The Social Authenticity of Dialect in Dickens's Great Expectations

Abstract

Dickens' novel Great Expectations is one of the finest and most sophisticated novels, the novel is classified as 'Bildungsroman' a novel that follows the development and the growth of the main character. Great Expectations presents the process of maturity of Pip in a semiautobiographical style. Dickens is a social reformer of the nineteenth century, his main aim is to change the miseries and injustice done towards lower-class people. This paper aims at studying the language and words of different characters in Great Expectations. Characters' dialects are categorized according to social class, so there are mainly two types of language forms standard used by educated upper class people, and non-standard multi-dialect style used by lower class characters.