Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 September 2009
Whenever by choice or fate men set out on journeys across the earth they drag the burden of their past with them as a snail drags its shell. No matter how ardent the adventurer or how inescapable the exile, ghosts of the past lurk at the back of the voyager's mind to bemuse him.
(Sidney Baker 1947: 13)Introduction
The origins and development of New Zealand English are, quite obviously, intimately intertwined with the history of immigration to New Zealand. In this chapter, therefore, we survey the European settlement history of New Zealand and its relation to the development of New Zealand English. As will be seen in Chapters 6 and 7, historical factors, in particular population figures and places of origin, are important to any consideration of how new dialects develop. If we are to consider concepts such as the ‘founder effect’ (Mufwene 1996), ‘First Effective Settlement doctrine’ (Zelinsky 1992: 13; Labov 2001: 45), ‘swamping’ (Lass 1990), or processes involved in ‘koinéisation’ (Trudgill 1986b) in relation to New Zealand English (see Chapter 7), then specific historical information is needed.
Historical background: the immigrants
The investigation of the origins and evolution of New Zealand English requires an understanding of both sociolinguistics and history.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.