none 10.1075/veaw.g44.13mcc John Benjamins Publishing Company John Benjamins Publishing Company 1757 67856449 1421649 1421602 202507031802000014 10.1075 2025-07-03T12:01:07Z 2014-03-23T18:21:38Z 58 0172-7362 10.1075/veaw https://benjamins.com/ catalog/veaw Bettina Migge University College Dublin https://ror.org/05m7pjf47 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3305-7113 Máire Ní Chiosáin University College Dublin https://ror.org/05m7pjf47 This volume brings together current research by international scholars on the varieties of English spoken in Ireland. The papers apply contemporary theoretical and methodological approaches and frameworks to a range of topics. A number of papers explore the distribution of linguistic features in Irish English, including the evolution of linguistic structures in Irish English and linguistic change in progress, employing broadly quantitative sociolinguistic approaches. Pragmatic features of Irish English are explored through corpus linguistics-based analysis. The construction of linguistic corpora using written and recorded material form the focus of other papers, extending and analyzing the growing range of corpus material available to researchers of varieties of English, including diaspora varieties. Issues of language and identity in contemporary Ireland are explored in several contributions using both qualitative and quantitative methods. The volume will be of interest to linguists generally, and to scholars with an interest in varieties of English. G44 11 15 2012 10 22 2012 9789027249043 9789027273178 John Benjamins Publishing Company Amsterdam 10.1075/veaw.g44 http://www.jbe-platform.com/content/books/9789027273178 https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1075/veaw.g44/html https://www.jbe-platform.com/deliver/fulltext/9789027273178.pdf Kevin McCafferty University of Bergen https://ror.org/03zga2b32 Carolina P. Amador-Moreno University of Extremadura https://ror.org/0174shg90 A tool for studying the history and evolution of Irish English Using samples from the Corpus of Irish English Correspondence , the rise of the progressive in Irish English is traced from the late eighteenth to the mid-nineteenth century. Comparison with other varieties shows the progressive was no more frequent in Irish English than in other varieties up to the late eighteenth century. However, in the nineteenth century it outstrips other Englishes, supporting the hypothesis that this development in English generally might have been driven by Irish immigration. However, peculiarly Irish uses of the progressive are not well attested in the corpus data, even in the mid-nineteenth century. This paper suggests that increasing literacy drove the development in Ireland, with vernacular uses of the progressive increasing in step with literacy levels. Keywords: Irish English; corpus; emigrant letters; progressive aspect; literacy 11 15 2012 10 22 2012 265 288 10.1075/veaw.g44.13mcc https://benjamins.com/catalog/veaw.g44.13mcc https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1075/veaw.g44.13mcc/html