BRITISH DIALECTS' IMPACT ON THE NEW ZEALAND ENGLISH FORMATION

This research presents the analysis of the British dialects influence on the formation of the New Zealand variant of the English language (NZE). The article provides information about the advent of colonizers in the 19^th century in New Zealand when England's colonial expansion caused the spread of the English language and its active development of the new regional branch. Specific features of British dialects and their mutual linguistic impact along with the wideranging foreign policy of England formed the basis for modern Kiwi English or NZE. Being heavily mixed between each other and the Maori language, the dialects of British migrants and the language of the indigenous tribe created a new pronunciation, orthography and particular vocabulary. Therefore, the main objective of this article is to reveal all the nuances of the dialectal impact of the British on the emergence and evolution of the New Zealand variant of English. In addition, much attention is paid to the various migrants' layers of the New Zealand society during the period of British colonization, assessing shifts in the population's composition and language changes accordingly. The article also indicates certain areas of migrants' settlements with different accents of the English language. There are two theories which explain establishing of the New Zealand English language. The first “single-origin theory” includes the influence of Cockney English dialect. The second theory is called “the mixing - bowl theory”, which presents the combination of southeastern English accents and dialects. Moreover, the survey has shown the possibility to determine the roots of words and their origin. The results thus obtained are compatible with literary sources, which confirm the language presence of the Scots and the Irish as well as the Maori. The vocabulary of New Zealand can be rooted in southeastern areas of England, but it came via Australia. Empirical, theoretical and sociological methods are used to scrutinize and structure this data and information. In conclusion, the results of this study identified that the English dialects of the southeastern regions of England, Scottish English and Irish English had the most significant impact on the New Zealand variant of the English language.