REGIONAL VARIANTS AND DIALECTS OF MODERN ENGLISH

The actuality of the research. Wide spreading of the English language in the world communication has been stimulated by rapid development of international, economic, scientifi c, and cultural relations which is called by the necessity to study the languageintermediary. For a long time English has been studied in its well-known form – BBC / RP which received the status of national standard in the UK. Under the modern circumstances when contacts have become more personal it appears to be not enough to know the refi ned version of the standardized English language. People become more interested in local, regional, and social variations of language which they hear every day in different parts of the world. The varieties of English attract attentions not only for practical purposes but scientifi c cognitive too. In different English speaking countries there always been people who advocated the specifi cs of local talk or at least tried to differentiate regional variant from that which is spoken in metropoly. Among the fi rst most prominent scholars who dedicated himself to this task was Noam Webster [9]. At present day philological studies one can observe the works dedicated both to regional variations of English [1; 3; 4; 6; 11] and local its representations [2; 5; 7; 8; 10]. The objective of the article. In our turn, we would like to pay our attention to three major differences in variation of English: phonological, lexical semantic, and structural grammatical as well as to consider the reasons of its origin. Traditionally, British dialectologists divide all variants of English into: English-based group that comprises E-E, Welsh E, Scottish E, Northern Ireland E, Australian E, New Zealand E, and American-based group that comprises Am E and Canadian E. The main accents grouping within England are between Northern England and Southern England. Northern England includes the north east England dialects. Northern English shows Viking infl uence because the area was all north of the Danelaw. To the distinctive phonetic features of the Northern English belong the following: using of [u] and [u:] instead of [ ] and [u], e.g.: luck [luk], look [lu:k], [a] instead of [æ], e.g.: cat [cat], trap [trap], monophthongs [e:] and [o:] instead of diphthons [ei] and [ou], like in face and goat. Some dialect words used across the North are listed in extended editions of the Oxford Dictionary with a marker Ученые записки Таврического национального университета им. В.И. Вернадского Серия «Филология. Социальные коммуникации» Том 25 (64) № 1. Часть 1.С.128-134. 129 “North England”, e.g.: ginnell and snicket for “specifi c types of alleyways”, to fettle – “to organize”, or the use of while to mean “until”. The best-known Northern words are nowt “nothing”, owt “anything”, summat “something”. The “present historical” is named after the speech of the northern region. Instead of saying I said to him, users would say I says to him, or instead of I went up there, they would say I goes up there. Southern English originated from the upper-class speech of the London – Oxford – Cambridge triangle and is particularly notable as the basis for RP. Southern English accents have three main historical infl uences: the London accent, in particular, Cockney; RP; southern rural accents, such as West Country, Kent, and East Anglian. Southern English accents are distinguished by using long [a:] instead of short [a] in such words as cast [ka:st], bath [ba:θ]; diphthongal realization of [i] and [u], e.g.: beat [biit], paw [po ], losing of ‘to’ from sentences related to places, e.g.: Do you want to go West End?. Compared to English spoken in Britain, North American English is more homogeneous. North American English has undergone some sound changes not found in other varieties of English speech: replacement of [o] by [ ], e.g.: body, everybody, nobody; dropping of [j] in words like duke, new, suit, resume; pronouncing [æ] instead of [a] in such words as chance, dance, glass, last; vocalization of sound [r] in words and at the margins of words, e.g.: morning, winter. There is a considerable number of words which differ in their phonetic shape comparing with RP in Great Britain, e.g.: advertisement [ædvε:´taizm nt], blouse [blaus], clerk [kl:k], either [´ið ], epoch [´ep k], leisure [´li ], lieutenant [lu´ten nt], neither [´nið ], process [´proses], progress [´progr s], schedule [s´kedjul], tomato [t ´meitou], vase [veis]. The most signifi cant spelling differences which can be detected in present-day American and British English can be revealed as follows: Am -in versus Br -en – inclosure, inquiry; Am -er versus Br -re – center, fi ber, liter, meter, theater; Am -or versus Br -our – behavior, color, harbor, honor, humor, labor, neighbor; Am -se versus Br -ce – defense, license, offense, practise; Am -z versus Br -s – analyze, criticize, emphasize, idealize, organize; Am -e versus Br -ae / -oe – anemia, anesthesia, medieval; Am -f versus Br -ph – sulfur, sulfate; Am -i versus Br -y – tire, siphon, Am -y versus Br -i – gayety, gypsy, Am single consonant -l versus Br doubled one -ll before a suffi x in unstressed syllables – dialed, labeled, marvelous, traveler. There are some isolated differences, e.g.:

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