Colloquial English : Structure and Variation

346 Pages·2018·3.39 MB·English

by  Andrew Radford

COLLOQUIAL ENGLISH
Drawing on vast amounts of new data from live, unscripted radio and TV
broadcasts,andtheinternet,thisisabrilliantandoriginalanalysisofcollo-
quial English, revealing unusual and largely unreported types of clause
structure. Andrew Radford debunks the myth that colloquial English has a
substandard,simplifiedgrammar,andshowsthatithasacoherentandcom-
plex structure of its own. The book develops a theoretically sophisticated
account of structure and variation in colloquial English, advancing an area
thathasbeeninvestigatedfromotherperspectives,suchascorpuslinguistics
or conversational analysis, but never before in such detail from a formal
syntacticviewpoint.
andrew radford isEmeritusProfessorattheUniversityofEssex.Hehas
writtenninebooksonsyntactictheoryandEnglishsyntax,includingSyntactic
Theory and the Structure of English (1997), Minimalist Syntax (2004) and
Analysing English Sentences (2016), all published by Cambridge University
Press.
cambridge studies in linguistics
GeneralEditors:p. austin, j.bresnan, b. comrie, s. crain,
w. dressler, c. j. ewen, r. lass, d. lightfoot, k. rice,
i. roberts, s. romaine, n. v. smith
Colloquial English
Inthisseries
116. gilliancatrionaramchand:VerbMeaningandtheLexicon:AFirstPhase
Syntax
117. pietermuysken:FunctionalCategories
118. juanuriagereka:SyntacticAnchors:OnSemanticStructuring
119. d.robertladd:IntonationalPhonology(secondedition)
120. leonardh.babby:TheSyntaxofArgumentStructure
121. b.elandresher:TheContrastiveHierarchyinPhonology
122. davidadger,danielharbourandlaurelj.watkins:Mirrorsand
Microparameters:PhraseStructureBeyondFreeWordOrder
123. niinaningzhang:CoordinationinSyntax
124. neilsmith:AcquiringPhonology
125. ninatopintzi:Onsets:SuprasegmentalandProsodicBehaviour
126. cedricboeckx,norberthornsteinandjaironunes:Controlas
Movement
127. michaelisrael:TheGrammarofPolarity:Pragmatics,Sensitivity,andtheLogic
ofScales
128. m.ritamanziniandleonardom.savoia:GrammaticalCategories:Variation
inRomanceLanguages
129. barbaracitko:SymmetryinSyntax:Merge,MoveandLabels
130. rachelwalker:VowelPatternsinLanguage
131. marydalrympleandirinanikolaeva:ObjectsandInformationStructure
132. jerroldm.sadock:TheModularArchitectureofGrammar
133. dunstanbrownandandrewhippisley:NetworkMorphology:ADefaults-
basedTheoryofWordStructure
134. betteloulos,corrienblom,geertbooij,marionelenbaasandans
vankemenade:MorphosyntacticChange:AComparativeStudyofParticlesand
Prefixes
135. stephencrain:TheEmergenceofMeaning
136. huberthaider:SymmetryBreakinginSyntax
137. jose´ a.camacho:NullSubjects
138. gregorystumpandraphaela.finkel:MorphologicalTypology:FromWord
toParadigm
139. brucetesar:Output-DrivenPhonology:TheoryandLearning
140. asieralca´zarandmariosaltarelli:TheSyntaxofImperatives
141. mishabecker:TheAcquisitionofSyntacticStructure:AnimacyandThematic
Alignment
142. martinawiltschko:TheUniversalStructureofCategories:TowardsaFormal
Typology
143. fahadrashedal-mutairi:TheMinimalistProgram:TheNatureand
PlausibilityofChomsky’sBiolinguistics
144. cedricboeckx:ElementarySyntacticStructures:ProspectsofaFeature-Free
Syntax
145. phoevospanagiotidis:CategorialFeatures:AGenerativeTheoryofWordClass
Categories
146. markbaker:Case:ItsPrinciplesanditsParameters
147. williambennett:ThePhonologyofConsonants:Dissimilation,Harmonyand
Correspondence
148. andreasims:InflectionalDefectiveness
149. gregorystump:InflectionalParadigms:ContentandFormattheSyntax-
MorphologyInterface
150. rochellelieber:EnglishNouns:TheEcologyofNominalization
151. johnbowers:DerivingSyntacticRelations
152. anateresape´rez-leroux,mihaelapirvulescuandyvesroberge:
DirectObjectsandLanguageAcquisition
153. matthewbaerman,dunstanbrownandgrevillecorbett:
MorphologicalComplexity
154. marceldendikken:DependencyandDirectionality
155. lauriebauer:CompoundsandCompounding
156. klausj.kohler:CommunicativeFunctionsandLinguisticFormsinSpeech
Interaction
157. kurtgoblirsch:Gemination,Lenition,andVowelLengthening:OntheHistoryof
QuantityinGermanic
158. andrewradford:ColloquialEnglish:StructureandVariation
Earlierissuesnotlistedarealsoavailable
COLLOQUIAL ENGLISH
STRUCTURE AND VARIATION
ANDREW RADFORD
UniversityofEssex
UniversityPrintingHouse,CambridgeCB28BS,UnitedKingdom
OneLibertyPlaza,20thFloor,NewYork,NY10006,USA
477WilliamstownRoad,PortMelbourne,VIC3207,Australia
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CambridgeUniversityPressispartoftheUniversityofCambridge.
ItfurtherstheUniversity’smissionbydisseminatingknowledgeinthepursuitof
education,learning,andresearchatthehighestinternationallevelsofexcellence.
www.cambridge.org
Informationonthistitle:www.cambridge.org/9781108428057
DOI:10.1017/9781108552202
©AndrewRadford2018
Thispublicationisincopyright.Subjecttostatutoryexception
andtotheprovisionsofrelevantcollectivelicensingagreements,
noreproductionofanypartmaytakeplacewithoutthewritten
permissionofCambridgeUniversityPress.
Firstpublished2018
PrintedintheUnitedKingdombyClays,StIvesplc
AcataloguerecordforthispublicationisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Names:Radford,Andrew,author.
Title:ColloquialEnglish:structureandvariation/AndrewRadford.
Description:Cambridge,UnitedKingdom:CambridgeUniversityPress,[2018]|
Series:Cambridgestudiesinlinguistics
Identifiers:LCCN2017058251|ISBN9781108428057(hardback)
Subjects:LCSH:Englishlanguage–Variation.|Englishlanguage–Spoken
English.|Englishlanguage–Grammar.|Conversationanalysis–Dataprocessing.
|Linguisticchange.|Communicationmodels.
Classification:LCCPE1074.7.R362018|DDC425–dc23
LCrecordavailableathttps://lccn.loc.gov/2017058251
ISBN978-1-108-42805-7Hardback
ISBN978-1-108-44869-7Paperback
CambridgeUniversityPresshasnoresponsibilityforthepersistenceoraccuracy
ofURLsforexternalorthird-partyinternetwebsitesreferredtointhispublication
anddoesnotguaranteethatanycontentonsuchwebsitesis,orwillremain,
accurateorappropriate.
ThisbookisdedicatedtomydearwifeKhadija,whoseunswerving
andenduringlove,friendshipandselflessnesshavesupportedmy
research,andwhosewinningsmileandirresistiblelaughterhavelitup
lifeinGreyBritainforthepastfourdecades.Wordscanneverexpress
myfeelingsforyouandtheprofounddebtIoweyou.

Contents
Acknowledgements page xi
Prologue 1
1 Background 7
1.1 Introduction 7
1.2 S-,S'-andS"-analyses 7
1.3 CPAnalyses 14
1.4 TheCartographicApproach 22
1.5 TruncatedClauses 32
1.6 Summary 39
2 Topics 40
2.1 Introduction 40
2.2 ThreeTypesofTopicinColloquialEnglish 40
2.3 TheDerivationofTopics 45
2.4 MultipleTopicStructures 58
2.5 TopicsandComplementisers 67
2.6 TopicsandOtherPeripheralNon-whConstituents 72
2.7 TopicsinWh-interrogativesandExclamatives 78
2.8 TopicsinRelativeClauses 89
2.9 Summary 102
3 Complementisers 105
3.1 Introduction 105
3.2 PrimarySpellout 106
3.3 SecondarySpellout 122
3.4 ComplementisersinEmbeddedWh-clauses 134
3.5 ComplementisersinRootClauses 156
3.6 TheNatureofComplementiserSpellout 170
3.7 Summary 195
3.8 Appendix:ComplementisersinAdverbialClauses 197
ix