname shared with HMNB Portsmouth and the Portsmouth Football Club. It is the United Kingdom's only island city. Portsmouth is situated 70 miles (110 km) south-west of London and 19 miles (31 km) south-east of Southampton. Portsmouth's population was recorded as 205,100 in the 2011 UK Census. The city forms part of the South Hampshire conurbation.More
48 Estuary English
Estuary English is an English accent associated with the area along the River Thames and its estuary, including London. Phonetician John C. Wells proposed a definition of Estuary English as "Standard English spoken with the accent of the southeast of England". Estuary English may be compared with Cockney, and there is some debate among linguists as to where Cockney speech ends and Estuary English begins.More
49 Kent
Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west. The county also shares borders with Essex along the estuary of the River Thames, and with the French department of Pas-de-Calais through the Channel Tunnel. The county town is Maidstone.More
50 Multicultural London English
Multicultural London English is a sociolect of English that emerged in the late twentieth century. It is spoken authentically by mainly young working class people in London.More
51 Sussex dialect
The Sussex dialect is a dialect that was once widely spoken by those living in the historic county of Sussex in southern England. Much of the distinctive vocabulary of the Sussex dialect has now died out, although a few words remain in common usage and some individuals still speak with the traditional Sussex accent.More
52 West Country English
West Country English is a group of English language varieties and accents used by much of the native population of South West England, the area sometimes popularly known as the West Country.More
53 Cornish dialect
The Cornish dialect is a dialect of English spoken in Cornwall by Cornish people. Dialectal English spoken in Cornwall is to some extent influenced by Cornish grammar, and often includes words derived from the Cornish language. The Cornish language is a Celtic language of the Brythonic branch, as are the Welsh and Breton languages. In addition to the distinctive words and grammar, there are a variety of accents found within Cornwall from the north coast to that of the south coast and from east to west Cornwall. Typically, the accent is more divergent from Standard British English the further west through Cornwall one travels. The speech of the various parishes being to some extent different from the others was described by John T. Tregellas and Thomas Quiller Couch towards the end of the 19th century. Tregellas wrote of the differences as he understood them and Couch suggested the parliamentary constituency boundary between the East and West constituencies, from Crantock to Veryan, as roughly the border between eastern and western dialects. To this day, the towns of Bodmin and Lostwithiel as well as Bodmin Moor are considered the boundary.More
54 Janner
Janner is an English regional nickname associated with Plymouth both as a noun and as an adjective for the local accent and colloquialisms. In 1987 Cyril Tawney, in his book Grey Funnel Lines, described its meaning as "a person from Devon", deriving from Cousin Jan, but "more particularly in naval circles anyone from the Plymouth area".More
55 Dorset dialect
The Dorset dialect is the traditional dialect spoken in Dorset, a county in the West Country of England. Stemming from Proto-Norse and Saxon, it is preserved in the isolated Blackmore Vale, despite it somewhat falling into disuse throughout the earlier part of the 20th century, when the arrival of the railways brought the customs and language of other parts of the country and in particular, London. The rural dialect is still spoken in some villages however and is kept alive in the poems of William Barnes and Robert Young.More
56 Scottish English
Scottish English is the set of varieties of the English language spoken in Scotland. The transregional, standardised variety is called Scottish Standard English or Standard Scottish English (SSE). Scottish Standard English may be defined as "the characteristic speech of the professional class [in Scotland] and the accepted norm in schools". IETF language tag for "Scottish Standard English" is en-scotland.More
57 Highland English
Highland English or Highland and Island English is the variety of Scottish English spoken by many in the Scottish Highlands and the Hebrides. It is more strongly influenced by Gaelic than other forms of Scottish English.More
58 Welsh English
Welsh English comprises the dialects of English spoken by Welsh people. The dialects are significantly influenced by Welsh grammar and often include words derived from Welsh. In addition to the distinctive words and grammar, a variety of accents are found across Wales, including those of North Wales, the Cardiff dialect, the South Wales Valleys and West Wales.More
59 Abercraf English
Abercraf English is a dialect of Welsh English, primarily spoken in the village of Abercraf, located in the far south of the county Powys.More
60 Anglesey
Anglesey, an island off the north-west coast of Wales, forms the principal area and historic county of that name. It includes Holy Island to the west and some islets and skerries. Anglesey island, at 260 square miles (673 km2), is by far the largest in Wales, the seventh largest in the British Isles, largest in the Irish Sea and the second most populous after the Isle of Man. The area administered by Isle of Anglesey County Council measures 276 square miles (715 km2), with a 2011 census population of 69,751, including 13,659 on Holy Island, across the narrow Cymyran Strait from the main island. The Menai Strait between Anglesey and mainland Wales is spanned by the Menai Suspension Bridge, designed by Thomas Telford in 1826, and the Britannia Bridge, built in 1850 and replaced in 1980. The largest town is Holyhead on Holy Island, whose port handles over 2 million passengers a year to and from Ireland. The next largest is Llangefni, the county council seat. From 1974 to 1996 Anglesey formed part of Gwynedd. Most Anglesey inhabitants are habitual Welsh speakers. The name Ynys Môn is used for the UK Parliament and Senedd constituencies. The island's postcodes are LL58–LL78.More
61 Cardiff English
The Cardiff accent, also known as Cardiff English, is the regional accent of English, and a variety of Welsh English, as spoken in and around the city of Cardiff, and is somewhat distinctive in Wales, compared with other Welsh accents. Its pitch is described as somewhat lower than that of Received Pronunciation, whereas its intonation is closer to dialects of England rather than Wales.More
62 Gower dialect
The Gower dialect refers to the older vocabulary or slang of the Gower Peninsula on the south Wales coast. It was Normanised/Anglicised relatively early after the Norman conquest of England. Relatively cut off from the Welsh hinterland, but with coastal links across south Wales and the West Country, the region developed their distinct English dialect which endured to within living memory.More
63 Gwynedd
Gwynedd is a county in Wales, sharing borders with Powys, Conwy, Denbighshire, Anglesey over the Menai Strait, and Ceredigion over the River Dyfi. The scenic Llŷn Peninsula and most of Snowdonia National Park are in Gwynedd. Bangor is the home of Bangor University.More
64 Port Talbot English
Port Talbot English (PTE) is a variety of Welsh English spoken in Port Talbot, generally by the working class.More
65 Wrexham
Wrexham is a large market town and the administrative centre of the Wrexham County Borough in Wales, United Kingdom. Wrexham is located between the Welsh mountains and the lower Dee Valley alongside the neighbouring county of Cheshire. Historically part of Denbighshire, the town became part of Clwyd in 1974 and since 1996 has been the principal centre of Wrexham County Borough.More
66 Manx English
Manx English, or Anglo-Manx, is the historic dialect of English spoken on the Isle of Man, though today in decline. It has many borrowings from Manx, a Goidelic language, and it differs widely from any other variety of English, including dialects from other areas in which Celtic languages are or were spoken, such as Welsh English and Hiberno-English.More
67 Channel Island English
Channel Island English refers to Alderney English, Guernsey English and Jersey English and similar dialects of English found in the other Channel Islands.More
68 Gibraltarian English
Gibraltarian English denotes the accent of English spoken in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. The English language has been present at Gibraltar for approximately 300 years, and during these centuries English has mixed with diverse languages, particularly Andalusian Spanish. Gibraltarian English has become a subject of study for linguists interested in how English and other languages mix. While the primary language of Gibraltarians is a variety of Andalusian Spanish called Llanito or Yanito, Gibraltarian English is becoming more prominent, and there has been a theory proposed that this variety of English is becoming "nativised". Gibraltarian English is similar in many respects to British English, particularly southern varieties.More
69 Hiberno-English
Hiberno-English or Irish English is the set of English dialects natively written and spoken within the island of Ireland.More
70 Ulster
Ulster is one of the four traditional Irish provinces, in the north of Ireland. It is made up of nine counties: six of these constitute Northern Ireland ; the remaining three are in the Republic of Ireland.More
71 Ulster Scots dialect
Ulster Scots or Ulster-Scots, also known as Ulster Scotch, Scots-Irish and Ullans, is the language of the Scots spoken in parts of Ulster in Ireland. It is generally considered a dialect or group of dialects of Scots, although groups such as the Ulster-Scots Language Society and Ulster-Scots Academy consider it a language in its own right, and the Ulster-Scots Agency and former Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure have used the term Ulster-Scots language.More
72 Leinster
Leinster is one of the provinces of Ireland, situated in the east of Ireland. The Leinster province comprises the ancient Kingdoms of Meath, Leinster and Osraige. Following the 12th-century Norman invasion of Ireland, the historic fifths of Leinster and Meath gradually merged, mainly due to the impact of the Pale, which straddled both, thereby forming the present-day province of Leinster. The ancient kingdoms were shired into a number of counties for administrative and judicial purposes. In later centuries, local government legislation has seen further sub-division of the historic counties.More
73 Connacht
Connacht, formerly spelled Connaught, is one of the provinces of Ireland, in the west of Ireland. Until the ninth century it consisted of several independent major Gaelic kingdoms.More
74 Munster
Munster is one of the provinces of Ireland, in the south of Ireland. In early Ireland, the Kingdom of Munster was one of the kingdoms of Gaelic Ireland ruled by a "king of over-kings". Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the ancient kingdoms were shired into counties for administrative and judicial purposes. In later centuries, local government legislation has seen further sub-division of the historic counties.More
75 Forth and Bargy dialect
The Forth and Bargy dialect, also known as Yola, is an extinct Anglic language once spoken in the baronies of Forth and Bargy in County Wexford, Ireland. It is thought to have evolved from Middle English, which was brought to Ireland during the Norman invasion, beginning in 1169. As such, it was similar to the Fingallian dialect of the Fingal area. Both became extinct in the 19th century, when they were replaced by modern Hiberno-English. The name "Yola" means "old" in the dialect.More
76 Middle English
Middle English was a form of the English language spoken after the Norman conquest (1066) until the late 15th century. English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English period. Scholarly opinion varies, but the Oxford English Dictionary specifies the period when Middle English was spoken as being from 1150 to 1500. This stage of the development of the English language roughly followed the High to the Late Middle Ages.More
77 County Wexford
County Wexford is a county in Ireland. It is in the province of Leinster and is part of the South-East Region. Named after the town of Wexford, it was based on the historic Gaelic territory of Hy Kinsella, whose capital was Ferns. Wexford County Council is the local authority for the county. The population of the county was 149,722 at the 2016 census.More
78 Fingallian
Fingallian or the Fingal dialect is an extinct Anglic language formerly spoken in Fingal, Ireland. It is thought to have been an offshoot of Middle English, which was brought to Ireland during the Norman invasion, and was extinct by the mid-19th century. Although little is known of Fingallian, it is thought to have been similar to the Forth and Bargy dialect of County Wexford.More
79 Fingal
Fingal is a county in Ireland. It is located in the province of Leinster and, within that, is part of the Dublin Region. Its name is derived from the medieval territory of Scandinavian foreigners that settled in the area. Fingal County Council is the local authority for the county. In 2016 the population of the county was 296,214, making it the second-most populous county in the state.More
80 Euro English
Euro English or European English, less commonly known as EU English and EU Speak, is a pidgin dialect of English based on common mistranslations and the technical jargon of the European Union and the native languages of its non-native English speaking population. It is mostly used among EU staff, expatriates from EU countries, young international travellers, European diplomats, and sometimes by other Europeans that use English as a second or foreign language.More
81 English in the Netherlands
English in the Netherlands, according to research, can be spoken by 90% to 93% of the Dutch population. According to some, the main reasons for the high degree of English speakers is the country's small size, dependence on international trade, and the use of subtitles for foreign languages on television, rather than audio dubbing. Dutch's genealogical proximity to English is also noted as a significant factor since both languages are closely related West Germanic languages. Occupations that require a complex knowledge of English, such as those in aviation and the sciences, are also abundant in the Netherlands. Furthermore, it is an official and the majority language in the Caribbean municipalities of Saba and Sint Eustatius.More
82 Languages of Germany
The official language of Germany is Standard German, with over 95 percent of the country speaking Standard German or German dialects as their first language. This figure includes speakers of Northern Low Saxon, a recognized minority or regional language that is not considered separately from Standard German in statistics. Recognized minority languages have official status as well, usually in their respective regions.More
83 Languages of Sweden
Swedish is the official language of Sweden and is spoken by the vast majority of the 10 million inhabitants of the country. It is a North Germanic language and quite similar to its sister Scandinavian languages, Danish and Norwegian, with which it maintains partial mutual intelligibility and forms a dialect continuum. A number of regional Swedish dialects are spoken across the county. In total, more than 200 languages are estimated to be spoken across the county, including regional languages, indigenous Sámi languages, and immigrant languages.More
84 Languages of Greenland
The official language of Greenland is Greenlandic. The number of speakers of Greenlandic is estimated at 50,000, divided in three main dialects, Kalaallisut, Tunumiit and Inuktun. The remainder of the population mainly speaks Danish; Greenlandic Sign Language is the language of the deaf community.More

North America

Dialects of English spoken in Canada and the United States. 1. Standard Canadian English
2. Western American English
3. North-Central American ("Upper Midwest") English
4. Inland Northern American ("Great Lakes") English
5. Midland American English
6. Southern American English
6a. Texan English
6b. Inland Southern American ("Appalachian") English
7. Western Pennsylvania ("Pittsburgh") English
8. Mid-Atlantic American ("Baltimore" and "Philadelphia") English
9. New York City English
10. Southwestern New England English
11. Southeastern New England ("Rhode Island") English
12. Northwestern New England ("Vermont") English
13. Northeastern New England ("Boston" and "Maine") English
14. Atlantic Canadian English

North American English

United States

American English:

Canada

Canadian English:

List of dialects of English North America articles: 54
1 American English
American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. Currently, American English is the most influential form of English worldwide.More
2 African-American English
African-American English (AAE), also known as Black English in American linguistics, is the set of English sociolects primarily spoken by most black people in the United States and many in Canada; most commonly, it refers to a dialect continuum ranging from African-American Vernacular English to a more standard English. Like other widely spoken languages, African-American English shows variation such as in vernacular versus standard forms, stylistic variation, rural versus urban characteristics, variation based on geography, and other types of variation. There has been a significant body of African-American literature and oral tradition for centuries.More
3 Ebonics (word)
Ebonics is a term that was originally intended to refer to the language of all people descended from enslaved Black Africans, particularly in West Africa, the Caribbean, and North America. Since the 1996 controversy over its use by the Oakland School Board, the term Ebonics has primarily been used to refer to the sociolect African American English, a dialect distinctively different from Standard American English.More
4 African-American Vernacular English
African-American Vernacular English, also referred to as Black Vernacular, Black English Vernacular (BEV), Black Vernacular English (BVE), occasionally as Ebonics, or simply as Black English (BE), is the variety of English natively spoken, particularly in urban communities, by most working- and middle-class African Americans and Black Canadians.More
5 Boontling
Boontling is a jargon or argot spoken only in Boonville in Northern California. Today it is nearly extinct, and fewer than 100 people still speak it. It has an IANA sub-tag of boont.More
6 Cajun English
Cajun English, or Cajun Vernacular English, is the dialect of English spoken by Cajuns living in Southern Louisiana. Cajun English is significantly influenced by Louisiana French, the historical language of the Cajun people, a subset of Louisiana Creoles—although many today prefer not to identify as such—who descend largely from the Acadian people expelled from the Maritime provinces during Le Grand Dérangement. It is derived from Louisiana French and is on the list of dialects of the English language for North America. Louisiana French differs, sometimes markedly, from Metropolitan French in terms of pronunciation and vocabulary, partially due to unique features in the original settlers' dialects and partially because of the long isolation of Louisiana Creoles from the greater francophone world.More
7 Chicano English
Chicano English, or Mexican-American English, is a dialect of American English spoken primarily by Mexican Americans, particularly in the Southwestern United States ranging from Texas to California, as well as in Chicago. Chicano English is sometimes mistakenly conflated with Spanglish, which is a mixing of Spanish and English; Chicano English is a fully formed and native dialect of English, not a "learner English" or interlanguage. It is even the native dialect of some speakers who know little to no Spanish.More
8 Miami accent
The Miami accent is an evolving American English accent or sociolect spoken in South Florida, particularly in Miami-Dade county, originating from central Miami. The Miami accent is most prevalent in American-born Hispanic youth who live in the Greater Miami area.More
9 New York Latino English
The English language as primarily spoken by Hispanic Americans on the East Coast of the United States demonstrates considerable influence from New York City English and African American Vernacular English, with certain additional features borrowed from the Spanish language. Though not currently confirmed to be a single stabilized dialect, this variety has received some attention in the academic literature, being recently labelled New York Latino English, referring to its city of nineteenth-century origin, or, more inclusively, East Coast Latino English. In the 1970s scholarship, the variety was more narrowly called (New York) Puerto Rican English or Nuyorican English. The variety originated with Puerto Ricans moving to New York City after World War I, though particularly in the subsequent generations born in the New York dialect region who were native speakers of both English and often Spanish. Today, it covers the English of many Hispanic Americans of diverse national heritages, not simply Puerto Ricans, in the New York metropolitan area and beyond along the northeastern coast of the United States.More
10 Pennsylvania Dutch English
Pennsylvania Dutch English is a dialect of English that has been influenced by the Pennsylvania German language. It is largely spoken in South Central Pennsylvania, both by people who are monolingual and bilingual. The dialect has been dying out, as non-Amish younger Pennsylvania Germans tend to speak General American English. Very few non-Amish members of these people can speak the Pennsylvania German language, although most know some words and phrases. The World War II Generation was the last generation in which Pennsylvania Dutch was widely spoken outside the Old Order Amish and Old Order Mennonite communities.More
11 Yeshivish
Yeshivish, also known as Yeshiva English, Yeshivisheh Shprach, or Yeshivisheh Reid, is a sociolect of English spoken by Yeshiva students and other Jews with a strong connection to the Orthodox Yeshiva world.More
12 General American English
General American English or General American is the umbrella accent of American English spoken by a majority of Americans and widely perceived, among Americans, as lacking any distinctly regional, ethnic, or socioeconomic characteristics. In reality, it encompasses a continuum of accents rather than a single unified accent. Americans with high education, or from the North Midland, Western New England, and Western regions of the country, are the most likely to be perceived as having "General American" accents. The precise definition and usefulness of the term "General American" continue to be debated, and the scholars who use it today admittedly do so as a convenient basis for comparison rather than for exactness. Other scholars prefer the term Standard American English.More
13 Appalachian English
Appalachian English is American English native to the Appalachian mountain region of the Eastern United States. Historically, the term "Appalachian dialect" refers to a local English variety of southern Appalachia, also known as Smoky Mountain English or Southern Mountain English in the United States, both influential upon and influenced by the Southern U.S. regional dialect, which has become predominant in central and southern Appalachia today, while a Western Pennsylvania regional dialect has become predominant in northern Appalachia. The 2006 Atlas of North American English identifies the "Inland South,” a dialect sub-region in which the Southern U.S. dialect's defining vowel shift is the most developed, as centering squarely in southern Appalachia: namely, the cities of Knoxville and Chattanooga, Tennessee; Birmingham, Alabama; and Asheville, North Carolina. All Appalachian English is rhotic and characterized by distinct phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon. It is mostly oral but its features are also sometimes represented in literary works.More
14 New England English
New England English collectively refers to the various distinct dialects and varieties of American English originating in the New England area. Most of eastern and central New England once spoke the "Yankee dialect", and many of those accent features still remain in eastern New England, such as "R-dropping". Accordingly, one linguistic division of New England is into Eastern versus Western New England English, as defined in the 1939 Linguistic Atlas of New England and the 2006 Atlas of North American English (ANAE). The ANAE further argues for a division between Northern versus Southern New England English, especially on the basis of the cot–caught merger and fronting. The ANAE also categorizes the strongest differentiated New England accents into four combinations of the above dichotomies, simply defined as follows:
  • Northeastern New England English shows non-rhoticity, the cot–caught merger, and strong fronting. It centers on Boston, Massachusetts, extending into New Hampshire and coastal Maine.
  • Southeastern New England English shows non-rhoticity, no cot–caught merger, and no strong fronting. It centers on Providence, Rhode Island and the Narragansett Bay.
  • Northwestern New England English shows rhoticity, the cot–caught merger, and strong fronting. It centers on Vermont.
  • Southwestern New England English shows rhoticity, no cot–caught merger, and no strong fronting. It centers around the Hartford-Springfield area of Connecticut and western Massachusetts.
More
15 Eastern New England English
Eastern New England English, historically known as the Yankee dialect since at least the nineteenth century, is the traditional regional dialect of Maine, New Hampshire, and the eastern half of Massachusetts. Features of this variety once spanned an even larger dialect area of New England, for example, including the eastern halves of Vermont and Connecticut for those born as late as the early twentieth century. Studies vary as to whether the unique dialect of Rhode Island technically falls within the Eastern New England dialect region.More
16 Boston accent
A Boston accent is a local accent of Eastern New England English native specifically to the city of Boston and its suburbs. Northeastern New England English is classified as traditionally including New Hampshire, Maine, and all of eastern Massachusetts, though some uniquely local vocabulary appears only around Boston. Some traditional Boston accent characteristics may be retreating, particularly among younger residents, but Linguist William Labov claims that, in the twenty-first century, the accent remains relatively stable, though subsequent research suggests it is increasingly becoming limited to the historically Irish-American neighborhood of South Boston.More
17 Maine accent
The Maine accent is Eastern New England English spoken in parts of Maine, especially along the "Down East" and "Mid Coast" seaside regions. It is characterized by a variety of features, particularly among older speakers, including r-dropping (non-rhoticity), resistance to the horse–hoarse merger, a deletion or "breaking" of certain syllables, and some unique vocabulary. This traditional Maine accent is rapidly declining; a 2013 study of Portland speakers found the horse–hoarse merger to be currently embraced by all ages; however, it also found the cot–caught merger to be resisted, despite the latter being typical among other Eastern New England speakers, even well-reported in the 1990s in Portland itself. It also widely reported elsewhere in Maine, particularly outside the urban areas. In the northern region of Maine along the Quebec border, Franco-Americans may show French-language influences in their English.More
18 Mid-Atlantic American English
Mid-Atlantic American English, Middle Atlantic American English, or Delaware Valley English is a class of American English, considered by The Atlas of North American English to be a single dialect, spoken in the southeastern part of the Mid-Atlantic United States and especially the Delaware Valley, comprising the Philadelphia and Baltimore subsets of English. The dialect is found throughout southeastern Pennsylvania, South Jersey, some southern parts of Central Jersey, Delaware, and eastern and especially northeast Maryland.More
19 Baltimore accent
A Baltimore accent, also known as Baltimorese, commonly refers to an accent that originates among blue-collar residents of South and Southeast Baltimore, Maryland. It is a sub-variety of Mid-Atlantic American English, as is nearby Philadelphia English.More
20 Philadelphia English
Philadelphia English is a variety or dialect of American English native to Philadelphia and extending into Philadelphia's metropolitan area throughout the Delaware Valley and South Jersey, including Atlantic City and Wilmington, Delaware. Philadelphia English is one of the best-studied types of English, as Philadelphia's University of Pennsylvania is the home institution of pioneering sociolinguist William Labov. Philadelphia English shares certain features with New York City English and Midland American English, although it is a distinct dialect. The closest relative of the Philadelphia accent is the Baltimore accent, both of which constitute what Labov describes as a single "Mid-Atlantic" regional dialect.More
21 Midland American English
Midland American English is a regional dialect or super-dialect of American English, geographically lying between the traditionally-defined Northern and Southern United States. The boundaries of Midland American English are not entirely clear and are revised and reduced by linguists because of definitional changes and several Midland sub-regions undergoing rapid and diverging pronunciation shifts that have occurred since the early 20th century.More
22 High Tider
High Tider or Hoi Toider is a dialect of American English spoken in very limited communities of the South Atlantic United States, particularly several small island and coastal townships in the rural North Carolina "Down East" that encompasses the Outer Banks and Pamlico Sound as well as in the Chesapeake Bay. High Tider dialect has been observed by locals as far west as Bertie County, North Carolina. The term is also a local nickname for any native resident of these regions.More
23 New Orleans English
New Orleans English is American English native to the city of New Orleans and its metropolitan area. Native English speakers of the region actually speak a number of varieties, including: the variety most recently brought in and spreading since the 20th century among white communities of the South in general ; the variety primarily spoken by black residents ; the variety spoken by Cajuns in southern Louisiana ; the variety traditionally spoken by affluent white residents of the city's Uptown and Garden District; and the variety traditionally spoken by lower middle- and working-class white residents of Eastern New Orleans, particularly the Ninth Ward. However, only the last two varieties are unique to New Orleans and are typically those referred to in the academic research as "New Orleans English". These two varieties specific to New Orleans likely developed around the turn of the nineteenth century and most noticeably combine speech features commonly associated with both New York City English and, to a lesser extent, Southern U.S. English. The noticeably New York-like characteristics include the NYC-like short-a split, non-rhoticity, th-stopping, and the recently disappearing coil–curl merger. Noticeably Southern characteristics include the fronting of and possible monophthongization of.More
24 Southern American English
Southern American English or Southern U.S. English is a regional dialect or collection of dialects of American English spoken throughout the Southern United States, though increasingly in more rural areas and primarily by White Southerners. In terms of accent, its strongest forms include southern varieties of Appalachian English and certain varieties of Texan English. Popularly known in the United States as a Southern accent or simply Southern, Southern American English now comprises the largest American regional accent group by number of speakers. Formal, much more recent terms within American linguistics include Southern White Vernacular English and Rural White Southern English.More
25 Texan English
Texan English is the array of American English dialects spoken in Texas, primarily falling under Southern U.S. English. As one nationwide study states, the typical Texan accent is a "Southern accent with a twist". The "twist" refers to inland Southern U.S., older coastal Southern U.S., and South Midland U.S. accents mixing together, due to Texas's settlement history, as well as some lexical (vocabulary) influences from Mexican Spanish. In fact, there is no single accent that covers all of Texas and few dialect features are unique to Texas alone. The newest and most developed Southern U.S. accent features are best reported in Lubbock, Odessa, Houston and variably Dallas, though general features of the dialect are found throughout the state, with several exceptions: Abilene and somewhat Austin, Corpus Christi, and El Paso appear to align more with Midland U.S. accents than Southern ones.More
26 New York City English
New York City English, or Metropolitan New York English, is a regional dialect of American English spoken by many people in New York City and much of its surrounding metropolitan area. Described by sociolinguist William Labov as the most recognizable dialect in North America, the dialect is known through its association in the media with many public figures and fictional characters. Its features are most densely concentrated in New York City proper and its immediate suburbs, but they also extend somewhat to the wider metropolitan area and the New York City diaspora in other regions.More
27 Northern American English
Northern American English or Northern U.S. English is a class of historically related American English dialects, spoken by predominantly white Americans, best documented in the greater metropolitan areas of Connecticut, Western Massachusetts, Western and Central New York, Northern Ohio, Northern Illinois, Wisconsin, the Lower Peninsula of Michigan, and Eastern South Dakota, plus Northern New Jersey, Northeastern Pennsylvania, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The North as a super-dialect region is considered, by the 2006 Atlas of North American English (ANAE), at its core, to consist of the dialects of the Inland North and Southwestern New England.More
28 Inland Northern American English
Inland Northern (American) English, also known in American linguistics as the Inland North or Great Lakes dialect, is an American English dialect spoken primarily by White Americans in a geographic band reaching from the major urban areas of Upstate New York westward along the Erie Canal and through much of the U.S. Great Lakes region, as far west as eastern Iowa and certain demographics in the Twin Cities, Minnesota. The most distinctive Inland Northern accents are spoken in Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse. Features of the Inland Northern accent have also infiltrated a geographic corridor from Chicago southwest along historic Route 66 into St. Louis, Missouri; today, the corridor shows a mixture of both Inland North and Midland American accents. Linguists often characterize the western Great Lakes region's dialect separately as North-Central American English.More
29 Chicago
Chicago, officially the City of Chicago, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois, and the third most populous city in the United States. With an estimated population of 2,693,976 in 2019, it is also the most populous city in the Midwestern United States. Chicago is the county seat of Cook County, the second most populous county in the U.S., while a small portion of the city's O'Hare Airport also extends into DuPage County. Chicago is the principal city of the Chicago metropolitan area, defined as either the U.S. Census Bureau's Metropolitan Statistical Area or the Combined Statistical Area, often called Chicagoland. It constitutes the third most populous urban area in the United States after New York City and Los Angeles.More
30 Cleveland
Cleveland, officially the City of Cleveland, is a major city in the U.S. state of Ohio, and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. It is located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. maritime border with Canada and approximately 60 miles west of the Ohio-Pennsylvania state border.More
31 Detroit
Detroit is the largest and most-populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan, the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of Wayne County. The municipality of Detroit had a 2019 estimated population of 670,031, making it the 24th-most populous city in the United States. The metropolitan area, known as Metro Detroit, is home to 4.3 million people, making it the second-largest in the Midwest after the Chicago metropolitan area, and 14th-largest in the United States. Regarded as a major cultural center, Detroit is known for its contributions to music and as a repository for art, architecture and design, along with its historical automotive background.More
32 Milwaukee
Milwaukee is the largest city in the state of Wisconsin and the fifth-largest city in the Midwestern United States. The seat of Milwaukee County, the city is located on Lake Michigan's southwestern shore and was incorporated in 1846. As of the U.S. Census Bureau's July 1, 2019 estimate, Milwaukee had a population of 590,157, making it the 31st largest city in the United States and the fourth-largest city situated along one of the Great Lakes. It is the main cultural and economic center of the Milwaukee metropolitan area, the fourth-most densely populated metropolitan area in the Midwest. Milwaukee is considered a "Gamma −" global city as categorized by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network with a regional GDP of over $107 billion.More
33 Western New York
Western New York is the westernmost region of the state of New York. It includes the cities of Buffalo, Rochester, Niagara Falls, Jamestown and the surrounding suburbs, as well as the outlying rural areas of the Great Lakes lowlands and Niagara Frontier, the Genesee Valley, and Chautauqua-Alleghany The historic beginnings of the region can be defined by its original eastern boundary of Preemption Line, created by the December 16, 1786 political settlement between the states of New York and Massachusetts, both of which claimed political dominion over the land. This eastern boundary shifted because of changing county borders in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.More
34 Lower Peninsula of Michigan
The Lower Peninsula of Michigan – also known as Lower Michigan – is the southern and less elevated of the two major landmasses that make up the U.S. state of Michigan, the other being the Upper Peninsula. It is surrounded by water on all sides except its southern border, which it shares with Indiana and Ohio. Although the Upper Peninsula is commonly referred to as "the U.P.", it is uncommon for the Lower Peninsula to be called "the L.P."More
35 Great Lakes region
The Great Lakes region of North America is a bi-national Canadian–American region that includes portions of the eight U.S. states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin as well as the Canadian province of Ontario. Quebec is at times included as part of the region because, although it is not in a Great Lake watershed, it is in the St. Lawrence watershed which is part of a continuous hydrologic system that includes the Great Lakes and eventually discharges into the Atlantic Ocean. The region centers on the Great Lakes and forms a distinctive historical, economic, and cultural identity. A portion of the region also encompasses the Great Lakes Megalopolis.More
36 Western New England English
Western New England English refers to the varieties of New England English native to Vermont, Connecticut, and the western half of Massachusetts; New York State's Hudson Valley also aligns to this classification. Sound patterns historically associated with Western New England English include the features of rhoticity, the horse–hoarse merger, and the father–bother merger, none of which are features traditionally shared in neighboring Eastern New England English. The status of the cot–caught merger in Western New England is inconsistent, being complete in the north of this dialect region (Vermont), but incomplete or absent in the south, with a "cot–caught approximation" in the middle area.More
37 North-Central American English
North-Central American English is an American English dialect native to the Upper Midwestern United States, an area that somewhat overlaps with speakers of the separate Inland North dialect centered more around the eastern Great Lakes region. The North-Central dialect is considered to have developed in a residual dialect region from the neighboring distinct dialect regions of the American West, Great Lakes, and Canada.More
38 North-Central American English
North-Central American English is an American English dialect native to the Upper Midwestern United States, an area that somewhat overlaps with speakers of the separate Inland North dialect centered more around the eastern Great Lakes region. The North-Central dialect is considered to have developed in a residual dialect region from the neighboring distinct dialect regions of the American West, Great Lakes, and Canada.More
39 Western American English
Western American English is a variety of American English that largely unites the entire Western United States as a single dialect region, including the states of California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming. It also generally encompasses Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana, some of whose speakers are classified additionally under Pacific Northwest English.More
40 California English
California English collectively refers to varieties of American English native to California. A distinctive vowel shift was only first noted by linguists in the 1980s in Southern California and the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California, helping to define an accent emerging primarily among youthful, white, urban, coastal speakers, first popularly associated with the Valley girl and surfer dude youth subcultures. The possibility that this is, in fact, an age-specific variety of English is one hypothesis; however, certain features of the variety are intensifying and spreading geographically. Other documented California English includes a "country" accent associated with rural and inland white Californians, an older accent once spoken by Irish Americans in San Francisco, and distinctly Californian varieties of Chicano English associated with Mexican Americans. Research has shown that Californians themselves perceive a linguistic boundary between Northern and Southern California.More
41 English in New Mexico
English in New Mexico refers to varieties of Western American English and Chicano English native to the U.S. state of New Mexico. Other languages in the region include New Mexican Spanish, Navajo, and numerous other Native American languages.More
42 Western American English
Western American English is a variety of American English that largely unites the entire Western United States as a single dialect region, including the states of California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming. It also generally encompasses Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana, some of whose speakers are classified additionally under Pacific Northwest English.More
43 Pacific Northwest English
Pacific Northwest English is a variety of North American English spoken in the U.S. states of Washington and Oregon, sometimes also including Idaho and the Canadian province of British Columbia. Current studies remain inconclusive about whether Pacific Northwest English is a dialect of its own, separate from Western American English or even California English or Standard Canadian English, with which it shares its major phonological features. The dialect region contains a highly diverse and mobile population, which is reflected in the historical and continuing development of the variety.More
44 Wyoming
Wyoming is a state in the Mountain West region of the United States. The 10th largest state by area, it is also the least populous and least densely populated state in the contiguous United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to the south. The state population was estimated at 578,759 in 2019. The state capital and the most populous city is Cheyenne, which had an estimated population of 63,957 in 2018.More
45 Western Pennsylvania English
Western Pennsylvania English, known more narrowly as Pittsburgh English or popularly as Pittsburghese, is a dialect of American English native primarily to the western half of Pennsylvania, centered on the city of Pittsburgh, but potentially appearing in some speakers as far north as Erie County, as far west as Youngstown, Ohio, and as far south as Clarksburg, West Virginia. Commonly associated with the white working class of Pittsburgh, users of the dialect are colloquially known as "Yinzers".More
46 Older Southern American English
Older Southern American English was a set of American English dialects of the Southern United States, primarily spoken by white Southerners up until the American Civil War, moving toward a state of decline by the turn of the twentieth century, further accelerated after World War II and again, finally, by the Civil Rights Movement. These dialects have since largely given way, on a larger regional level, to a more unified and younger Southern American English, recognized today by a unique vowel shift and certain other vocabulary and accent characteristics. Some features unique to older Southern U.S. English persist today, like non-rhoticity, though typically in only very localized dialects or speakers.More
47 Mid-Atlantic accent
The Mid-Atlantic accent, or Transatlantic accent, is a cultivated accent of English blending together features of both American and British English that were considered the most prestigious by the early 20th-century American upper class and entertainment industry. It is not a native or regional accent; rather, according to voice and drama professor Dudley Knight, it is an affected set of speech patterns "whose chief quality was that no Americans actually spoke it unless educated to do so". Primarily fashionable in the first half of the 20th century, the accent was embraced in private independent preparatory schools, especially by members of the Northeastern upper class, as well as in schools for film and stage acting. The accent's overall use sharply declined following the Second World War. A similar accent that resulted from different historical processes, Canadian dainty, was also known in Canada in the same era. More recently, the term "mid-Atlantic accent" can also refer to any accent with a perceived mixture of both American and British characteristics.More
48 Atlantic Canadian English
Atlantic Canadian English is a class of Canadian English dialects spoken in the Atlantic provinces of Canada and is notably distinct from Standard Canadian English. It is composed of Maritime English and Newfoundland English. It is mostly influenced by British and Irish English, Irish and Scottish Gaelic, and some Acadian French. Atlantic Canada is the easternmost region of Canada, comprising four provinces located on the Atlantic coast – the three Maritime provinces: Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, as well as Newfoundland and Labrador. The population of the Atlantic Provinces in 2016 was about 2,300,000 on a land area of approximately half a million square kilometres, with Nova Scotia being the most populous province, and its capital, Halifax, the most populous city. Regions such as Miramichi and Cape Breton have a wide variety of phrases and words not spoken outside of their respected regions.More
49 Atlantic Canadian English
Atlantic Canadian English is a class of Canadian English dialects spoken in the Atlantic provinces of Canada and is notably distinct from Standard Canadian English. It is composed of Maritime English and Newfoundland English. It is mostly influenced by British and Irish English, Irish and Scottish Gaelic, and some Acadian French. Atlantic Canada is the easternmost region of Canada, comprising four provinces located on the Atlantic coast – the three Maritime provinces: Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, as well as Newfoundland and Labrador. The population of the Atlantic Provinces in 2016 was about 2,300,000 on a land area of approximately half a million square kilometres, with Nova Scotia being the most populous province, and its capital, Halifax, the most populous city. Regions such as Miramichi and Cape Breton have a wide variety of phrases and words not spoken outside of their respected regions.More
50 Lunenburg English
Lunenburg English is a moribund, German-influenced dialect of English, spoken in the town of Lunenburg and Lunenburg County in the province of Nova Scotia. It is sometimes called "Lunenburg Dutch". The dialect shows unique features in pronunciation, e.g. unusual handling of rhotic consonants, in syntax and vocabulary, which portray the various sociohistorical influences.More
51 Newfoundland English
Newfoundland English is a term referring to any of several accents and dialects of Atlantic Canadian English found in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Most of these differ substantially from the English commonly spoken elsewhere in Canada and North America. Many Newfoundland dialects are influenced by the dialects of England's West Country, in particular the city of Bristol and the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Hampshire and Somerset, while in terms of general cultural heritage, one estimate claims 80 to 85 percent of Newfoundland's English heritage came from England's southwest. Other Newfoundland dialects are influenced by the dialects of Ireland's southeastern counties, particularly Waterford, Wexford, Kilkenny and Cork. Still others blend elements of both and there is also a discernible influence of Scottish English. This reflects the fact that while the Scottish came in smaller numbers than the English and Irish, they had a large influence on Newfoundland society.More
52 Standard Canadian English
Standard Canadian English is the mostly-homogeneous variety of Canadian English spoken particularly all across Central and Western Canada and throughout Canada among urban middle-class speakers from English-speaking families, excluding the regional dialects of Atlantic Canadian English. It has a mostly-uniform phonology and much less diversity of dialects in Canada than the neighbouring English of the United States. The Standard Canadian English dialect region is defined by the cot–caught merger to [ɒ] ( listen) and an accompanying chain shift of vowel sounds, called the Canadian Shift. A subset of the dialect geographically at its central core, excluding British Columbia to the west and everything east of Montreal, has been called Inland Canadian English and is further defined by both of the phenomena known as Canadian raising, the production of and with back starting points in the mouth, and the production of with a front starting point and very little glide, almost in the Prairie provinces.More
53 Quebec English
Quebec English encompasses the English dialects of the predominantly French-speaking Canadian province of Quebec. There are few distinctive phonological features and very few restricted lexical features common among English-speaking Quebecers. The native English speakers in Quebec generally align to Standard Canadian English, one of the largest and most relatively homogeneous dialects in North America. This standard English accent is common in Montreal, where the vast majority of Quebec's native English speakers live. English-speaking Montrealers have, however, established ethnic groups that retain certain lexical features: Irish, Jewish, Italian, and Greek communities that all speak discernible varieties of English. Isolated fishing villages on the Basse-Côte-Nord of Quebec speak Newfoundland English, and many Gaspesian English-speakers use Maritime English. Francophone speakers of Quebec also have their own second-language English that incorporates French accent features, vocabulary, etc. Finally, the Kahnawake Mohawks of south shore Montreal and the Cree and Inuit of Northern Quebec speak English with their own distinctive accents, usage, and expressions from their indigenous languages.More
54 Ottawa Valley English
Ottawa Valley English is Canadian English of the Ottawa Valley, particularly in reference to the historical local varieties of the area, now largely in decline. The accents of such traditional varieties are commonly referred to as an Ottawa Valley twang or brogue. The Ottawa Valley historically extends along the Ottawa River from northwest of Montreal through the city of Ottawa and north of Algonquin Park. The Atlas of North American English identifies an Ottawa Valley traditional dialect enclave in Arnprior, which lacks the Canadian raising of and strongly fronts before, but neither feature is documented in the City of Ottawa itself or in other nearby urban areas, which speak Standard Canadian English.More

Caribbean, Central, and South America

Caribbean

The Bahamas

Barbados

Belize

Bermuda

Cayman Islands

Falkland Islands

Guyana

Honduras

Jamaica

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

  • Vincentian English

Trinidad and Tobago

Asia

Bangladesh

Brunei

Burma

Hong Kong

India

Indian English:

Japan

Malaysia

Middle East

Nepal

Pakistan

Philippines

Singapore

Sri Lanka

List of dialects of English Caribbean, Central, and South America articles: 11
1 British Raj
The British Raj was the rule by the British Crown on the Indian subcontinent from 1858 to 1947. The rule is also called Crown rule in India, or direct rule in India. The region under British control was commonly called India in contemporaneous usage, and included areas directly administered by the United Kingdom, which were collectively called British India, and areas ruled by indigenous rulers, but under British tutelage or paramountcy, called the princely states. The region was sometimes called the Indian Empire, though not officially.More
2 Hinglish
Hinglish, a portmanteau of Hindi and English, is the macaronic hybrid use of English and South Asian languages from across the Indian subcontinent, involving code-switching or translanguaging between these languages whereby they are freely interchanged within a sentence or between sentences.More
3 English-language education in Japan
English-language education in Japan began as early as 1600 with the initial contacts between the Japanese and Europeans. Almost all students graduating from high school in Japan have had several years of English language education; however, many still do not have fluent English conversation abilities.More
4 Engrish
Engrish is a slang term for the misuse or corruption of the English language by native speakers of Japanese, Korean and other Asian languages. The term itself relates to Japanese speakers' tendency to inadvertently substitute the English phonemes "R" and "L" for one another, a process known as lallation, because, unlike English, the Japanese language has only one liquid consonant. The same situation exists with Korean.More
5 Malaysian English
Malaysian English (MyE), formally known as Malaysian Standard English (MySE), is a form of English used and spoken in Malaysia. While Malaysian English can encompass a range of English spoken in Malaysia, some consider to be it distinct from the colloquial form commonly called Manglish.More
6 Arabic chat alphabet
The Arabic chat alphabet, Arabizi, Franco-Arabic, Arabish, Araby, and Mu'arrab (معرب), refer to the Romanized alphabets for informal Arabic dialects in which Arabic script is transcribed or encoded into a combination of Latin script and Arabic numerals. These informal chat alphabets were originally used primarily by youth in the Arab world in very informal settings—especially for communicating over the Internet or for sending messages via cellular phones—though use is not necessarily restricted by age any more and these chat alphabets have been used in other media such as advertising.More
7 Arablish
Arablish is slang for code-switching between the two languages or macaronically using features of one in the other. The term is first recorded in 1984. It is alternatively termed Arbalizi, a portmanteau combining the words Arabic and Inglizi.More
8 Nepalese English
Nepalese English (Nepali:अङ्ग्रेजी) refers to a variety of the English language principally used in Nepal that is heavily influenced by Indo-Aryan languages of Nepal.More
9 Pakistani English
Pakistani English or Paklish or Pinglish is the group of English language varieties spoken and written in Pakistan. It was first so recognised and designated in the 1970s and 1980s. Pakistani English (PE) is slightly different from other dialects of English in respect to vocabulary, syntax, accent, spellings of some words and other features.More
10 Singapore English
Singapore English is the set of varieties of the English language native to Singapore. English language spoken in Singapore, of which there are two main forms, are Standard Singapore English and Singapore Colloquial English. English is the first language of the plurality of the population.More
11 Sri Lankan English
Sri Lankan English (SLE) is the English language as it is used in Sri Lanka, where it is colloquially known as Singlish, a term dating from 1972. Sri Lankan English is principally categorised as the Standard Variety and the Nonstandard Variety, which is called as "Not Pot English". The classification of SLE as a separate dialect of English is controversial. English in Sri Lanka is spoken by approximately 23.8% of the population, and widely used for official and commercial purposes. Sri Lankan English being the native language of approximately 5400 people thus challenges Braj Kachru's placement of it in the Outer Circle. Furthermore it is taught as a compulsory second language in local schools from grade one to thirteen, and Sri Lankans pay special attention on learning English both as children and adults. It is considered even today that access and exposure to English from one's childhood in Sri Lanka is to be born with a silver spoon in one's mouth.More

Africa

Cameroon

The Gambia

Ghana

Kenya

Liberia

Malawi

Namibia

Nigeria

South Africa

South Atlantic

South Sudan

  • South Sudanese English

Uganda

Zimbabwe

Oceania

Australia

Australian English (AusE, AusEng):

Fiji

New Zealand

New Zealand English (NZE, en-NZ)

List of dialects of English Africa articles: 7
1 Variation in Australian English
Australian English is relatively homogeneous when compared with British and American English. The major varieties of Australian English are sociocultural rather than regional, are divided into 3 main categories: general, broad and cultivated.More
2 Australian Aboriginal English
Australian Aboriginal English (AAE) is a dialect of Australian English used by a large section of the Indigenous Australian population. It is made up of a number of varieties which developed differently in different parts of Australia. These varieties are generally said to fit along a continuum ranging from light forms, close to Standard Australian English, to heavy forms, closer to Kriol. There are generally distinctive features of accent, grammar, words and meanings, as well as language use. AAE is not to be confused with Kriol, which is a separate language from English spoken by over 30,000 people in Australia. Speakers have been noted to tend to change between different forms of AAE depending on whom they are speaking to, e.g. striving to speak more like Australian English when speaking to a non-Indigenous English-speaking person.More
3 South Australian English
South Australian English is the variety of English spoken in the Australian state of South Australia. As with the other regional varieties within Australian English, these have distinctive vocabularies. To a lesser degree, there are also some differences in phonology (pronunciation).More
4 Western Australian English
Western Australian English is the English spoken in the Australian state of Western Australia (WA).More
5 Torres Strait English
Torres Strait English is a dialect of the English language spoken by the people of various backgrounds born and raised on Thursday Island and neighbouring islands in Torres Strait, North Queensland, Australia. It is distinct from Torres Strait Creole, though most locals speak both the creole and English. Quite a few locals are also speakers of General Australian English.More
6 Variation in Australian English
Australian English is relatively homogeneous when compared with British and American English. The major varieties of Australian English are sociocultural rather than regional, are divided into 3 main categories: general, broad and cultivated.More
7 Languages of Fiji
Fiji has three official languages under the 1997 constitution : English, iTaukei and Hindi. The iTaukei language is spoken either as a first or second language by most indigenous Fijians who make up around 54% of the population.More

Other

Antarctica

Tristan da Cunha

  • Tristan da Cunha English

World Global English

These dialects are used in everyday conversation almost all over the world, and are used as lingua francas and to determine grammar rules and guidelines.

List of dialects of English Other articles: 3
Lingua franca
A lingua franca, also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, vehicular language, or link language, is a language or dialect systematically used to make communication possible between groups of people who do not share a native language or dialect, particularly when it is a third language that is distinct from both of the speakers' native languages.More
International English
International English is the concept of the English language as a global means of communication in numerous dialects, and the movement towards an international standard for the language. It is also referred to as Global English, World English, Common English, Continental English, General English, Engas, or Globish. Sometimes, these terms refer simply to the array of varieties of English spoken throughout the world.More
English as a lingua franca
English as a lingua franca (ELF) is the use of the English language "as a global means of inter-community communication" and can be understood as "any use of English among speakers of different first languages for whom English is the communicative medium of choice and often the only option". ELF is "defined functionally by its use in intercultural communication rather than formally by its reference to native-speaker norms" whereas English as a second or foreign language aims at meeting native speaker norms and gives prominence to native speaker cultural aspects. While lingua francas have been used for centuries, what makes ELF a novel phenomenon is the extent to which it is used in spoken, written and in computer-mediated communication. ELF research focuses on the pragmatics of variation which is manifest in the variable use of the resources of English for a wide range of globalized purposes, in important formal encounters such as business transactions, international diplomacy and conflict resolution, as well as in informal exchanges between international friends.More

See also

References

  1. ^ Wakelin, Martyn Francis (2008). Discovering English Dialects. Oxford: Shire Publications. p. 4. ISBN 978-0-7478-0176-4.
  2. ^ Crystal, David. The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language, Cambridge University Press, 2003
  3. ^ Trudgill and Hannah, 2002
  4. ^ a b Hickey, Raymond (2005). Dublin English: Evolution and Change. John Benjamins Publishing. pp. 196–198. ISBN 90-272-4895-8.
  5. ^ Hickey, Raymond (2002). A Source Book for Irish English (PDF). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing. pp. 28–29. ISBN 90-272-3753-0. ISBN 1-58811-209-8 (US)
  6. ^ "Chicago Daily Tribune". 1903-06-02. Archived from the original on 2017-03-12. Retrieved 2020-01-22.CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  7. ^ Daniel Schreier, Peter Trudgill. The Lesser-Known Varieties of English: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press, Mar 4, 2010 pg. 10
  8. ^ Harrington, Jonathan; Gubian, Michele; Stevens, Mary; Schiel, Florian (13 November 2019). "Phonetic change in an Antarctic winter". Journal of the Acoustical Society of America. 146 (5): 3327–3332. doi:10.1121/1.5130709. PMID 31795649. Retrieved 12 October 2020.
  9. ^ Bard, Susanne. "Linguists Hear an Accent Begin". Scientific American. Retrieved 2020-04-28.

Further reading

External links