Irish English variety in James Joyce’s Dubliners.

An approach to corpus analysis.

Joana Rodríguez García

Juan Pedro Rica Peromingo

Research Methods and Tools in English Linguistics

1. Introduction
2. Theoretical background

2.1. An introduction to corpus linguistics.

2.2. The use of corpus linguistics as a tool of text analysis.

2.3. An approach to the representation of dialects in literature.

2.4. Language variation and linguistic stereotypes

3. Methodology.

3.1. A brief introduction to Irish English grammar.

4. Analysis and discussion of results.

4.1. Analysis of the Irish English Corpora

4.2. Discussing James Joyce’s linguistic choices

5. Conclusion.

6. References.

7. Appendixes.

1
Introduction

Recently, there has been growing a wide interest in Irish contemporary writings. General

assumptions about the sense of nationality emerging in the culture are common findings in

literature studies, where some peculiar properties of non-standard linguistic variation and

phonological features of accents come along with the narration. According to Kirk (cited in

Kallen, 1997), literary writings comprises several choices such as specific generic-functional

features that depend on whether the texts are in spoken or written form. He also argues that

there are two forms of representation of dialects and non-standard structures:

Transcription (whereby speech is represented in writing faithfully, "as

it is") or symbolism (whereby the impression of speech is given by

the conventions of the written language as well as the reader's

ability to recognize the transcription as nonstandard IrE) (p.203)

However, the criterion for representing some characteristics of spoken English varieties

in literature remains unexplored. Thus, these aspects have raised the following questions: to

what extend can dialectical linguistic features be depicted in literature? Is corpus text analysis

a good methodical approach to the depiction of dialects in written texts? Is the author

influenced by linguistic stereotypes? Is the depiction of dialectical features necessary to

identify English varieties in literature? What is the criterion to consider those features more

representative than others?

This dissertation aims to analyze James Joyce’s Dubliners to unravel the enigma of

how English varieties are depicted in literary writings. In this paper, several lexical and

syntactic elements of the Irish-English variety are analyzed using corpus linguistic text

2
analysis. The study offers some important insights into language variation and how different

Irish linguistic features are portrayed through the use of certain characteristics over the others.

1. Theoretical Background

1.1. An approach to the representation of dialects in literature

There is a relatively small body of studies that are concerned with the depiction of English

dialects in literary texts. According to Kirk (as cited in Kallen, 1997:203), in literature there

are two forms of representation of dialects and non-standard structures:

1) Transcription (whereby speech is represented in writing faithfully , "as it is"),

[1]
which is governed by the principle of mimesis .

2) Contemporary literary writing: symbolism (whereby the impression of speech

is given by the conventions of the written language as well as the reader's

ability to recognize the transcription as nonstandard IrE), which is governed

[2]
by the principle of isomorphism .

In Irish English and Contemporary Literary Writing, Kirk (as cited in Kallen,

1997:203) also suggested that even though non-standard ‘semiotic’ structures could contrast

with the standard ones, the aim of the use of the direct speech representation (involving the

use of dialects and non-standard forms) is “to represent the thought of characters, to provide

variety, freshness, and color” (whereas using standard forms allude to flatness, correctness

and, in some cases, formality). These techniques lead one to question the ‘authenticity’ of the

literary texts, as well as, to question “linguistic values, just for confirmation or even for

challenge”.

Detailed examination of direct speech transcription in literature by Walpole (1974:4)

showed that characters are portrayed according to their social status, if a character belongs to

3
a respectable social class he or she will probably be represented with “grammatical and

orthographic correctness”, whereas if the character belongs to a lower social class or , as

Walpole suggested; “if he is of an ethnic minority, if he is foreign, or ill-educated, his

dialogue becomes branded as substandard by the use of colloquialisms, solecisms, and eye

dialect.”

Eye dialect has been a technique used in literature to transcribe spoken language

naturally. In the Oxford English Dictionary ‘Eye dialect’ is defined as “the nonstandard

respelling (sometimes for comic effect) to represent dialectal or colloquial pronunciation (as

in Aw knaow for standard I know), or standard pronunciation not predictable from regular

orthography (as enuff for standard enough)”. Similarly, in his analysis A study of Eye dialect,

Bowdre (1964) described ‘Eye dialect’ as a way of representing direct speech that is

considered non-standard to the eye but to the ear still maintains the standard pronunciation

rules.

Almost every paper that has been written on linguistic variations includes a section

relating to the study of literary dialects and non-standard formations. Kirk (cited in Kallen,

1997) showed that there are two main approaches to analyze their purpose in literature.

Firstly, a stylistic approach which is generally the study of both fields; and secondly, the

dialectological approach where there is a need to find evidences, ‘often historical’, of the use

of these dialectical or non-standard structures. He argued that dialectologists considered

important the frequency in which those established linguistic features are produced, as well

as, the environment in which they occurred, in order to determine the “validity of literary

language”.

There is a large number of published studies (e.g., Bex and Watts, 1999; McArthur,

1998) that explore the connotations attached to ‘standard’ and ‘nonstandard’ dialects in the

English language. In his article, What it isn't, Trudgill (as cited in Bex and Watts, 1999:119)

4
provided several arguments supporting what Standard English is and explained the

misunderstanding of why SE is not a language, an accent or a style. As he described it, SE is,

in fact, the most popular English dialect of the world, which is not restricted by geographical

boundaries. It is spoken worldwide by those considered 'educated people’, and learned by

those whose mother tongue is not English. In this chapter (5), Trudgill also dealt with the

degree of formality in social situations associated to SE. He suggested all English dialects

share this quality of adapting to formal or informal registers depending on the circumstances

surrounding them.

On the other hand, non-standard structures, specifically “non-standard Irish English”,

have been defined by Kirk (cited in Kallen, 1997:193) as the following:

(…)anything which departs from the norms of the conventional, especially

printed, standard language but would not qualify as traditional dialect, such as

nonstandard grammar which has widespread currency, or slang ,foul language,

and other conspicuously colloquial vocabulary, which also enjoy widespread

currency and are regarded neither as part of traditional dialect nor as part of

formal , conventionally printed language, or also non-standard spellings intended

to reflect particular social and usually stigmatized accents or styles of speaking,

etc .”

Other sociolinguistic perspectives have rejected the notion that a non-standard variety

is inferior to others. Edwards (2009:67) examined several studies that questioned whether or

not standard varieties were ‘more prestigious’ than other varieties. He reported experiments of

students that compared the perception of their own variety in relation to others, asking which

would be ‘the most pleasant to the listener’ and the results were as follows:

5
 (...) aesthetic assessments of the sound of a variety seem to be heavily influenced

by listeners’ conceptions of just who is speaking. The ‘inherent’ value hypothesis

fails, and the ‘imposed norm’ hypothesis is confirmed… Aesthetic standards are

constructed by those in the know; the stereotypes that link beauty or harshness to a set

of sounds are unavailable to others.

The conclusions of these studies favored social functions as he explained in the

following quotation: “evaluations of different language varieties are not based upon intrinsic

qualities but rest, rather, upon social conventions and preferences.” (p.68)

Considering all of this evidence, it seems that the term ‘standard’ does not imply superior

credibility in relation to non-standard varieties and vice versa. Each variety of a language

proves to be unique and suitable in their own contexts.

1.2. Language variation and linguistic stereotypes

Some linguistic features of English varieties may come from stereotypes attached to the

language itself, but to what extent can it be suggested that a dialect is being stereotyped?

What signs can we identify as stereotypes when comes to a dialect?

Groebner (as cited in Edwards, 2009, p.16), pointed out that the issue of identity is

important when analyzing language variation. The word ‘identity’ can indirectly lead us into

misconceptions since it is certainly true that a language has an identity based on several

factors, and those ‘elements’ bring along a set of cultural and social stereotypes that are

manifested in the language itself.

6
 The identity of language can be analyzed at the communicative or symbolic level;

Ireland’s nationalism and its recognition of the language have been an example of it. Since the

country was subjected to British colonialism, the Irish language has undergone several

language revivals after English became the first channel of communication in the isle. Though

native speakers of the language make up less than 3% of the population, Irish is still the

official language of the country, as a symbolic image of the ‘sense of belonging’ in the

Republic (see Edwards, 2009, p.56).

At this point, it is necessary to provide a clear definition of “what stereotypes are”.

Stereotypes (as first defined by Lippman in 1992) are “pictures inside [one’s] head”. In their

article Stereotyping, Prejudice and Discrimination; several authors as Dovidio and Johnson,

(as cited in Macrae et al., 1996) suggested that this term helped to simplify our perception of

the world, however, “it led to generalization and, in fact, to misconceptions and irrational

beliefs”. Other authors such as Hilton (2000) have argued that our individual cognitive

processes are not developed enough to comprehend the complexity of ‘social experiences’,

which is the reason why we simplify experiences through categorization (p.135).

As our ideas are no longer independent, our perception of the world becomes socially

influenced by a common generalization mainly determined by social power and prejudices.

Edwards (2009) observed that social power frequently influence our assessments, and these

assessments tend to be misunderstood as “deficiencies” rather than “differences”. These

“social conventions” make us exchange from standard to non-standard variations in order to

produce a reaction in the receiver or to achieve a certain purpose during the message.

However, this aspect also depends on whether the speaker is a “standard dialect” speaker, or

otherwise, a “non-standard-dialect speaker”. Studies from Labov’s Black American English

(as cited in Edwards, 2009) have shown that speakers from the second group are more likely

7
to “accept and agree with unfavorable stereotypes of their speech styles, and example of

minority group reaction” (p. 69).

In view of all that has been mentioned so far, one may suppose that if stereotypes are

‘cultural meaning constructions’ and in the majority of cases, they are unjustified and

irrational beliefs, as Hinton (2000) questioned: “And why is it that our cognitive processes

lead us to have such expectations that will, in certain cases at least, be shown to be incorrect?”

(p.22)

3. Methodology

This research has been carried out through a quantitative and qualitative analysis. Qualitative

methods offer an effective way of approaching the results. For the purpose of analysis, it has

been selected James Joyce’s Dubliners as an attempt of determining the level of Irishness that

can be found in the novel and which characteristics belonging to the IE variety can be

identified within the chapters of the novel.

James Joyce is one of the most influential Irish authors from the 20thC, widely known

by his innovative narrative techniques and his unique and subtle representation of human

nature in literature. The novel narrates different strange and puzzling events regarding

epiphanies, religion, national identity, the intersection of life and death, etc.

The corpus of the analysis has been named Irish English Corpora in James Joyce’s

Dubliners (IECJJD). It consists of 15 chapters and 67622 total numbers of words. The

chapters were divided and organized according to their extension, being The Dead (15620

words) the first one and Eveline (1828 words) the last one.

The procedure carried out was that of analyzing some of the grammatical features of

Irish English: the use of the definite article ‘the’; the presence of Irish English perfect tenses,

8
and the use of reflexive pronouns such as ‘himself’ ‘yourself’) that will be commented in the

following section (3.1).

After analyzing the aforementioned features, it was also necessary to comment on the

use of the conjunction ‘and’ since, as will be seen in the Analysis (section 4), it provided

significant insights on the linguistic features used in Dubliners.

The softwares used to carry out the quantitative analysis of this paper were Wordsmith

Tool 6.0 and Excel for statistical significance. The function of Concordance within

Wordsmith Tool software was the most representative one for this analysis since the main

objectives were that of examine the linguistic features that can be identified in the novel and

how these characteristics function within the chapters of the book. However, significance

statistical results where obtain by previous word list created with WordList function.

3.1 A brief introduction to Irish English grammar.

To introduce IE syntax, it should be done retrospection into the language shifts between the

17th and 19th centuries that Ireland has undergone which had a great impact on present-day

Irish English. Even though there is no reliable evidence on these shifts, several authors (see

Hickey 2005, Filppula 1999) have speculated that the data compiled is based on “what we

assume must have happened rather than historical “proof” as such”.

In 1999, Markku Filppula published The Grammar of Irish English, a volume of

linguistic research, in which he provided an extended account of grammatical features of

‘Hiberno-English’ dialects. As this paper is going to deal with some of these aspects in the

analysis of Irish English in James Joyce’s novel, it is important to provide a general approach

to the grammatical characteristics of the Irish variety. Following a sociolinguistic approach,

9
and due to the extensiveness of the characteristics shown by Filppula, only some of the

common IE features will be analysed it will be analysed.

It is true that nonstandard English varieties have similar characteristics depending on

the geographical location, and the proximity to other varieties. Some of these common

features are the use of them for demonstrative pronouns or adjectives, the use of singular

forms with plural pronouns, among others. As will be commented below, Filppula discussed

several interesting aspects of IE usage in grammar.

In Irish English, the use of the definite article has been an issue to analyze. Joyce

(1910/1988:82), as cited in Filppula (1999), argued that ‘in Irish there is only one article, an,

which is the equivalent to the English definite article the, in contrast to the use of definite

articles in Standard English, in Irish, they function much more freely. As illustrated in Tá an

tae tar éis an stsaoil go léir a lot [‘The tea has ruined the people’].

As a consequence of the Irish influence in Anglo-Irish speech, people tended to add

this article creating ‘new’ nonstandard structures. Here are some illustrated examples, among

other peculiarities of this aspect (extracted from Filppula’s database, 1999):

And = the money used to flow around Ringsend at that time.

The one fortune might change six times in the one year.

Another frequently considered aspect of IE was the use of reflexive pronouns. In SE,

these pronouns are usually accompanied by other nominal elements, however in IE, they are

often used on their own, and Filppula named them ‘Unbound Reflexives’, as in the following

instances:

10
 And d’you hear me, you didn’t know the minute they’d burn yourself an’ the house.

I’m sure, it’s about seventy-one years. Even if I’m wrong itself what matter.

Regarding syntactic features of verbal phrases in IE, Filppula (1999:90) has made a

classification of some of the relevant aspects in this field. He argued that, in comparison to

the perfect tense of Standard Englishes, in IE there are several ‘perfect tenses’, as he

labelled:

(a) the ‘indefinite anterior’ perfect (IAP for short; e.g. Were you ever in Kenmare?

‘Have you ever been…?’)

(b) the after perfect (AFP; e.g. You’re after ruinin’ me ‘you have just ruined me’)

(c )the ‘medial-object’ perfect (MOP; e.g. I have it forgot ‘I have forgotten it’)

(d) the be perfect (BEP; e.g. All the tourists are gone back now)

(e) the ‘extended-now’ perfect (ENP; e.g. I’m not in this {caravan} long ‘I haven’t

been…’)

The first type, IAP, was normally used to refer events or states that happened in an

unspecified moment in the past but remained a connection with the present, as in the

following examples:

I never had a motorcar. I never saw a motorcar when I was = I din’t see

motorcar till I was thirty years. Twenty years anyway.

The second type, the AFP, is one of the most popular features in IE, it has been used in

contexts involving an event that has taken placed in a recent moment in the past, and which

effects are still shown in the present. Filppula (1999) has argued that this feature is a calqued

from Irish (following the previous studies cited in page 101) formed by ‘the verb tá (be),

followed by the subject, the preposition tréis (after) and the verbal noun’, as in: Tá sé tréis

11
imeacht (‘He’s after going’). As illustrated in the following example: An’ there was a house

yo’re after passin’, there was fifteen, sixteen children in = in the house. [‘...you’ve just

passed,...’]

The third type, the MOP, is used when the object of the sentence has been affected, in

some sort of way, by a certain action. The verbs involved are usually transitive and the focus

of this perfect tense remains in the result of the action, rather than the action as such. In Irish,

there were similar constructions, as in: Tá sé scríobhtha aige [‘Is it written at-him’] or Tá sé

briste aige [‘Is it broken at-him’]. This aspect is better illustrated in the following utterance:

It was […] calm and sun all the time. Cut it today, and turn it tomorrow, and bale it

the next day […] Couple of weeks, about three weeks we had it [i.e. the hay] all done

[…] Had it in, and […]

The be perfect, according to Filppula, is similar to the MOP, the only difference is that

it favors verbs with dynamic meanings that are normally intransitive. Following the studies of

Ó Sé (1922), Filppula also agreed that there were common constructions in Irish, formed by tá

followed by the past participle, as in the following example: Tá sé imithe. [Is he/it gone’] or

Tá sé imithe le seachtain [‘He is gone a week’] (p.121). Hiberno-English instances can be

appreciated in the following example: I think the younger generations are gone idle over it.

And they’re gone useless to a certain extent, (...)

The ‘extended-now perfect’, was frequently used to ‘indicate a state/event/activity that

has been started in the past and introduces the moment of utterance’, and normally followed

by adverbial phrases:

12
 I’m not in this [caravan] long [...] Only have this here a few year. (I haven’t

been...have had this here for a few years)

And = they’re fighting out then years in the North for an all-Ireland republic. (...

they have been fighting…)

Another aspect that has drawn the attention of several authors, is the so-called

‘periphrastic do’. This verbal tense marks habitual aspects, in which the auxiliary do is

unstressed and meaningless, as can be seen in the following sentences:

Two lorries of them [i.e. turf] now in the year we do burn.

They does be lonesome by night, the priest does,surely.

4. Analysis and discussion of results

4.1 Analysis of the Irish English corpora

The results obtained from the corpora are summarized in the following images. The Concord

function was used to qualitative analyzed the samples obtained in the chapter. (In the

Appendixes will be displayed more information about the findings)

Some unexpected results include the lack of the representation of IE grammatical structures,

specifically verbal tenses. However, a few cases of the IAP tense (described in section 3.1)

were found, as illustrated in Image 1:

13
Image 1. Entries of the IAP tense, identified by the use of the adverb ‘never’.

The IAP tense is used as the Present perfect in Standard English, but with the absence

of the auxiliary ‘have’, regarding this feature 25 instances were found. As Wordsmith Tool is

not able to analyze non-standard features, the samples of this feature were obtained by the

search of the adverb ‘never’. In the following Images can be appreciated how this verbal tense

is depicted in the chapters:

Image 2. Samples of the entries regarding IAP tense.

14
Image 3. The positioning of the IAP tense in the chapters.

As can be seen in Images 4 and 5, no evidence of linguistic features regarding the ‘HI

perfect tenses’ were found in the novel. The word ‘after’ is used as a preposition or a

conjunction, but there are not instances regarding the IE ‘after perfect’.

Image 4. The word ‘after’.

Image 5. Examples of the collocation of the word ‘after’.

15
 To continue with samples of IE grammatical structures, only one entry of the

periphrastic do was found in one of the chapters. As illustrated below:

Image 6. Entry on the periphrastic do.

Image 7. Collocation of the periphrastic do within the source text.

As commented in the section 3.1, in Irish Gaelic there was only one word for the

representation of articles (an), an aspect that has been transferred into the Irish English variety

nowadays. Besides, this linguistic feature was also characteristic of the spoken language since

it has been influenced by the historical background of the Ireland regarding oral transmission

and folklore. Thus, it is necessary to comment on the use of the conjunction ‘and’ as well

since it was another of the linguistic features highly represented along the novel, and a

representative feature of oral transmission as well. To determine whether or not these

linguistic features were frequently depicted in the novel, a t-test analysis was carried out in

order to add statistical significance. As illustrated bellow (Table 1), both cases proved to be of

great significance in the representation of the Irish variety in the novel. Furthermore, further

information of the word frequency in each of the chapters, using WordList function, has been

added (see Appendix II).

16
The use of ‘and’ The use of ‘the’

>0,000206415 >0,000267773

The Concord function provided the study with relevant examples of the clusters within

the phrases containing the definite article ‘the’, as illustrated in Image 8:

Image 8. Clusters of the article ‘the’.

The following images (Image 9 and 10) showed the collocations of the conjunction

‘and’ (also used as a subordinator in subordinate clauses), and their position in the chapters:

17
 Image 9. Collocations of the conjunction ‘and’.

Image 10. The positioning of the conjunction ‘and’.

Another representative feature of Irish English syntax is the use of reflexive pronouns as

intensifiers or as ‘boundless’ (defined by Filppula, 1999). In the Images 11 and 12, illustrated

below, can be seen six entries that were identified. In Image 11, examples of the reflexive

pronoun ‘himself’ are illustrated, whereas in Image 12, five entries of the pronoun ‘itself’

were found:

18
 Image 11. Entries on the pronoun ‘himself’.

Image 12. Entries on the pronoun ‘itself’.

4.2 Discussing James Joyce’s linguistic choices

According to these data, a possible interpretation of James Joyce’s linguistic choices in the

novel can be suggested. According to Larkin (2017), there is a special tribute paid to Stewart

Parnell, an Irish politician member of the British House of Commons who died in 1891. He

has argued that Joyce considered this nationalist politician as a representative figure since his

commitment with the country was worthy of admiration. However, even though there are

references to his person in one of the chapters (The Dead), there is not presence of politics or

historical events in the novel. James Joyce have been praised for being an innovative writing

in the early 20th century since he was one of the first writers who depicted the harsh reality of

Ireland during the pre-revolutionary events that will lead to the Irish civil war in the 1920s.

Thus, the fact that these issues have not been mentioned in the novel is related to the linguistic

choices of the author considering that Joyce did not want to enclose the novel in political

debates, the election of the language used in the novel can be related to the fact that Irish

languages is a mark of identity and nationalism that have led to many political and economic

19
struggles. This possible interpretation may be also supported by the publication date of the

novel (1914), when several political conflicts with the British domains where taking place.

5. Conclusion

The aim of the present research was to determine the level of Irishness in James Joyce’s novel

analyzing Irish English non-standard feature, focusing on the linguistic features represented

with more frequency than others. Besides, this paper attempted to examine to what extend the

author of the novel have been faithful to the depiction of the Irish variety without falling into

linguistic stereotypes of the language. The study has identified a great level of Irishness in the

novel, but no evidence of stereotypic linguistic values associated with English dialects.

1.

A key strength of the present study was the analysis of Irish English linguistic

variations in a historic Irish novel. Even though there is previous research on Irish English

writing from literary perspectives, the contribution of this study has been that of providing

additional data about representation of dialectical features and whether or not those

characteristics can be found in literature. The study has confirmed some of the findings of

Filppula (1999) which found evidence of unusual collocations coming originally from Gaelic,

such as the issue of ‘HE perfect tenses’. It is unfortunate that the study did not include

comparisons with other English varieties considering the similarities shared with Northern

English dialects and Scottish varieties, due to space and time limitation. However, it provided

an extensive approach to Gaelic influences on Irish English following a corpus linguistic

analysis. It is suggested that the association of these factors should be contrasted in future

studies.

2.

20
 It was not possible to assess non-standard structures as instances of language

stereotypes; therefore, future research should concentrate on the investigation of dialectical

linguistic features in the context of corpus linguistic analysis.

6. References

Bex, T., & Watts, R. J. (1999). Standard English: The Widening Debate (1) (pp.117-128).
London: Routledge.

Cedergren, J., H., & Sankoff, D. (1974). Variable Rules: Performance as a Statistical
Reflection of Competence. Language, Vol. 50 (2), pp. 333-355. Linguistic Society of
America.

Edwards, J. (2009). Language and identity: an introduction. Cambridge, UK ; New York:

Cambridge University Press.

Filppula, M. (1999). Routledge Studies in Germanic Linguistics: The Grammar of Irish

English: Language in Hibernian Style (1). London. US: Routledge.

Hickey, R. (2005). Varieties of English Around the World: Dublin English: Evolution and
change. Amsterdam. John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Hinton, P. (2000). Stereotypes, social cognition and culture (1st ed.). London; New York:
Routledge.

Kallen, L., J. (1997). Varieties of English Around the World: Focus on Ireland. Philadelphia.
John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Labov, W. (1969). A study of non-standard English. Center for Applied Linguistics.

Washington. D.C. ERIC Clearinghouse for Linguistics.

Larkin, M., F.(2017). James Joyce and the Easter Rising: the first revisionist. The Irish Times.
Retrieved from: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/james-joyce-and-the-easter-rising-
the-first-revisionist-1.2950525

McArthur, T. (1998). The English Languages (pp. 129-134). Cambridge University Press.

Macrae, C. N., Stangor, C., & Hewstone, M. (1996). Stereotypes and Stereotyping. Guilford
Press.

O’Dea, D. (2017). James Joyce the Regionalist: The Irish Homestead, Dubliners, and

Modernism’s Regional Affect. MFS Modern Fiction Studies. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Vol., 63:3, pp. 475-501.

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Apendixes I

Concordance

The use of the article ‘the’

Concordance

The use of the conjunction ‘and’

22
Concordance of reflexive pronouns.

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Appendix II

The following images are the Word lists of frequent words in each of the chapters.

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