A sociolinguistic approach to the study of literary dialect in the work of John Galt and Christian Johnstone
This thesis is interested in the communicative function of literary dialect. It argues that approaches to the study of literary dialect which focus on linguistic form at the expense of literary function have helped to create a false dichotomy: literary dialect is seen either as the writer's serious attempt at re-creating the nuances of speech, or else is merely the use of established literary conventions which have no bearing on actual linguistic usage. Taking John Galt's The Entail (1823) and The Provost (1822) together with 'West Country Exclusives' by Christian Johnstone (1834-5) as case studies, the thesis aims to develop, apply and assess a series of analytical procedures which can effectively describe the selection and distribution of literary dialect in these texts and can explain the range of functions dialect serves: its role in creating the impression of verisimilitude and the development of characterisation, together with its wider thematic and stylistic functions. The sociolinguistic approach to the study of literary dialect adopted here incorporates methods already established within linguistic research. For example, the dialectology of West-Mid Scots provides a model of the Ayrshire dialect represented
Hewitt, Lindsay Ann
PR English literature
A sociolinguistic approach to the study of literary dialect in the work of John Galt and Christian Johnstone. This thesis is interested in the communicative function of literary dialect. It argues that approaches to the study of literary dialect which focus on linguistic form at the expense of literary function have helped to create a false dichotomy: literary dialect is seen either as the writer's serious attempt at re-creating the nuances of speech, or else is merely the use of established literary conventions which have no bearing on actual linguistic usage. Taking John Galt's The Entail (1823) and The Provost (1822) together with 'West Country Exclusives' by Christian Johnstone (1834-5) as case studies, the thesis aims to develop, apply and assess a series of analytical procedures which can effectively describe the selection and distribution of literary dialect in these texts and can explain the range of functions dialect serves: its role in creating the impression of verisimilitude and the development of characterisation, together with its wider thematic and stylistic functions. The sociolinguistic approach to the study of literary dialect adopted here incorporates methods already established within linguistic research. For example, the dialectology of West-Mid Scots provides a model of the Ayrshire dialect represented
sociolinguistic_study literary dialect work john christian interested communicative_function literary dialect argues approach study literary dialect focus linguistic_form expense literary function help_create false dichotomy literary dialect see either writer serious_attempt creating nuance speech else merely use establish literary convention bear actual linguistic usage taking john entail together west_country christian case_study aim_develop apply assess series analytical procedure effectively describe selection distribution literary dialect text explain range function dialect serf role create_impression development characterisation together wider thematic stylistic function sociolinguistic_study literary dialect adopt incorporate method already_establish within linguistic research example dialectology west mid scots provide_model dialect represent