Zhytomyr State University LibraryAmerican English in its historical and sociolinguistic contextsV. V.YevchenkoauthorThe article focuses on some aspects of the functioning of the English language in North America and the evolution of its social functions in connection with the formation and the development of the North American variant of English. The article brings into focus the genetic and functional status of American English and states its main distinctive features as a language variant of the English language. The article adopts a historical approach to the development of morphological divergences of North American English usage. The article provides historical evidence supported by illustrations taken from Shakespeare’s works to a peculiar character of the North American usage of adverbs without the adverbial suffix -ly and their counterparts with the adverbial suffix. The article also touches upon the problem of American English and British English interrelationship in the contemporary sociolinguistic contexts, on the process of divergent and convergent developments of the transplanted variety and its mainland source. The article points out three possible forms of North American influences on British English: introduction of new forms, reintroduction of old forms and a supporting effect on the process underway. The article states that the North American English distinctive features seen in the usage of adverbs without the adverbial suffix -ly in literary oral and written types of discourse are not innovations but factually optional realizations revealed in usage. They show regional language variation determined by common linguistic and different sociolinguistic factors of the evolution of the same language system.P Philology. Linguistics2017Вид-во ЖДУ ім. І.ФранкаArticle

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