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"English language -- History"
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New-dialect formation
This book presents a controversial theory about the formation of new colonial dialects, examining Latin American Spanish, Canadian French, and North American English, with a special focus on Australian, South African, and New Zealand English.
eBook
Holy shit : a brief history of swearing
\"Almost everyone swears, or worries about not swearing, from the two year-old who has just discovered the power of potty mouth to the grandma who wonders why every other word she hears is obscene. Whether they express anger or exhilaration, are meant to insult or to commend, swear words perform a crucial role in language. But swearing is also a uniquely well-suited lens through which to look at history, offering a record of what people care about on the deepest levels of a culture -- what's divine, what's terrifying, and what's taboo. Holy Sh*t tells the story of two kinds of swearing -- obscenities and oaths -- from ancient Rome and the Bible to today. Melissa Mohr takes readers on a journey to discover how \"swearing\" has come to include both testifying with your hand on the Bible and calling someone a *#$&!* when they cut you off on the highway. She explores obscenities in ancient Rome -- which were remarkably similar to our own -- and unearths the history of religious oaths in the Middle Ages, when swearing (or not swearing) an oath was often a matter of life and death. Holy Sh*t also explains the advancement of civility and corresponding censorship of language in the 18th century, considers the rise of racial slurs after World War II, examines the physiological effects of swearing (increased heart rate and greater pain tolerance), and answers a question that preoccupies the FCC, the US Senate, and anyone who has recently overheard little kids at a playground: are we swearing more now than people did in the past?\"--Publisher's description.
Book
Transatlantic Perspectives on Late Modern English
This contribution explores the use of the formal resources of English (third-person singular pronouns in anaphora, sex-sensitive collocations) for \"assigned gender\" in a corpus of letters written by settlers of the Great Plains of the United States in the last decades of the nineteenth century. The textual work is introduced by a discussion of significant theoretical aspects of the grammatical category of gender and of certain methodological issues - particularly \"Units of Anaphoric Reference\". Although assigned gender has been approached from a general perspective, particular attention has been paid to two specific usages: the feminine pronoun as an indicator of colloquial American English, and the neuter pronoun as a frequent (and possibly patterned) choice for nouns like baby or child.
eBook
May I Quote You on That?
We all use language in different ways, depending on the situations we find ourselves in. In formal contexts we are usually expected to use a formal level of Standard English-the English codified in grammars, usage guides, and dictionaries. In May I Quote You on That? Stephen Spector offers a new approach to learning Standard English grammar and usage. The product of Spector's forty years of teaching courses on the English language, this book makes the conventions of formal writing and speech easier and more enjoyable to learn than traditional approaches usually do. Each lesson begins with humorous, interesting, or instructive illustrative quotations from writers, celebrities, and historical figures. Mark Twain appears alongside Winston Churchill, Yogi Berra, Woody Allen, Jerry Seinfeld, Stephen Colbert, Oprah, Lady Gaga, and many others. These quotations allow readers to infer the rules and word meanings from context. And if they stick in readers' memory, they can serve as models for the rules they exemplify. The lessons then offer short essays, written in a conversational style, on the history of the rules or the words being discussed. But because English is constantly changing, the essays offer not only the traditional rules of Standard English, but also the current opinions of usage panelists, stylists, and language specialists. When rules are controversial, Spector offers advice about stylistic choices. A companion website features a workbook with practice drills. This book will appeal to anyone who wants to write well. It's aimed at those who are applying to college, taking the SAT, or writing a job application, an essay, or anything else that requires clear and effective communication.
eBook
A History of the English Language
The history and development of English, from the earliest known writings to its status today as a dominant world language, is a subject of major importance to linguists and historians. In this book, a team of international experts cover the entire recorded history of the English language, outlining its development over fifteen centuries. With an emphasis on more recent periods, every key stage in the history of the language is covered, with full accounts of standardisation, names, the distribution of English in Britain and North America, and its global spread. New historical surveys of the crucial aspects of the language are presented, and historical changes that have affected English are treated as a continuing process, helping to explain the shape of the language today. This complete and up-to-date history of English will be indispensable to all advanced students, scholars and teachers in this prominent field.
eBook
Say what? : the weird and mysterious journey of the English language
Presents the history of the modern English language and how previous languages and civilizations influenced its development.
Book
Communities of Practice in the History of English
Languages change and they keep changing as a result of communicative interactions and practices in the context of communities of language users. The articles in this volume showcase a range of such communities and their practices as loci of language change in the history of English. The notion of communities of practice takes its starting point in the work of Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger and refers to groups of people defined both through their membership in a community and through their shared practices. Three types of communities are particularly highlighted: networks of letter writers; groups of scribes and printers; and other groups of professionals, in particular administrators and scientists. In these diverse contexts in England, Scotland, the United States and South Africa, language change is not seen as an abstract process but as a response to the communicative needs and practices of groups of people engaged in interaction.
eBook