The Handbook Of The History Of English

The Handbook of the History of English is a collection of articles written by leading specialists in the field that focus on the theoretical issues behind the facts of the changing English language. organizes the theoretical issues behind the facts of the changing English language innovatively and applies recent insights to old problems surveys the history of English from the perspective of structural developments in areas such as phonology, prosody, morphology, syntax, semantics, language variation, and dialectology offers readers a comprehensive overview of the various theoretical perspectives available to the study of the history of English and sets new objectives for further research

This ambitious handbook takes advantage of recent advances in the study of the history of English to rethink the understanding of the field.

Routledge English Language Introductions cover core areas of language study and are one-stop resources for students. Assuming no prior knowledge, books in the series offer an accessible overview of the subject, with activities, study questions, sample analyses, commentaries and key readings – all in the same volume. The innovative and flexible ‘two-dimensional’ structure is built around four sections – introduction, development, exploration and extension – which offer self-contained stages for study. Each topic can also be read across these sections, enabling the reader to build gradually on the knowledge gained. This revised second edition of History of English includes: ❑ a comprehensive introduction to the history of English covering the origins of English, the change from Old to Middle English, and the influence of other languages on English; ❑ increased coverage of key issues, such as the standardisation of English; ❑ a wider range of activities, plus answers to exercises; ❑ new readings of well-known authors such as Manfred Krug, Colette Moore, Merja Stenroos and David Crystal; ❑ a timeline of important external events in the history of English. Structured to reflect the chronological development of the English language, History of English describes and explains the changes in the language over a span of 1,500 years, covering all aspects from phonology and grammar, to register and discourse. In doing so, it incorporates examples from a wide variety of texts and provides an interactive and structured textbook that will be essential reading for all students of English language and linguistics.

The availability of large electronic corpora has caused major shifts in linguistic research, including the ability to analyze much more data than ever before, and to perform micro-analyses of linguistic structures across languages. This has historical linguists to rethink many standard assumptions about language history, and methods and approaches that are relevant to the study of it. The field is now interested in, and attracts, specialists whose fields range from statistical modeling to acoustic phonetics. These changes have even transformed linguists' perceptions of the very processes of language change, particularly in English, the most studied language in historical linguistics due to the size of available data and its status as a global language. The Oxford Handbook of the History of English takes stock of recent advances in the study of the history of English, broadening and deepening the understanding of the field. It seeks to suggest ways to rethink the relationship of English's past with its present, and make transparent the variety of conditions and processes that have been instrumental in shaping that history. Setting a new standard of cross-theoretical collaboration, it covers the field in an innovative way, providing diachronic accounts of major influences such as language contact, and typological processes that have shaped English and its varieties, as well as highlighting recent and ongoing developments of Englishes--celebrating the vitality of language change over the centuries and the many contexts and processes through which language change occurs.

The History of English provides an accessible introduction to the changes that English has undergone from its Indo-European beginnings to the present day. The text looks at the major periods in the history of English, and provides for each a socio-historical context, an overview of the relevant major linguistic changes, and also focuses on an area of current research interest, either in sociolinguistics or in literary studies. Exercises and activities that allow the reader to get 'hands-on' with different stages of the language, as well as with the concepts of language change, are also included. By explaining language change with close reference to literary and other textual examples and emphasising the integral link between a language and its society, this text is especially useful for students of literature as well as linguistics.

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION: THE History of the English Language, as distinct from that of its Literature, constitutes a separate division of the English department at the Civil Service and other Government examinations. An effort has been made in the following pages to throw into as small a space as possible all such matter as is needed to meet the requirements of that single head. Indeed the present work was actually suggested by, and has been wholly planned on, the very first question on the English language put to the candidates at the July examinations, 1858. However abstruse, however varied, or seemingly superfluous, the matter herein contained, it is but an answer, and that far from complete, to this remarkable question:— 'Give a distinct account of the constitution of the English language, in respect both of the vocabulary and of the grammar, at each of the following dates: in the tenth century, when it was still what is usually called Saxon or Anglo-Saxon by modern philologists' (see the whole of Sec. II.); 'in the twelfth' (Sec. III.); 'in the fourteenth' (Sec. V.); 'in the sixteenth and in the eighteenth' (Sec. VI.); 'noting carefully the difference between each stage of its progress, and the immediate preceding one, and assigning the cause or causes of the change.' But, while the whole book is thus occupied in dealing with this formidable query, it may have incidentally disposed of others less exacting in their nature, ex. gr. second:— 'Describe clearly and exactly the position and connection of the English language (regarded in its earliest known form, which is still its basis or mould), in what is called the Indo-European family of languages' (Sec I.); the fourth:— 'Compare the English language in its present state with any other, ancient or modern, with which you may be familiar, in general serviceableness and power as an instrument of expression' (Sec. VI., §97, 98); the fifth:— 'Illustrate by a few decisive examples the manner in which the English language adopts words from the French (Sec. V., § 72 ; VI., § 95), from the Latin (Sec. VI., § 97), and from the Greek (Sec. VI., § 99) languages respectively; and the nature of the changes, whether in the spelling, the pronunciation, or both, by which it assimilates them, and makes them its own.' But though the work has been planned and the subject matter selected with a view to meet the requirements of these examinations, its special object may not, perhaps, render it the less generally useful, having been so compiled as to form a practical introduction both to the history of English literature and to an exact knowledge of the science of English grammar. It may thus be found a valuable text-book to the more advanced pupils of our schools and colleges, without being altogether void of interest to the general reader. A knowledge of the steps by which the language has reached its present state seems needed to the right understanding of the true principles of English grammar. Changes like its for his, they for hi, loving for lovand, are intelligible only in the light of the past; and it may be truly said that if nearly all our grammars are avowedly meaningless, often positively injurious, it is because they treat the language either in conformity with a classic model or with a total disregard of its past history and Saxon origin.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1875.