Celebrating 30 years of the ... - Memorial University



|Celebrating 30 years of the Dictionary of Newfoundland English: |

|Newfoundland and Labrador English Symposium |

| |

|Saturday, November 10, 2012 |

|Memorial University |

|A1046 |

|Program |

|8:00-9:00 |Set-up/Welcome |

| |Beginnings of the DNE, toponomy and onomastics |

| |Chair: Robert Hollett |

|9:00-9:30 |Writing the DNE, 1954-1982 |

| |Jeff Webb- Associate Professor, History |

| | |

| |This talk will give a brief account of the impetus and the evolution of the Dictionary of Newfoundland English. Particular|

| |attention will be paid to the contribution of the three authors, George Story, William Kirwin and John |

| |Widdowson and how their varied backgrounds led to the DNE. |

|9:30-10:00 |Toponymy in Newfoundland: Some history and links to Folklore |

| |Shamus MacDonald, PhD Candidate, Folklore |

| | |

| |This paper provides an overview of place name research in Newfoundland. It illustrates the important ties that exist |

| |between toponymy, history and folklore in the province. |

|10:00-10:30 |Newfoundland and Labrador Family Name Changes in the Twentieth Century |

| |Philip Hiscock, Associate Professor, Folklore |

| | |

| |In the twentieth century, thousands of Newfoundlanders engaged in a kind of identity management through the phonic |

| |re-construction of their surnames, in an attempt to bring their family name in line with their contemporary desires for |

| |controlled connotations. This paper examines cases of this surname re-modelling. |

|10:30-11:00 |Coffee break |

| |Language variation in Newfoundland |

| |Chair: Gerard Van Herk |

|11:00-11:30 |Phonetic creativity and the (he)art of storytelling |

| |Paul De Decker, Assistant Professor, Linguistics |

| | |

| |In this presentation I will show how the use of verbs of quotation by Newfoundlanders and Labradorians has changed over |

| |the past 60 years. While newer forms like those found in cases such "She was like, 'I LOVES it!'" might be seen as leading|

| |to the loss of a distinctive Newfoundland dialect, I argue that these verbs enable young Newfoundlanders to create dynamic|

| |stories, employing traditional dialect features in creative and unique ways - pronunciations they might not otherwise use |

| |in their day to day speech. |

|11:30-12:00 |Stop and go (away): Linguistic consequences of non-local aspirations among small-town Newfoundland youth |

| |Sarah Knee, PhD Candidate, Linguistics |

| | |

| |This study investigates the role of local affiliation and social aspiration by examining the production of ‘th’ sounds |

| |among twelve adolescents in New-Wes-Valley. Informants share social characteristics and community, but differ in sex and |

| |aspiration: some intend to remain in the community, while others plan to leave at the earliest opportunity. We found that |

| |youth with local aspirations were significantly more likely to produce ‘th’ as ‘t’ or ‘d’ than youth with non-local |

| |aspirations. |

|12:00-12:30 |Mapping regional diversity: Introducing the Online Dialect Atlas of Newfoundland and Labrador English |

| |Sandra Clarke, Professor Emerita, University Research Professor, Linguistics |

| | |

| |To date, there has been no thorough investigation of regional language variation throughout the province. This talk |

| |introduces the Dialect Atlas of Newfoundland and Labrador, designed to fill this gap. The atlas is grounded in data |

| |assembled by linguist Harold Paddock in the 1970s and 1980s, and represents the speech of over 200 older residents of the |

| |province, from 90 different coastal communities. Online and interactive, the atlas is now almost fully completed, under |

| |the direction of faculty members affiliated with Memorial University’s English Language Research Centre, in conjunction |

| |with DELTS and C & C Webworks. This talk demonstrates the features of the atlas, and shows how patterns of regional |

| |variation provide insights into our linguistic and settlement history. |

|12:30-2:00 |Lunch/ELRC tour |

| |Fieldwork in Newfoundland and Labrador |

| |Chair: Robert Hollett |

|2:00-2:30 |In the field with Dr. John Widdowson |

| |Suzanne Power, M. A. Candidate, Linguistics |

| | |

| |This presentation is a collage of fieldwork stories from DNE editor Dr. John Widdowson. These stories come from an |

| |interview recorded at the English Language Research Centre in August 2012 and are accompanied by photographs from the ELRC|

| |files dating back to the 1960s. |

|2:30-3:00 | “Our Little Townie”: Observing and performing in Ferryland |

| |Rachel Deal, M. A. Candidate, Linguistics |

| | |

| |Thanks to a local thespian my fieldwork took me to Ferryland, where I observed and partook in their dinner theatre. “Away |

| |with ya!” was locally written, produced, and performed. This combination has been ideal for studying cultural identity and|

| |authenticity across performance and interview speech. This talk will describe my experience in Ferryland as well as some |

| |of my findings. |

|3:00-3:30 |English in Labrador |

| |Jennifer Thorburn, PhD Candidate Linguistics |

| |Although there is a long history of studying English in Newfoundland, there is relatively little work on English in |

| |Labrador, even though some scholars consider the continental portion of this province to be “even more of a language |

| |museum” than Newfoundland (Orkin 1970:100). In this talk, I provide an overview of research on English in Labrador, |

| |beginning with a historical perspective and culminating with my own experiences working in Nain, an Inuit community on |

| |Labrador’s north coast. |

|3:30-4:00 |Coffee break |

| |Building Identity |

| |Chair: Suzanne Power |

|4:00-4:30 |You deal with what she brings: performances of masculinity in Newfoundland offshore workers' narratives |

| |Nicholas Hartmann, PhD Candidate, Folklore |

| | |

| |The traditional notion of manhood in Newfoundland, long connected to the fishery, faced a crisis following the 1992 cod |

| |moratorium. The rise of the offshore oil industry brings up important questions regarding the role of the working man in |

| |Newfoundland families. This paper examines, via the study of occupational narrative, how tradition is maintained and |

| |adapted in the present era. |

|4:30-5:00 |Enregister now! Salience, enregisterment, and Newfoundland English and identity |

| |Gerard Van Herk, Associate Professor, Canada Research Chair in Regional Language and Oral Text, Linguistics |

| | |

| |This paper looks at how the commodification and enregisterment of Newfoundland English – especially through comedy and |

| |advertising – leads to some linguistic features becoming more socially important than others, and how that is reflected in|

| |the choices speakers make. |

|5:00-5:30 |Closing remarks |

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