Phraseology and Culture in English

Daniel Schreier 
who traditionally represented local values and were held in high esteem by 
other Vineyarders, also by the comparatively more urban population 
groups on the island. Labov argued that the reversal of this language 
change, which in effect saw the revival or intensification of a feature that 
was in the process of dying out, was to be explained by the fact that raised 
/ay/ diphthongs became socially significant: “It is apparent that the imme-
diate meaning of this phonetic feature is ‘Vineyarder.’ When a man says
[ r
º×t ] or [ hºÿs ], he is unconsciously establishing the fact that he belongs 
to the island: that he is one of the natives to whom the island really be-
longs” (Labov 1972: 36). The intensification of Canadian raising on Mar-
tha’s Vineyard is thus a direct consequence of an increase in tourists 
spending their summer holidays on Martha’s Vineyard and mainlanders 
buying up property on the island (which led to antipathy and scepticism in 
the local population, as epitomized by an islander’s claim that “You can 
cross the island from one end to the other without stepping on anything 
but No Trespassing signs”, quoted in Labov 1972: 28). The more the local 
Vineyarders felt threatened by outsiders with more financial means, the 
more they oriented themselves towards local values and symbolically em-
brace local language features as an expression of solidarity and group 
membership. 
Another case of dialect intensification comes from Smith Island, Mary-
land (as documented in Schilling-Estes 2002; Wolfram and Schilling-Estes 
2003), which is situated in the Chesapeake Bay, southwest of Washington 
DC. The current island population is declining rapidly, from about 700 
residents in 1960 to 364 in the (2000) census. Local employment opportu-
nities decreased, as the island has no heavy industry and an island-based 
crabbing and oystering industry has continuously declined in recent dec-
ades. The decline of a local job market forced islanders to leave their homes 
in search of employment elsewhere. Moreover, significant areas of Smith 
Island may soon become uninhabitable as a result of soil erosion, and there 
is some speculation that the island may be physically sinking into Chesa-
peake Bay. The outflux of the local workforce is not countered by an influx 
of tourists and new residents coming to live on the island. Even though 
these conditions might favour the thinning-out, and eventually the loss, of 
the community’s traditional dialect features, as they have in locales such as 
Ocracoke, Schilling-Estes (2002) and Schilling-Estes and Wolfram (1999) 
document an opposite scenario, namely a rapid increase in the usage of 
local features. Leveling to weren’t increases to an extent that it “is near-
categorical for the younger generations of speakers” (Wolfram and Schil-

---

Greetings as an act of identity in Tristan da Cunha English 
367
ling-Estes 2003: 140), and younger Smith Islanders intensify the local re-
alizations of /ai/ and /au/ diphthongs to [ 
Ä× ~ ¼× ] and [ aø ~ aÆ ], respec-
tively. They thus display a strong tendency to intensify their local dialect 
features as a symbolic reaction against the economic threats and the is-
land’s uncertain future. 
In sum, historically isolated communities may react differently when fac-
ing an influx of tourists and / or new residents, or when their cohesion and 
survival is threatened by economic hardships and increasing outmigration. 
Such developments may either lead to the dissipation and loss of local lan-
guage features (as documented on Ocracoke, NC) or else to their intensifica-
tion, as a symbolic reaction against the threat and perceived pressures faced 
by the community (as found on Martha’s Vineyard and on Smith Island). 
This leads us back to the discussion of the pragmatic value and interpretation 
of the greeting formula how you is? on Tristan da Cunha, which now offers 
the opportunity to explore how localized greeting formulae develop in a com-
munity that is becoming increasingly mobile and whose social networks are 
constantly expanding.