ENGLISH IN LABRADOR: DEMONSTRATING DIFFERENCE

Abstract

THE IDEA OF "OTHERNESS" REGARDING the sense of difference and distance Labrador people feel from their Newfoundland neighbours, and the emic expression of this view in language, is the subject of this paper. Folklorist Gerald Pocius has written:

In a sense, all identity deals with the issue of contrast. We can argue that there can be no identity (individual, regional or national) without contrast of other persons or groups. Identity first centers on the individual and how we experience differences among those in our immediate context. The construction of individual and community identities has as much to do with actual confrontations with "the other" as anything. (Pocius 2001: 1)

Labrador is a place of contradictions: part of a province which glories in its insularity, yet located on the mainland, and situated at a point where the north meets the east, displaying the powerful cultural traits of both places.

This paper discusses the idea of "otherness" as it relates to identity construction in Labrador.