VARIETY. A term in SOCIOLINGUISTICS for a distinct form of a language. Varieties fall into two types: (1) User-related varieties, associated with particular people and often places, such as Black English (English as used by blacks, however defined and wherever located, but especially African-Americans in the US) and Canadian English (English as used in Canada: either all such English or only the standard form). In this sense, the term variety is similar to but less likely to carry emotive and judgemental implications than dialect, patois, etc.: compare the phrases speaking the local patois and speaking the local variety. (2) Use-related varieties, associated with function, such as legal English (the language of courts, contracts, etc.) and literary English (the typical usage of literary texts, conversations, etc.). In this sense, the term variety is conceptually close to REGISTER and in practice is a synonym of USAGE, as in legal usage, literary usage.

Users and uses of English can be characterized in terms of variation in region, society, style, and medium. Regional variation is defined in terms of such characteristics as phonological, grammatical, and lexical features, as when American English is contrasted with British English: see AMERICAN ENGLISH AND BRITISH ENGLISH. Social variation represents differences of ethnicity, class, and caste, as in BLACK ENGLISH and CHICANO ENGLISH in the US, ANGLO-INDIAN ENGLISH in India, and HIBERNO-ENGLISH in Ireland. Stylistic variation is defined in terms of situation and participants (such as formal versus informal usage, colloquial versus literary usage) and function (as with business English and the restricted variety known as Seaspeak). Variation according to medium is defined in terms of writing, speech, and the use of sign language for the deaf (where there are, for example, differences between American and British practices).

In discussing English at large, the term variety permits the identification of differences without pre-empting the argument in favour of one or other set of such differences: for example, standard usage is no more or less evidence of a ‘variety’ than non-standard usage, and non-standard forms need not be approached as ‘deviations’ from a norm. In order to describe regional varieties of English, the Indian scholar Braj B. Kachru has proposed a model consisting of three concentric circles: inner, outer, and expanding. The Inner Circle contains territories where English is the primary or native language. To it belong such varieties as American English and New Zealand English. The Outer Circle refers to territories colonized by Britain (such as India, Nigeria, and Singapore) and the US (such as the Philippines). In it can be found such institutionalized and increasingly autonomous non-native varieties as Indian English and Philippine English. The Expanding Circle contains those countries not colonized by Inner Circle nations: that is, the rest of the world. To it belong such performance varieties as German English and Indonesian English.