Roots of English

Question 1

Optimal way of detecting linguistic change

Answer 1

Via a number of diachronic or historical cross-sections in real-time.

Question 2

Real-time studies

Answer 2

Comparing the state of a language with its previous states, often separated by centuries.
Ex. London English - 2016 - 1916 - 1816 …

Question 3

Types of linguistic change

Answer 3

1. Qualitative
   - The addition of a novel form to the language.
2. Quantitative
   - An increase or decrease over time in the use of an existing sound, meaning, lexical item or grammatical construction.

Question 4

What can change? What is most likely to change?

Answer 4

Phonology, syntax, semantics can change.

The lexis is the most likely to change.

Question 5

Major problem with the study of change

Answer 5

It has to do with where change originates.
Beyond the 19th century, all the evidence for change is found in written texts.
This presents major methodological problems for the reconstruction of earlier varieties of spoken English.

Question 6

Using writing to reconstruct earlier varieties

Answer 6

1. Writing is an imperfect representation of speech.
2. Prescriptive conventions may block the use of non-standard vernacular forms of interest.
3. Literacy was the privilege of the upper-class.
4. Speech-based genres become more scanty further back in time.

Question 7

Original inhabitants of British Isles

Answer 7

Celts: possibly arrived around 2000 BCE.
Their languages were varieties of Goidelic and Brythonic Celtic.
Today they have some place names.

Question 8

What language is English?

Answer 8

West Germanic

Question 9

Roots of English traced back to?

Answer 9

Germanic invasions of England in the 5th century.

They would have spoken northern varieties of English.

Question 10

Earliest evidence of Germanic settlements?

Answer 10

Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in the Lower Thames and Norfolk

Question 11

Germanic invaders

Answer 11

1. Jutes
2. Angles
3. Saxons

Question 12

Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy

Answer 12

The arrival of the Germanic settlers formed seven separate kingdoms.
The land became the land of the Angles.
The seven kingdoms formed Old English.

Question 13

Old English dialects

Answer 13

1. Kentish
2. Northumbrian
3. West Saxon
4. Mercian

Question 14

Synthetic vs Analytical language

Answer 14

Synthetic:
- Words are composed of two or more grammatical morphemes.
- Case marking (grammatical endings on nouns to indicate their relationship)
Ex. Latin, Old English
Analytical:
- Express each separate morpheme as a separate word.
Ex. Chinese, Vietnamese, Modern English

Question 15

Most important event in the external history of Old English

Answer 15

Concerns the Viking invasions

Question 16

Danelaw

Answer 16

Danish Vikings gradually gained control over large parts of northern and eastern England; the area was called the Danelaw.

Question 17

Factors favouring language contact

Answer 17

1. Old Norse and Old English were structurally and lexically similar.
2. It was probably easy to understand the other language without having to learn to speak it.

Question 18

What is unusual about the contact with Old English?

Answer 18

Old English borrowed nouns, and verbs which was normal.

It also borrowed grammatical or function words from Old Norse such as 3rd person pronouns.