Tony Crowley is Professor of English at the University of Leeds. Born and bred in Liverpool, he has taught at Oxford, Southampton and Manchester universities. He was the Hartley Burr Alexander Chair of the Humanities at Scripps College, California (2005–13), and is a Fellow of the English Association. His previous books include The Liverpool English Dictionary (Liverpool University Press, 2017), Scouse: A Social and Cultural History (Liverpool University Press, 2012), Wars of Words: The Politics of Language in Ireland 1537–2005 (Oxford University Press, 2005) and The Politics of Language: The Standard Language Question in Cultural Debates (Palgrave, 2003).

• AcknowledgementsPreface, Liverpool: Language, culture and history1. The sea, slavery and strangers: observations on the making of early modern Liverpool and its culture2. Language in Liverpool: the received history and an alternative thesis3. Language and a sense of place: the beginnings of 'Scouse'4. Frank Shaw and the founding of the 'Scouse industry'5. What is 'Scouse'? Historical and theoretical issues6. Liverpools: places, histories, differencesAppendix: Stories of words: naming the place, naming the peopleBibliographyIndex

Tony Crowley’s searching book starts with a rigorous study of historic sources, their modern interpretations and the insights of contemporary linguistic theory. The conventional view has been that, in the 1840s, a warm front of Irish immigration came up against an unyielding mass of Lancashire grittiness, rough and dour. So superficially appealing has this explanation been that it’s gone largely unquestioned until now, even by serious historians. Crowley places the emergence of a distinctive Liverpool accent a great deal earlier – but that of “Scouse” as comparatively recent. In doing so, he opens up much wider questions of place, class and identity; of how people are seen and come to see themselves.

Tony Crowley is Professor of English at the University of Leeds. Born and bred in Liverpool, he has taught at Oxford, Southampton and Manchester universities. He was the Hartley Burr Alexander Chair of the Humanities at Scripps College, California (2005–13), and is a Fellow of the English Association. His previous books include The Liverpool English Dictionary (Liverpool University Press, 2017), Scouse: A Social and Cultural History (Liverpool University Press, 2012), Wars of Words: The Politics of Language in Ireland 1537–2005 (Oxford University Press, 2005) and The Politics of Language: The Standard Language Question in Cultural Debates (Palgrave, 2003).

• AcknowledgementsPreface, Liverpool: Language, culture and history1. The sea, slavery and strangers: observations on the making of early modern Liverpool and its culture2. Language in Liverpool: the received history and an alternative thesis3. Language and a sense of place: the beginnings of 'Scouse'4. Frank Shaw and the founding of the 'Scouse industry'5. What is 'Scouse'? Historical and theoretical issues6. Liverpools: places, histories, differencesAppendix: Stories of words: naming the place, naming the peopleBibliographyIndex

Tony Crowley’s searching book starts with a rigorous study of historic sources, their modern interpretations and the insights of contemporary linguistic theory. The conventional view has been that, in the 1840s, a warm front of Irish immigration came up against an unyielding mass of Lancashire grittiness, rough and dour. So superficially appealing has this explanation been that it’s gone largely unquestioned until now, even by serious historians. Crowley places the emergence of a distinctive Liverpool accent a great deal earlier – but that of “Scouse” as comparatively recent. In doing so, he opens up much wider questions of place, class and identity; of how people are seen and come to see themselves.

Tony Crowley is Professor of English at the University of Leeds. Born and bred in Liverpool, he has taught at Oxford, Southampton and Manchester universities. He was the Hartley Burr Alexander Chair of the Humanities at Scripps College, California (2005–13), and is a Fellow of the English Association. His previous books include The Liverpool English Dictionary (Liverpool University Press, 2017), Scouse: A Social and Cultural History (Liverpool University Press, 2012), Wars of Words: The Politics of Language in Ireland 1537–2005 (Oxford University Press, 2005) and The Politics of Language: The Standard Language Question in Cultural Debates (Palgrave, 2003).

• AcknowledgementsPreface, Liverpool: Language, culture and history1. The sea, slavery and strangers: observations on the making of early modern Liverpool and its culture2. Language in Liverpool: the received history and an alternative thesis3. Language and a sense of place: the beginnings of 'Scouse'4. Frank Shaw and the founding of the 'Scouse industry'5. What is 'Scouse'? Historical and theoretical issues6. Liverpools: places, histories, differencesAppendix: Stories of words: naming the place, naming the peopleBibliographyIndex

Tony Crowley’s searching book starts with a rigorous study of historic sources, their modern interpretations and the insights of contemporary linguistic theory. The conventional view has been that, in the 1840s, a warm front of Irish immigration came up against an unyielding mass of Lancashire grittiness, rough and dour. So superficially appealing has this explanation been that it’s gone largely unquestioned until now, even by serious historians. Crowley places the emergence of a distinctive Liverpool accent a great deal earlier – but that of “Scouse” as comparatively recent. In doing so, he opens up much wider questions of place, class and identity; of how people are seen and come to see themselves.