Appalachian English

Appalachian English is a dialect of English that is spoken in the Appalachian Mountains region, especially in the southern part of the Appalachians. Research suggests it is one of the most different dialects in the United States from the others.[1]

Since the 1930s, much research has been done to figure out where the dialect came from. One theory is that the dialect is a remnant of Elizabethan (or Shakespearean) English that has been preserved by the region's isolation.[2][3] Another theory suggests that the dialect developed out of the Scots-Irish and Anglo-Scottish border dialects that were brought to the region by some of its earliest settlers,[4] who were from the border of Scotland and England, in the British Isles.

Recent research suggests that Appalachian English developed as a uniquely-American dialect, as early settlers adapted English to their unfamiliar frontier environment. That is supported by the many similarities between it and Colonial American English.[5]

References

  1. ↑ Walt Wolfram and Donna Christian, Appalachian Speech (Arlington, Virginia: Center for Applied Linguistics, 1976), 1.
  2. ↑ Michael Montgomery, "How Scotch-Irish is Your English?" The Journal of East Tennessee History vol. 67 (1995), 17-18.
  3. ↑ Cooper, Horton. "History of Avery County", Biltmore Press, (1964),
  4. ↑ David Hackett Fischer, Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 653-654.
  5. ↑ Montgomery, 1002-1004.


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