The Role of Local Identity in the Usage and Recognition of Anglo-Cornish Dialect Lexis

Abstract

Despite the well attested finding that orientation to place can exhibit correlations with sociolinguistic usage, the role of place identity in sociolinguistic variation and change has been long disputed. The disputes often center around two key points. Firstly, a contested point is whether observed identity effects are independent statistically meaningful effects or whether they are corollaries of effects relating to other socio-demographic features such as age or socioeconomic class. Secondly, when place identity effects are found in sociolinguistic usage, few studies have explored the extent to which these effects can be attributed to acts of identity or to common interactions that can be influenced by attitudinal factors such as local orientation. To delve into these issues, I analyze lexical data from Cornwall and highlight the complexity involved in interpreting the role of place identity in sociolinguistic usage. I advocate, to varying extents, for both the act of identity and interlocutor frequency interpretations for different data sets.