Key arguments and concepts Flashcards
What is The Great Vowel Shift?
- vowels and some consonants were shorted
- letters were silenced
- increase in standardisation
- Jespersen first studied it
What were the 4 main possible causes of The Great Vowel Shist which Jespersen identified?
1) Population migration
2) Middle Class Hypercorrection
3) French loan words
4) War with France
How was population migration a cause of TGVS?
The rapid migration of people from the north of England to the southeast following the black death caused a mixing of accents that forced a change in the standard London vernacular
How is MC hypercorrection a cause of TGVS?
A shift that unintentionally resulted in vowel pronunciations that are inaccurate imitations of French pronunciations
How were French loan words a cause of TGVS?
Others argue that the influx of French loan words was a major factor in the shift
How did the war with France impact TGVS?
An opposing theory states that the wars with France and general Anti-French sentiments caused hypercorrection deliberately to make English sound less French as they did not want to sound like them
Who are the 3 main 18th century Grammarians?
- Swift
- Johnson
- Lowth
Swift on ‘fixing English’
The academy of English to resist change
- Inkhorn debate
- needed to prevent the English Language from corruption
- must be stuck, control and standardised
1755 Johnson’s dictionary
Concluded that language is constantly changing and cannot be fixed
- 8years, 6 people helped
- It was popular but criticised for being too personal to him
1762
ROBERT LOWTH
Grammar
Self-improving grammar book
- rules we must follow and are responsible for in language
- terrible social stigma for those using incorrect grammar
Attitudes towards language change
Norman Tebbit
Conservative MP
1985 interview
- there was a correlation between good English, personal hygiene, a life of crime
- loss of standards
Identity and language
Signals who you are similarly to clothes
STENSTROM
- forms of teen language are characterised by
- slang/taboo lexis
- irregular turn-taking
- name-calling
- word shortening
Lexical Change
Anglo-saxon origin
- coin new words
External factors: borrow loan words
Internal factors: modifying existing words
ECKERT
‘Young people are the ‘movers and shakers’ of language change’
- motivation behind their linguistic changes
- build and maintain individual group identities
AITCHISON
Language change is indicative of progress rather than decline
- some are inclined to view language change as sloppy and lazy
