This paper is concerned with one of the features typically associated with genderlectal differentiation in language, namely tag questions. It investigates the repertoire of tag questions in Indian English, comprising both canonical and non-canonical tags such as invariant isn’t it and the indigenous forms no/na. Both a quantitative and a qualitative approach are chosen. Firstly, we apply a multifactorial analysis to the data derived from the private dialogues in the International Corpus of English for India (ICE-India) in order to determine the interplay of (sociolinguistic) context factors for the occurrence of specific tag question types. Secondly, we consider patterns of social interaction and their linguistic correlates in all-female, all-male, and mixed-group conversations, thus trying to establish locally meaningful uses of tags. We also offer some general considerations on the feasibility of integrating more recent sociolinguistic approaches towards the category of gender in corpus-linguistic research.

INTRODUCTION

The global spread of English in new forms and functions has prompted several suggestions for updates on existing taxonomies or altogether new models of the evolution of Englishes. While most researchers would readily concur with the pronouncement that “recent realities seem to be rendering the ENL [English as a Native Language] – ESL [English as a Second Language] distinction increasingly obsolete” (Schneider 2007: 13), the debate about a similar blurring of the boundaries between ESL/ Outer Circle and EFL (English as a Foreign Language)/Expanding Circle is still in full swing, as this volume testifies. The editors’ own proposal, the Extra- and Intra-territorial Forces (EIF) Model, is designed to ‘decolonise’ (in the sense of Edwards [2016]) Schneider's Dynamic Model of the evolution of postcolonial Englishes (PCEs) in order to include “those types of traditionally Expanding Circle Englishes which appear to be developing into second-language varieties of English even without a (post)colonial history” (Buschfeld and Kautzsch 2017: 105). Schneider himself put forward the notion of ‘Transnational Attraction’ to come to terms with “English in emergent contexts” (Schneider 2014: 24) which do not fit readily into his original model. Yet another framework by Mair (2013) goes one step further in incorporating globalization and transnationalism as constitutive for the dynamics of ‘the world system of Englishes’.

This chapter focuses on the first two models and attempts to tease out each proposal's explanatory potential with respect to speakers of English in India situated at both ends of the lectal continuum. For the young urban middle class, English is a natural part of their linguistic repertoire and arguably also an integral part of their identity. For the large majority of the less affluent, rural population, however, English is a foreign language and a much sought-after commodity for upward social mobility (cf. Uma et al. 2014). We will present the results from an attitude study carried out in and among Mumbai and other parts of Maharashtra, documenting the extent of English usage in different domains vis-a-vis the local languages, as well as Hindi as the overarching official language besides English (cf. Satyanath 2015). Another focus of the study is speakers’ differential attitudes towards English as an identity carrier within their respective social contexts.