15 - English on the Falklands

Summary

Introduction

The Falkland Islands are a South Atlantic archipelago comprising three hundred or so islands, covering an area roughly half the size of Wales and slightly larger than Jamaica (4,700 miles² / 12,173 km²). They lie 8,000 miles (12,800 km) south of the UK and 300 miles (480 km) east of the South American mainland, more or less on the same latitude south as London is north. Since 1833 the islands have been settled by the British and they remain a British colony today.

There are two main islands, East and West Falkland. Stanley, the capital and only town, is located on the far east of East Falkland and is home to almost three-quarters of the population (1,600 people). The remaining 500 or so live in small settlements outside Stanley, varying in size from thirty people to just two or three. Everywhere outside Stanley, including these settlements and the land itself, is collectively known as Camp.

The Falklands have been permanently settled for little under 170 years, making the variety of English which has developed there one of the most recent nativespeaker Englishes in the world. However, amongst other extraterritorial Englishes the development of Falkland Islands English (henceforth FIE) is unique: because of its demography and dialect contact situation, the negligible contact with other languages and by virtue of the fact that, unlike most countries with native-speaker Englishes, the Falklands remain a British colony.