LLS Colloquium: Wait what?! An emerging change in spoken English (with evidence from York 1997-2018)

On Thursday 1st December 2022, Sali Tagliamonte (University of Toronto) will be presenting on "An emerging change in spoken English (with evidence from York 1997-2018)".

Talk: Wait what?! An emerging change in spoken English (with evidence from York 1997-2018)

This study investigates a discourse-pragmatic use of the word wait that has recently developed in contemporary English (Tagliamonte 2021). The new function is an extension from an original lexical meaning of pausing or lingering which has extended to indicate a pause in discourse as a speaker reflects on or corrects an earlier topic. In Canada, the Ontario Dialects Project (Tagliamonte 2003-present) offers an early assessment of variation among alternates of this innovative use and enables a quantitative analysis of social and linguistic factors in order to understand the underlying processes. 

Analysis reveals that this development follow well-known principles of linguistic change: older people use longer, more temporally specified variants, wait a minute/wait a second; there is a robust increase in use of wait alone, e.g. “I haven’t seen her yet. No wait. Yes, I have”, co-occurrence with other markers, e.g. no, and the function of self-correction/commentary arises among individuals born after 1970 with women leading its advance.

This development raises the question of whether this feature is evolving elsewhere in the English-speaking world and if so how. Fortuitously, data collected in York in 1997, 2008, 2013, and 2018 provides comparative evidence and a striking documentation of the actuation of this change, that may still be advancing in the city.

The talk will take place at 5pm in the Dianna Bowles Lecture Theatre (B/K/018), followed by a drinks reception in the Deborah Hines room. 

Event poster: LLS Colloquium: Wait what?! An emerging change in spoken English (with evidence from York 1997-2018)