A Variationist Analysis of Quotatives in Ottawa English

Abstract

This study investigates variation and change in the quotative system in Ottawa English and provides a comparative sociolinguistic analysis of its development. A corpus of spontaneous speech of 30 speakers of Ottawa English stratified according to age and sex is compiled to provide a quantitative analysis of the effects of some social and linguistic factors on the distribution of quotative variants in this variety. The results show that the choice of quotative variants is socially and linguistically constrained. The results also show that the distribution of the quotative variants in Ottawa English has changed due to the incorporation of the incoming variant be like. The results also confirm that younger speakers use this variant more than their older counterparts with younger female speakers leading the change. Moreover, the results provide a further piece of evidence in favor of the advanced stage of grammaticalization that be like has undergone. Furthermore, the results demonstrate that while be like is completely absent from the speech of older speakers in Ottawa English, it seems that this variant has eventually found its way to the discourse of older female speakers in Ottawa English. This result in particular shows the efficacy of conducting more variationist studies on an intensively discussed variable to provide updates regarding the level of variation and change it has reached. Keywords: Canadian English, Language Variation & Change, Ottawa English, Quotative System, Variationist Approach.