3. A new dialect for a new village: Evidence for koinéization in East Kent

Abstract

The construction of Aylesham as 'new town' for miners in East Kent brought together migrants from every UK coalfield, providing conditions for dialect mixing and koineization comparable to those described by Trudgill (2004) for colonial settings such as New Zealand. Trudgill's deterministic model of new dialect formation is tested here using data from a pilot study conducted in the village, and found broadly to be valid for internal migrant as well as tabula rasa settings. An important difference, however, lies in evidence of the emergence of a new dialect in the first, rather than the second indigenous Aylesham generation as the model would predict.