Book contents
- Worldwide Perspectives on English Usage
- Worldwide Perspectives on English Usage
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Section 1 Usage Variation and Codification
- 1 ‘All-Governing Custom’
- 2 On National Dictionaries
- 3 ‘No “Afringlish”, Please, We’re British’
- 4 Being Representative?
- Section 2 Usage Variation amid Social Diversity and Political Change
- Section 3 Corpus-Based Research on Variable Usage in Place and Medium
- Index
- References
2 - On National Dictionaries
Pluricentricity in the Transnational Context and the Example of Standard Canadian English
from Section 1 - Usage Variation and Codification
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 June 2026
Book contents
- Worldwide Perspectives on English Usage
- Worldwide Perspectives on English Usage
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Section 1 Usage Variation and Codification
- 1 ‘All-Governing Custom’
- 2 On National Dictionaries
- 3 ‘No “Afringlish”, Please, We’re British’
- 4 Being Representative?
- Section 2 Usage Variation amid Social Diversity and Political Change
- Section 3 Corpus-Based Research on Variable Usage in Place and Medium
- Index
- References
Summary
This chapter uses the case of Standard Canadian English to argue for the versatility of linguistic pluricentricity in a globalising world. It argues that the traditional roles of standard languages and standard varieties ought to be augmented by translanguaging phenomena and not replaced by them. This is important in particular for speakers of non-dominant standard varieties, such as Canadian English, Quebec French or Brazilian Portuguese, whose linguistic identities may be expressed by non-dominant standard varieties and who have a right to ’pluricentric linguistic justice’. The historical development of Canadian English dictionaries, linked with present-day attitude data that confirms a strong but not universal linguistic autonomy, is used to reflect on ’endonormative stabilisation’, suggesting that claims to phase dating and claims of mono-directionality may be tenuous. It is argued that non-territorially bound varieties, from translanguaging to ELF, must be an addition to, not a replacement of, the familiar concepts of ’state nation’, and ’standard varieties’. Linguistic pluricentricity, enriched by a transnational perspective, is therefore presented as the model of choice.
Keywords
Information
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Worldwide Perspectives on English UsageInto the Third Millennium, pp. 35 - 58Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2026
References
Ammon, U., Bickel, H., Lenz, A. N. et al. (2016). Variantenwörterbuch des Deutschen. Variantenwörterbuch des Deutschen. 2., völlig neu bearbeitete und erweiterte Auflage. Berlin: de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Avis, W. S. (1957/58). Review of a Dictionary of Americanisms. Ed. Mathews, Mitford M. Queen’s Quarterly, 64, 147–148.Google Scholar
Avis, W. S., Crate, C., Drysdale, P., Leechman, D., Scargill, M. H., Lovell, C. J. (Eds.). (1967). A Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles. Toronto: W. J. Gage. www.dchp.ca/dchp2 (7 May 2024).Google Scholar
Bagga-Gupta, S. (2022). RE-. Vocabularies we live by in the language and educational sciences. In Makoni, et al. (Eds.) (pp. 61–84).Google Scholar
CELPIP. (2024). Paragon Testing Services, www.celpip.ca/take-celpip/overview/ (2 May 2024).Google Scholar
Clyne, M. G. (Ed.). (1992). Pluricentric Languages. Differing Norms in Different Nations. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Costa-Carreras, J. (2021). Compositionality, pluricentricity, and pluri-areality in the Catalan Standardisation. In Cortijo Ocaña, A. & Martines, V. (Eds.), History of Catalonia and Its Implications for Contemporary Nationalism and Cultural Conflict (pp. 182–197). Hershey, PA: IGI Global.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cramer, J. (2014). Perceptual dialectology. In Oxford Handbook Topics in Linguistics. Online edition, ed. by Anon., https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199935345.013.60 (1 May 2024).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DCHP-3 = Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles, 3rd ed. In progress, https://dchp.arts.ubc.ca/entries/visible%20minority (7 May 2023).Google Scholar
Dhondt, A. (2024). Pluricentrisme in de praktijk: Naar een methode voor de codificatie van grammaticale verschillen tussen Belgisch Nederlands en Nederlands Nederlands. PhD thesis, University of Ghent.Google Scholar
Doherty, A. (2020). The Western Canadian Dictionary and the making of the Canadian West. MA thesis, UBC Department of English Language and Literatures.Google Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2015). The Written Questionnaire in Social Dialectology: History, Theory, Practice. Amsterdam: Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2019a). The Pluricentricity Debate: On Austrian German and Other Germanic Standard Varieties. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2019b). Creating Canadian English: The Professor, the Mountaineer, and a National Variety of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2020). English in Canada. In Nelson, C., Proshina, Z. & Davis, D. (Eds.), Handbook of World Englishes, 2nd ed. (pp. 52–69). Malden, MA: Blackwell-Wiley.Google Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2021). Österreichisches Deutsch oder Deutsch in Österreich? Identitäten im 21. Jahrhundert. [Austrian German or German in Austria? Identities in the 21st Century] 3rd ed. Vienna: New Academic Press https://www.nid-library.com/Home/ViewBook/512.Google Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2023). Afterword: Who is afraid of pluricentric perspectives? In Callies, M. & Hehner, S. (Eds.), Pluricentric Languages and Language Education: Pedagogical Implications and Innovative Approaches to Language Teaching (pp. 217–221). Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Dollinger, S. (2025). Dialectology as ‘language making’: Hegemonic disciplinary discourse and the One Standard German Axiom (OSGA). In Wagner, S & Stange-Hundsdörfer, U (Eds.), (Dia)lects in the 21st Century: Selected Papers from Methods in Dialectology XVII (Mainz, 2022) (pp. 287–318). Berlin: Language Science Press.Google Scholar
Dollinger, S. & Hinrichs, L. (2026). Canadian language attitudes from ‘coast to coast to coast’: On the pluricentricity of English. Australian Journal of Linguistics, 46(2), online first.Google Scholar
Dollinger, S. & Huber, M. (2024). Pluricentric languages: retrospect and prospect. In Nesi, H. & Milin, P. (Eds.), International Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, 3rd ed. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Drudi, C. (2024). At last: Work begins on new Canadian dictionary. Quill and Quire, 17 Apr. 2024, https://quillandquire.com/omni/at-last-work-begins-on-new-canadian-dictionary/Google Scholar
Drysdale, P. D. & Barber, K. (2006). Dictionary. In The Canadian Encyclopedia. www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/dictionary (1 May 2024).Google Scholar
Fee, M. & McAlpine, J. (1997). Guide to Canadian English Usage. 1st ed. Toronto: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Fee, M. & McAlpine, J. (2011). Guide to Canadian English Usage. 2nd ed., corrected reprint. Toronto: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
García, O. & Wei, L. (2014). Translanguaging: Language, Bilingualism and Education. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haugen, E. (1972 [1966]). Dialect, language, nation. In Firchow, E. S (Ed.), Studies by Einar Haugen: Presented on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday, April 19, 1971 (pp. 496–509). Berlin: Mouton De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Hundt, M. (2013). The diversification of English: Old, new and emerging epicentres. In Schreier, D. & Hundt, M. (Eds.), English as a Contact Language (pp. 182–203). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ivašković, I. (2024). Examining political influence on language: Contradictory linguistic lexical purging in the Croatian context. Journal of Language and Politics. Online First.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krämer, P., Kolehmainen, L. & Vogl, U. (2022). What is ‘language making’? International Journal for the Sociology of Language, 274, 1–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lambert, J. (2020). Lexicography and World Englishes. In Schreier, D., Hundt, M. & Schneider, E. (Eds.), Cambridge Handbook of World Englishes (pp. 408–435). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Leitner, G. (1992). English as a pluricentric language. In Clyne, (Ed.) (pp. 179–237).Google Scholar
Mahboob, A. (2017). Reimaging language competence: On professionalism. TESOL Profession Summit, 9–10 Feb. 2017. Handout (6 May 2024).Google Scholar
Mahboob, A. & Liang, J. (2014). Researching and critiquing World Englishes. Asian Englishes, 16(2), 125–140.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Makoni, S., Severo, C. G., Abdelhay, A. & Kaiper-Marquez, A. (Eds.). (2022). The Languaging of Higher Education in the Global South: De-colonizing the Language of Scholarship and Pedagogy. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, A. (2018). When theory is a joke: The Weinrich witticism in linguistics. Beiträge zur Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaft, 28(2), 263–292.Google Scholar
Maxwell, A. (2022). Noam Chomsky and the language/dialect dichotomy. Beiträge zur Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaft, 32, 72–98.Google Scholar
Morris, E. E. (1898). Austral English: A Dictionary of Australasian Words, Phrases and Usages. London: MacMillan.Google Scholar
Muhr, R. & Thomas, J. (Eds.). Pluricentric Theory beyond Dominance and Non-dominance. Graz: PCL-PRESS.Google Scholar
Oakes, L. (2021). Pluricentric linguistic justice: A new ethics-based approach to pluricentricity in French and other languages. Sociolinguistica, 35(1), 49–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oakes, L. & Peled, Y. (2018). Normative Language Policy: Ethics, Politics, Principles. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Peters, P. & Burridge, K. (Eds.). (2021). Exploring the Ecology of World Englishes. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Peters, P., Smith, A. & Korhonen, M. (2022). Epicentral effects on -ed/-t inflectional variation in Australasian Englishes 1850–2020. World Englishes, 41(3), 446–461. https://doi.org/10.1111/weng.12588CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piller, I. (2017). Intercultural Communication: A Critical Introduction. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pitzl, M.-L. (2018). Creativity in English as a Lingua Franca: Idiom and Metaphor. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Saraceni, M. (2014). A response to ‘Researching and Critiquing World Englishes’, by A. Mahboob and J. Liang. Asian Englishes, 16(3), 259–260.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scherr, E. & Ziegler, A. (2023). A question of dominance: Statistically approaching grammatical variation in German standard language across borders. Journal of Linguistic Geography, 11, 91–103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schmied, J. (2014). Comment on ‘Researching and critiquing World Englishes’ (A. Mahboob and J. Liang). Asian Englishes, 16(3), 261–263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schneider, E. W. (2007). Postcolonial English: Varieties around the World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schneider, E. W. (2022). Parameters of epicentral status. World Englishes, 41, 462–474.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seidlhofer, B. (2011). Understanding English as a Lingua Franca. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Skagen, E. (2021). Opinion: Canada needs a consistently updated dictionary. Quill & Quire, 8 Sept. 2021. Online.Google Scholar
Stewart, W. (1968). A sociolinguistic typology for describing national multilingualism. In Fishman, J (Ed.), Readings in the Sociology of Language (pp. 530–545). Den Haag: Mouton.Google Scholar
Ulster-Scots Agency. (2024). ‘The aims of the Ulster-Scots Agency are to promote the study, conservation, development and use of Ulster-Scots as a living language’. https://ulsterscotsagency.com/about-us/ (2 May 2024).Google Scholar
Van Rooy, R. (2020). Language or Dialect? The History of a Conceptual Pair. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinreich, M. (1945). Der Yivo und di problemen fun undzer tsayt. Yivo Bleter, 25(1), 3–18.Google Scholar
Wide, C., Norrby, C. & Oakes, L. (2021). New perspectives on pluricentricity. Sociolinguistica, 35(1), 1–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yáñez-Bouza, N., Rodrígues-Gil, M. E. & Pérez-Guerra, J. (Eds.). (2024). New Horizons in Prescriptivism Research. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.Google Scholar
Yu, S. (2018). Canadianisms in the Collins Canadian Dictionary (2010, 2011, and 2016): Representativeness, comprehensiveness, and accuracy. ENGL 507A Seminar paper. UBC Vancouver.Google Scholar
Accessibility standard: WCAG 2.2 AAA
Why this information is here
This section outlines the accessibility features of this content - including support for screen readers, full keyboard navigation and high-contrast display options. This may not be relevant for you.Accessibility Information
The HTML of this chapter
complies with version 2.2 of the
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
(WCAG), offering more comprehensive accessibility measures for a broad range
of users and attains the highest
(AAA)
level of WCAG compliance, optimising the user experience by meeting the most extensive
accessibility guidelines.
Content Navigation
Table of contents navigation
Allows you to navigate directly to chapters, sections, or non‐text items through a linked table of contents, reducing the need for extensive scrolling.
Allows you to navigate directly to chapters, sections, or non‐text items through a linked table of contents, reducing the need for extensive scrolling.
Index navigation
Provides an interactive index, letting you go straight to where a term or subject appears in the text without manual searching.
Provides an interactive index, letting you go straight to where a term or subject appears in the text without manual searching.
Reading Order & Textual Equivalents
Single logical reading order
You will encounter all content (including footnotes, captions, etc.) in a clear, sequential flow, making it easier to follow with assistive tools like screen readers.
You will encounter all content (including footnotes, captions, etc.) in a clear, sequential flow, making it easier to follow with assistive tools like screen readers.
Short alternative textual descriptions
You get concise descriptions (for images, charts, or media clips), ensuring you do not miss crucial information when visual or audio elements are not accessible.
You get concise descriptions (for images, charts, or media clips), ensuring you do not miss crucial information when visual or audio elements are not accessible.
Full alternative textual descriptions
You get more than just short alt text: you have comprehensive text equivalents, transcripts, captions, or audio descriptions for substantial non‐text content, which is especially helpful for complex visuals or multimedia.
You get more than just short alt text: you have comprehensive text equivalents, transcripts, captions, or audio descriptions for substantial non‐text content, which is especially helpful for complex visuals or multimedia.
Visualised data also available as non-graphical data
You can access graphs or charts in a text or tabular format, so you are not excluded if you cannot process visual displays.
You can access graphs or charts in a text or tabular format, so you are not excluded if you cannot process visual displays.
Visual Accessibility
Use of colour is not sole means of conveying information
You will still understand key ideas or prompts without relying solely on colour, which is especially helpful if you have colour vision deficiencies.
You will still understand key ideas or prompts without relying solely on colour, which is especially helpful if you have colour vision deficiencies.
Use of high contrast between text and background colour
You benefit from high‐contrast text, which improves legibility if you have low vision or if you are reading in less‐than‐ideal lighting conditions.
You benefit from high‐contrast text, which improves legibility if you have low vision or if you are reading in less‐than‐ideal lighting conditions.