Hong Kong English

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xviii

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2. Hong Kong English: An Overview

   • May Wong

   Pages 1-27

3. Lexicogrammar

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 29-29

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   2. Tag Questions

      • May Wong

      Pages 31-52

   3. Collective Nouns

      • May Wong

      Pages 53-70

4. Discourse

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 71-71

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   2. Expressions of Gratitude

      • May Wong

      Pages 73-101

   3. Code-Mixing of Indigenous Cantonese Words into English

      • May Wong

      Pages 103-129

   4. Linguistic Variation in Digital Discourse: The Case of Blogs

      • May Wong

      Pages 131-154

   5. Conclusion

      • May Wong

      Pages 155-163

5. Back Matter

   Pages 165-213

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This book systematically examines the linguistic features and socio-cultural issues of ‘Hong Kong English’. The author focuses on authentic data taken from the International Corpus of English (the Hong Kong component) and the Corpus of Global Web-based English to track the ways in which the English language in Hong Kong has been adapted by its users. She also analyses the emergence of new forms and structures in its grammar and discourse. While the phonetic and phonological aspects of this variety of English have been well documented, its grammatical peculiarities and social language use have been hitherto neglected. This book offers original insights into the grammatical and pragmatic/discoursal features of Hong Kong English and will therefore be of interest to those working in fields such as World Englishes and corpus linguistics.

• Corpus linguistics
• World Englishes
• Asian varieties of English
• Hong Kong English
• International Corpus of English
• ICE-HK
• discourse analysis

“I enjoyed reading this book for its geostatistical content, extension to the area of geophysics, and for its production quality. The target audience is the petroleum engineer, geophysicist, or numerically oriented geologist. … This book would be appropriate for an upper level undergraduate class and above.” (Michael Ed. Hohn, Mathematical Geosciences, Vol. 50, 2018)​ “For years, the forms and functions of English in Hong Kong has been an engaging and fascinating topic of research as well as public interest. Now, for the first time, readers can consult an in-depth description of the lexico-grammatical features of English in Hong Kong that is based on copious and reliable data. May Wong's meticulous work will prove to be an indispensable reference on English as it is used in Hong Kong, and a major contribution to the study of English in a global context.” (Prof K.-K Luke, Associate Dean (Research), College of Humanities, Arts, & Social Sciences; Director, Centre for Liberal Arts & Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore)

“Wong's book is the first comprehensive, corpus-based analysis of lexico-grammatical and discourse-related phenomena in Hong Kong English. In its scope and analytical depth, this landmark publication will be a standard reference for future research on this fascinating variety.”  (Prof Hans-Georg Wolf, Chair of the Development and Variation of the English Language programme, Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany; co-author of A Dictionary of Hong Kong English (Hong Kong University Press, 2011))

• School of English, University of Hong Kong, Pok Fu Lam, Hong Kong

  May Wong

May L-Y Wong is an honorary assistant professor in the School of English at the University of Hong Kong. Her research interests are in corpus linguistics, cognitive linguistics and semiotics.

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