Dialect and its types

Dialect

Definition:
A regional or social variety of a language distinguished by pronunciation, grammar, or vocabulary, especially a way of speaking that differs from the standard variety of the language. Adjective: dialectal.
The scientific study of dialects is known as dialectology, commonly regarded as a subfield of sociolinguistics.

What Is a Dialect?

"To a linguist, no dialect is inherently better or worse than any other"

One common myth about language is that a dialect is always somebody else's peculiar way of speaking, never our own.
But the truth is, everybody speaks a dialect (or a lect, as some linguists would have it). It may be standard or nonstandard, urban or rural, but it's a distinctive form of the language all the same--a variety of the mother tongue that most of us learned in early childhood. To a linguist, no dialect is inherently better or worse than any other.
The same goes for accents--though accents and dialects aren't quite the same. Your accent is simply the way you pronounce words. A dialect involves vocabulary and grammar as well as pronunciation. And dialects come in various overlapping shapes and sizes.
There are national dialects, such as American English, Irish English, and Philippine English. There are also regional dialects, spoken in specific areas of a country; social dialects (or sociolects), associated with certain classes or occupational groups; and ethnic dialects, commonly used by members of a particular ethnic group.
Finally, there's the language variety unique to each individual speaker. That's called an idiolect.
So in that sense, it's true that we all speak different dialects of the same language. What's remarkable is that we understand one another as well as we do (something linguists call mutual intelligibility).
Of course, sometimes--like the legendary Englishman, Scotsman, and Irishman at the bar--it may take a few drinks to facilitate communication.

Regional dialect

Definition:
The distinct form of a language spoken in a certain geographical area.
If the form of speech transmitted from a parent to a child is a distinct regional dialect, that dialect is said to be the child's vernacular.

Lexical variation

“ happen she were wearing a mask ”

The use of happen here meaning ‘perhaps’ or ‘maybe’ is an example of lexical variation — differences in vocabulary. It probably locates the speaker somewhere in an area centred on the Pennines: Yorkshire or Lancashire or adjacent areas of the East Midlands. The popular image of dialect speech tends to focus almost exclusively on dialect vocabulary and although there was at one time greater regional variation in vocabulary across the UK, there remains a great deal of lexical diversity.

Phonological variation

“ happen she were wearing a mask ”

The pronunciation of the word mask here could be very revealing. A well-known difference in British accents is the distinction between speakers in the north and south. Those in the north generally pronounce words such as bath, grass and dance with a short vowel — rather like the vowel in the word cat. Those in the south use a long vowel, rather like the sound you make when the doctor examines your throat. So you can immediately deduce something about a person who pronounces baths to rhyme with maths or pass to rhyme with mass.

Grammatical variation

“ happen she were wearing a mask ”

Grammar is the structure of a language or dialect. It describes the way individual words change their form, such as when play becomes played, to indicate an event in past time. It also refers to the way words are combined to form phrases or sentences. The construction she were wearing a mask might sound unusual to some ears, but in some dialects in northern England and the Midlands, many speakers indicate the past tense of ‘to be’ by saying I were, you were, he, she and it were, we were and they were. This means the verb is unmarked for person, while speakers of Standard English differentiate by using I was and he, she and it was. Some dialects, perhaps particularly those in the South East of England, favour a similarly unmarked version using the singular form of the verb I was, you was, he, she and it was, we was and they was.

Social Variation

“ maybe she was wearing a cap ”

This statement, if pronounced without an obvious regional accent, appears to reveal little about the speaker — certainly in terms of his regional origins. But the pronunciation of the final consonant in the word wearing might reveal a great deal about a speaker’s social background or the context in which he is speaking. Most people either use the <n> sound in finger, or they use the <n> sound in fin. In popular writing, the latter pronunciation is often transcribed as wearin’ and this usually conveys the sense that the speaker is either from a lower socio-economic group or is speaking in an informal situation.

Making speech fit the situation

All native speakers adjust their speech patterns depending on context: from relaxed conversation in familiar surroundings to a more formal setting. Most of us have been accused of having a ‘telephone voice’. We all have a range of different voices — for talking to children, talking to friends in the pub, making a presentation or talking to a foreigner and we modify our speech accordingly. In most cases, the changes we make are extremely subtle but nonetheless noticeable, and a perfectly natural way of making the people we are talking to feel at ease. Often this process is subconscious and we are simply expressing a shared identity or group solidarity or attempting to present a certain image. However, the range of any given speaker’s repertoire is defined by who he or she is. People from different geographical places speak differently, but even within the same small community, people might speak differently according to their age, gender, ethnicity and social or educational background.