How do Torontonians hear ethnic identity?

More attention is being paid to the sociolinguistic consequences of urban ethnolinguistic diversity, but the origins and social meanings of ethnolects are not well understood and their role in marking ethnic identity untested. Anecdotal remarks and media attention point to Canadians’ awareness of ethnically marked ways of speaking English but despite public interest, sparse research exists on perceptions of different ways of speaking. We report the results of a pilot project addressing perceptions of ethnically-marked ways of speaking English in Toronto, Canada’s largest and most ethnically diverse city. To test Torontonians’ ability to identify native speakers of Toronto English from different ethnic groups, we ask ~100 participants to listen to speech excerpts produced by 18 Torontonians from five of the largest ethnic groups in the city (British/Irish, Chinese, Italian, Portuguese and Punjabi). Participants were asked to identify the speakers’ ethnic backgrounds, indicate how well they think the person speaks English, and whether they believe them to be from Toronto. Results confirm that Torontonians are aware of ethnically marked ways of speaking and are better able to identify speakers who affiliate more strongly with their ethnicities. Judgments of speaking English well are tied more closely to perceived than actual ethnicity.