Earlier North American Englishes

A multi-year project on dialects in Ontario, Canada demonstrates how synchronic variation mirrors historical trajectories of change. Three linguistic features are examined, come vs. came, adjectives of smallness and 3rd person male referents. Using quantitative methods and a comparative sociolinguistic approach, I demonstrate how these features vary by geographical location, date of birth and social and linguistic factors. Some features are stable, providing a foundation of constancy. Other feat