Abstract

Sinhala, like many languages in South Asia, shows features of a clear diglossic situation. As against the definition of the term ‘diglossia’ which identifies two distinct varieties of the same language as used in specific functional domains, some scholars who have conducted research on Sinhala as a diglossic language, have raised the argument that the language has more than two diglossic variations spreading out into a spectrum of intermediate diglossic variations. In this paper, the researcher has made an attempt to conduct a study of the different ways in which language has been used in the authorial comments and descriptions in a selected number of contemporary novels, all of which have been written by award-winning authors, to determine the applicability of the above argument by scholars to a contemporary situation of language use. In this attempt, the researcher has employed the discourse on the lectal differences that could be applied to a study on a diglossic linguistic situation. The outcome of the study shows that the fiction writers concerned have employed the Sinhala language at various different styles and levels in both its grammar and vocabulary, thus validating the argument that Sinhala shows the existence of more than two distinct diglossic varieties and entails a gamut of intermediate varieties.

Keywords: Contemporary Fiction, Diglossia, Sinhala, Spectrum of Varieties