4 Type nouns in some varieties of English

Abstract

This article expands research on type nouns by looking at varieties of English other than British and American English. It investigates if the various uses of type nouns established in previous descriptions are also attested in other varieties and with what frequency. It does so by comprehensive corpus research of data extracted from the ICE-corpora and COCA. Special attention will go to the formal as well as semantic characteristics of the various uses of type nouns, their collocational patterns and the division of labour between the various type nouns, i.e. sort, kind and type. Differences and similarities between American English and other varieties are studied and results show, for instance, that the nominal qualifier use of sort/kind of is absent in the other varieties. The corpus study also reveals new patterns like kinda of which have to be considered as non-standard at this point. In addition, it seems that all manner of is making a recovery. Outer and inner circle varieties show differences in terms of the use of sort and kind, such that in outer circle varieties the binominal and postdeterminer uses are more frequent. However, in inner circle varieties, these type nouns are most frequently used as an adverbial modifier or discourse marker. The study confirms the general tendency that elements typically shift from propositional uses to non-propositional ones and argues that taking a global view is necessary in type noun research.