The Linguistics of the History of English

This textbook approaches the history of English from a theoretical perspective. The book provides a brief chronological overview describing the way in which the English language has changed over time from Old English to Modern English, while subsequent parts adopt a theoretical focus that is thematically organised to deal with the question of how and why English changed in the way it did, including a part addressing some specific contact-induced changes and key topics such as English as a Lingua Franca. Supported throughout with information boxes with empirical studies, the examples given are all drawn from English, but boxes with examples from other languages tie the development of the English language into changes in other contexts and settings. This book is an ideal resource for undergraduate students of the English Language and historical linguistics.

Organises topics thematically in a clear and accessible style for students Includes features such as study questions and highlight boxes to consolidate learning Focuses on English, while also including 'Change Elsewhere' comparisons

Autorentext

Remco Knooihuizen is an Assistant Professor in English Language and Linguistics at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands. His research includes experimental work on speakers' implicit awareness of strong verbal inflection patterns and verbal syntax in Dutch and Frisian, and contact-induced change in the pronoun system of Faroese. At the University of Groningen, he is responsible for courses on language variation and language change in the BA English Language and Culture.

Inhalt
Part I Introduction.- So what had happened was.- Explaining language change.- Part II Sound change.- Phonetic change.- Phonological change.- Track changes.- Part III Contact-induced change.- Language contact.- Dialect contact.- Part IV Structural change.- Analogy.- Grammaticalisation.- Syntactic change.- The loss of case. <p