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A handbook of present-day English

Language change and variation in English

Language change, variation and history

Languages are subject to a constant process of change which can take place either suddenly or slowly. There are no static or uniform languages. All languages can be considered as open and dynamic entities which adapt to the history and culture of the speech communities in which they are in use.

In major modern languages, we usually analyse language variability in relation to its standard variety, language par excellence in terms of social prestige, language functions and domains of use. Non-standard varieties have been commonly regarded as "irregularly patterned" and "unsystematic" with respect to standard.

According to sociolinguistics, all varieties of language have the same status. Sociolinguistics has mainly contributed to the understanding of how language behavior and variability are influenced by social factors or variables (class, age, sex, etc.). An example is Labov’s work, in particular, the analysis of the patterning of [r] pronunciation in NY.

Language change and variation do not emerge exclusively in relation to their social and structural status at a given time (Synchronic), but they take place along a historical continuum, or ordered chronological sequencing of events (Diachronic).

There are two approaches to historical language change:

• Comparative linguistics: based on the concept of "proto-language".
• History of language: the study of the changes over the centuries. Literature on the history of language has usually distinguished between:
  • External causes = extralinguistic or social factors like technology and introduction of new concepts.
  • Internal causes = to balance the system like the analogical spread of regular forms.

Three (4) main periods:

• Old English (OE) - 700-1150
• Middle English (ME) - 1150-1500
• Modern English (ModEngl) - 1500-1900
• (Present-day English) 1900-nowadays

Types of language change

Phonological change - deals with any mutation within the sound system of a language and can be both sporadic (refers to changes which affect the sounds of a limited number of words) and regular (implies changes leading to the re-organisation of the phonological inventory of a language).

A further distinction concerning phonological change refers to the differentiation between an unconditioned (refers to sound change regardless of the phonetic context in which it happens as in the case of the so-called Great Vowel Shift) and a conditioned change (refers to a phonological change which is conditioned by a specific phonetic environment as for example the development of PDE fricative phonemes).

Great Vowel Shift, 15^th-17^th century, affected ME long vowels. It caused a major reorganisation of the vowel system through a push chain process; the orthography had already begun to be standardised by the introduction of the printing press.

Morpho-syntactic change - refers to any change in both the morpho-phonematic and syntactic systems of a language.

Mechanisms of morphology are the following:

• Analogy, process of modelling a language form in relation to an already existing form of that language.
• Hypercorrection, speakers’ awareness of the social value of the different language varieties.
• Backformation, creation of a language form which is not historically documented.

Two main examples of syntactic change are:

• Word order, the order of the elements within the sentence.
• Grammaticalisation, phenomenon by which a grammatical function is given to an autonomous word.

Semantic change - refers to any mutation in the meaning of individual lexical items. There are different kinds of semantic change:

Change of meaning:

• Widening, use of a particular item in more than one context. From specific to general.
• Narrowing, general item used just in one context. From general to specific.

Change of connotation:

• Pejoration, which is linked to social attitude and prejudice.
• Amelioration, positive attitude towards a certain word.

The history of English

Old English

Historically, English is a Germanic language. Germanic was the language of the populations who inhabitated the continental European area east of the River Elbe (50 BC). The progenitor of Germanic is the Indo-European language. It's a reconstructed language, which is considered to be the ancestor of classic languages like Latin, Greek, Slavic and Sanskrit and as a consequence of many modern European languages such as Italian, French, Russian, English, and so on.

The OE period goes from 700 to c.1150 A.D., the term OE refers to the Germanic dialects spoken at that time in England by Germanic populations who were called Jutes, Angles, and Saxons and who arrived in the British Isles in the 5^th century A.D. The Celtic inhabitants of the British Isles were assimilated or forced to move to the North-West.

The event that mostly contributed to the shaping of the OE language was the Christianisation of the Island, starting from the 6^th century with the introduction of the Latin alphabet and the progressive abandonment of the Runic alphabet (Futhark).

During the period from the 9^th to the 11^th centuries several manuscripts were written, copied, and translated from Latin into OE, namely the West-Saxon dialect of the OE, considered the first standard written language.

Two important historical episodes profoundly changed the history of English during this period: the arrival and occupation of England by Scandinavian populations from the 8^th century on and the Norman conquest by William the Conqueror in 1066. The Norman conquest mainly contributed to changing Anglo-Saxon England socially, politically, and culturally. A new dominant French-speaking nobility substituted the Anglo-Saxon court. The re-organisation of political power meant the progressive marginalisation of the rich Anglo-Saxon cultural and literary tradition.

The term OE refers to a highly inflected or synthetic language. Synthetic means that language functions, grammatical categories and relations, and verb conjugations are expressed by use of a system of case markers.

• Words are variable and they are usually composed of a root and an ending.
• 4 main cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, and dative), 3 genders (feminine, masculine, and neuter) and 2 numbers (singular and plural).
• Two inflections of nouns (strong and weak).
• Difference in the forms and functions of the definite article and demonstrative pronouns. Pronouns with 4 cases, 3 persons, 3 genders.
• Two types of verbs in OE and PDE (strong-irregular, change stem vowel, and weak-regular, in OE change consonant sometimes). Both have 2 tenses, 3 moods, 2 infinitive forms, 2 participles.

OE vocabulary:

• The core of OE vocabulary is inherited Germanic lexis and its process of word formation.
• There is the influence of foreign languages such as Latin and Scandinavian. For Latin, there are two major stages of influence:
  • The first period of conquest of part of the British Isles by the Romans (54 BC).
  • The second stage, Christianisation of the island from the 6^th century.
• The Scandinavian influence is limited to technical terms.

Middle English

Starting from the Norman Conquest in 1066. We have three main stages of ME:

• 1066-1150 transitional stage, with important sociolinguistics changes. The Norman conquest represented the end of the advanced Anglo-Saxon social and cultural systems.
• 1150-1350 early ME period, English as official language with the increasing number of legal documents and literary writings in vernacular.
• 1350-1430 late ME period, many sociocultural changes took place in England, such as urbanisation, and the rising of new social classes, etc.

During the ME period three main languages were spoken in England:

• French/Anglo-Norman, language of power and bureaucracy
• Latin, language of learning, education, and the Church
• English, language of the majority of the population
• Gaelic and Scandinavian languages as dialects and minority languages

Classical ME variety refers to the main language changes operating during the 14^th century by Chaucer:

• The levelling of the OE inflectional case system
• The fixing of SVO word order
• A marked foreign influence of ME vocabulary

Modern English

This period (1500-c.1900) is considered as the stage of the HEL when a new consciousness increased the need to standardise the language. The origins of standard English are to be found in the south-eastern Midland variety of English, spoken in the London area in the 15^th century. In the course of these centuries, English became the language of those domains where Latin and French were previously used.

The expansion of vocabulary gave rise to the opposition between the so-called Neologisers and Purists. The former contributed to introducing a certain number of new words into English, mainly from Latin and French. During the ModEngl period several glossaries, mono/bilingual dictionaries, and grammars were compiled, such as “A dictionary of the English language” by Samuel Johnson and “A short introduction to English grammar” by Robert Lowth.

Another significant aspect of the debate on language codification concerns the idea of a correct pronunciation. From a linguistic point of view, we can say that ModEngl is very close to PDE written standard. However, there are still many inconsistencies in both spelling and grammar.

The main changes in ModEngl concern the inflectional systems of nouns, adjectives, and verbs. Towards the end of this period, the distinction between strong and weak declensions of nouns and adjectives disappeared. The only noun case that survived was the genitive case which was indicated by ‘s and -s‘ forms.

SVO word order can be summarised as follows:

• Inversion of subject in declarative sentences
• Multiple negation
• Omission/repetition of the subject

Late ModEngl is also the period of the fragmentation of the standard due to the worldwide spreading of English speakers. Three main stages can be distinguished:

• The increasing activity of British trading companies and the slave trade.
• The establishment of stable colonial settlements in America, Canada, Australia…
• The institutionalisation of English within colonies. English as the language of government, education, etc.

The sociolinguistic status of present-day English

The diaspora of English

The major parameters of the pluralisation of English are its geographical spread and the number and typology of its speakers. The new framework of language investigation is defined as the English paradigm (geographical location, linguistic and ethnic association, activities, etc.).

The diaspora of English is characterised by three main stages:

• It refers to the expansion of English within the British Isles, Wales, and Ireland. The process started in the 5^th century with the arrival of the first Germanic tribes and continued in the Middle Ages. Gaelic and Scots languages are still spoken as a second language and English as a language of social and economic mobility, instruction, and education.
• The discovery of new territories and establishment of British colonies in the USA, Australia, etc. Contact between the English and other languages resulted in the development of Pidgin Englishes and Creoles, which were used at that time as linguae francae for communication.
• The third stage or ‘second diaspora’ concerns its diffusion and use as L2 in Africa, Asia, and 19^th and 20^th century American imperialism called globalisation.

The countries and speakers of English

The geographical spread of PDE has been described in terms of three concentric circles:

• The inner circle, where English has a multifunctional role and is used as a native language
• The outer circle, English as a second language or additional language
• The expanding circle, English as a foreign language

English as a global language

PDE is a global language. The world Englishes paradigm, which has been initiated by Kachru, is probably the most relevant one. Its focus on the functional aspects of the spread of English, changing identity of English.

In a pragmatic-oriented view, English for Specific Purposes has interpreted its use and functions in terms of utility and instrumentality. English has been considered as a useful means of communication. Three major aspects of English as a global language can be identified:

• The establishment of new English-speaking communities in new contexts.
• The contact and mutual influence between English and other languages.
• The formation of non-native varieties of English.

The speech community of contemporary English

The speech community of PDE is a multicultural place, which is characterised by strong ethnic and social differentiation and where social multilingualism is the norm. The use of two or more varieties or languages within the same speech event, or code-switching, is the most powerful marker of language identity.

The varieties of English

Different labels have been used to describe the varieties of English worldwide: regional, social, colonial, immigrant, Pidgin and Creoles, and as a lingua franca. According to such a wide perspective, English is a set of different but related varieties, which share a common core of grammar and vocabulary.

Global Englishes can also be considered in two different ways:

• As a polylectal continuum ranging from standard varieties (acrolect) to low-prestigious varieties (basilect) passing through mixed varieties (mesolect).
• As a cline of bilingualism with at the end the educated variety of English and at the other varieties which reflect a particular cultural, social, and linguistic identity.

The genesis of global Englishes

Global Englishes are the result of imperfect learning of English and a result of linguistic creativity of non-native speakers. We need to distinguish between mistakes (cannot be accepted) and deviations (are a productive process which contributes to language change).

Global English has developed through five different chronologically ordered stages:

• Foundation, spread of English in non-English speaking countries worldwide
• Exonormative use, imposition of the varieties of English spoken by local native speakers
• Nativisation, mixing, and hybridisation of local/native communities and English native speakers
• Endonormative stabilisation, birth of an indigenous variety
• Differentiation, awareness of the sociolinguistic value of the new variety of English

Language contact: nativisation and acculturation

Language plurality and differentiation are always the result of processes of language decentralisation, acculturation, and nativisation. They may take place in the following way:

• Borrowing of words from native language to the English variety
• Nativisation of standard English words adapted to the local context
• Adoption and change of the original meaning of some standard English words

English has undergone a process of acculturation, manipulation, and adaption to new socio-cultural contexts through a process of linguistic creativity.

The linguistic features of global Englishes

In Global Englishes, the indefinite article is usually replaced by one. Deletion of the definite article is also common, in particular with proper nouns and when there is reference to a specific context. The reverse process, or addition, happens when in standard English either the article would be omitted, or an indefinite article would be present.

• Number - A common feature of global English is the deletion of noun plural marker -s.
• Regularisation of standard English zero plural nouns (furnitures, staffs)
• Use of post-nominal forms dem and them as plural markers.

In order to distinguish the 3 gender types, we use the pronominal forms he, she, it. In contrast, there is no distinction between he, she, it. Personal pronouns cannot be deleted. Deletion of personal pronouns is testified in several global English; in other cases, number contrast is not signalled as in the use of singular personal pronouns for plural.

Demonstrative pronouns - Use this/that for these/those.

Tense

• Past tense zero marking and process of regularisation of irregular verbs.

Aspect - use of the -s inflection in verbs to mark habituality, no distinction between dynamic and stative verbs, possibility to combine two modal verbs in the same sentence, another tendency is using would to express the future.

Concord - Absence of the simple present 3^rd person -s, use of plural personal pronouns with the past form was.

Forms of to be - Absence of copular be in the present tense, use of invariant form be for habitual actions.

Word order - Inverted word order: OV order in declarative sentences.

Tag questions - Invariant tag “isn’t it?”

English as a language of power

The power of English is mainly related to its functionality in contexts such as the global economy, communication technologies, business, and education. The knowledge of English allows having more work opportunities and signals the integration within the global market.

The pronunciation of English

Accents of English

The pronunciation of the English language is difficult. This difficulty is determined by the complex nature of the phonological system of English and, for Italian learners, by the structural differences between the sound systems of English and Italian. English is spoken with many different accents because accent variation is strongly connected to geographical areas, age, social class, education, etc. and because of the spread of English used as a colonial language/lingua franca. The most important distinction today is between British and American.

Phonetics and the articulators

Phonetics is the science that studies the physical characteristics of sounds. Phonetics deals with the production (articulatory), transmission (acoustic), and reception (auditory) aspects of sounds. The act of phonation consists in the contraction of the muscles in our chest and the production of a flow of air flow which passes through the larynx (here are the vocal cords), the glottis (the opening between the vocal cords). The closure of the glottis creates an interval...