LFU:online

Participants will acquire knowledge about different varieties of English and reflect on the problems of defining and classifying variation through the study of different models.

The lecture will look at varieties of English in terms of modelling differences. In addition to reviewing the presence and role of English in various parts of the world, it will look at typological similarities and differences between various „Englishes“. The content is therefore both descriptive and meta-descriptive, taking into account linguistic data but also the ways in which various scholars have tried to systematise this evidence, in order to create general „classifications“ of varieties.

Frontal teaching. Regular attendance is particularly recommended.

Final written exam, open questions

Edgar W. Schneider, Postcolonial English.Cambridge University Press, 2007, CHAPTERS 1 to 4. Gunnel Melchers – Philip Shaw, World Englishes, Arnold, 2003, CHAPTERS 1 to 3 PLUS PAGES 127-135. Tom McArthur The English Languages. Cambridge University Press, 2000, CHAPTERS 3 to 5. Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt ;Kortmann, Bernd, The morphosyntax of varieties of English worldwide: A quantitative perspective Lingua, 2009, Vol.119(11), p.1643-1663. Bernd Kortmann and Benedikt Szmrecsanyi, Global Synopsis:Morphological and syntactic variation in English. In Bernd KORTMANN, Kate BURRIDGE, Rajend MESTHRIE, Edgar W. SCHNEIDER and Clive UPTON (eds.), A Handbook of Varieties of English, Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 1142-1202.

For Diplom- and MA-Students: extra readings, to be announced

Prior attendance of VO1: Introduction to English Synchronic Linguistics and VO1: Introduction to the History of English is recommended

For the Teacher Training Programme: VO 1: Applied Linguistics (Survey).