Southern English in writing

This chapter deals with written evidence of regional varieties of language representing the middle and southern parts of England. ‘Southern English’ is here taken in a very wide sense, basically equivalent to ‘non-Northern’ and thus constituting a companion piece to the previous chapter. For two reasons, the chapter focuses on data from the nineteenth century: the written evidence is richer and, above all, reliable and detailed contemporary linguistic data collections and descriptions are available, notably the English Dialect Dictionary. Extensive use has also been made of data from the Survey of English Dialects. With regard to linguistic levels, special attention is given to phonological representation. Finally, the significance of genre, motivation and awareness is discussed.