History of the English language

A short history of the origins and development of English

The history of the English language really started _1_ the arrival of three Germanic tribes who invaded Britain during the 5th century AD.These tribes, the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes, crossed the North Sea from what today is Denmark and northern Germany.At that time the inhabitants_2_ Britain spoke a Celtic language.But most of the Celtic speakers were pushed west and north _3_ the invaders - mainly into what is now Wales, Scotland and Ireland.The Angles came_4_ "Englaland" and their language was called "Englisc" - from which the words "England" and "English" are derived.

Old English (450-1100 AD)

The invading Germanic tribes spoke similar languages, which in Britain developed _5_ what we now call Old English.Old English did not sound or look like English today.Native English speakers now would have great difficulty understanding Old English.Nevertheless, about half of the most commonly used words in Modern English have Old English roots.The words be, strong and water, for example, derive _6_ Old English.Old English was spoken _7_ around 1100.

Middle English (1100-1500)

In 1066 William the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy (part of modern France), invaded and conquered England.The new conquerors (called the Normans) brought _8_ them a kind of French, which became the language of the Royal Court, and the ruling and business classes.For a period there was a kind of linguistic class division, where the lower classes spoke English and the upper classes spoke French.In the 14th century English became dominant in Britain again, but with many French words added.This language is called Middle English.It was the language of the great poet Chaucer (c1340-1400), but it would still be difficult for native English speakers to understand today.

Modern English.Early Modern English (1500-1800)

Towards the end of Middle English, a sudden and distinct change _9_ pronunciation (the Great Vowel Shift) started, with vowels being pronounced shorter and shorter.From the 16th century the British had contact with many people from _10_ the world.This, and the Renaissance of Classical learning, meant that many new words and phrases entered the language.The invention of printing also meant that there was now a common language in print.Books became cheaper and more people learned to read.

Printing also brought standardization to English.Spelling and grammar became fixed, and the dialect of London, where most publishing houses were, became the standard.In 1604 the first English dictionary was published.

Late Modern English (1800-Present)

The main difference _11_ Early Modern English and Late Modern English is vocabulary. Late Modern English has many more words, arising from two principal factors: firstly, the Industrial Revolution and technology created a need _12_ new words;secondly, the British Empire at its height covered one quarter of the earth's surface, and the English language adopted foreign words from many countries.

Varieties of English

From around 1600, the English colonization of North America resulted _13_ the creation of a distinct American variety of English.Some English pronunciations and words "froze" when they reached America.In some ways, American English is more like the English of Shakespeare than modern British English is.Some expressions that the British call "Americanisms" are in fact original British expressions that were preserved in the colonies while lost for a time in Britain (for example trash for rubbish, loan as a verb instead of lend, and fall for autumn;another example, frame-up, was re-imported into Britain through Hollywood gangster movies).Spanish also had an influence _14_ American English (and subsequently British English), with words like canyon, ranch, stampede and vigilante being examples of Spanish words that entered English through the settlement of the American West.French words (through Louisiana) and West African words (through the slave trade) also influenced American English (and so, to an extent, British English).

Today, American English is particularly influential, due to the USA's dominance _15_ cinema, television, popular music, trade and technology (including the Internet).But there are many other varieties of English around the world, including for example Australian English, New Zealand English, Canadian English, South African English, Indian English and Caribbean English.

 

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□ The more he practices, the better he plays.

□ In other words, you have to build up language habits in English just as you build up language habits in your mother tongue.

□ It's up to you.

□ We can understand and read many words and structures that we cannot use in speaking and writing.

□ Forming a habit, any kind of habit, requires much practice.

ON LEARNING ENGLISH

Learning English is like learning to swim or learning to play ball. We learn to swim by swimming, to play ball by playing ball, and to speak English by speaking English. A good ball-player spends hours, days, months, and even years practicing. _1_ He has to learn to meet the situations of the game as they arise and react to them immediately. And so it is when we are talking.

The ideas we wish to express come instantly to our mind, but there is no time for us to stop and think of how to put together the words we need. Acquiring the ability to use a language automatically, that is without stopping to think, is a process of habit formation. Every language has patterns that are fundamental._2_

Every language has a body of common words used by all the speakers of that language and thousands of other words that are used less frequently. _3_ Every language has many ways of saying the same things.

Learning English efficiently requires that you put your mind on what you are doing and have the intention and the will to learn. The time you have is so short that you cannot afford to waste it by giving less than your full co-operation in class and in home study. _4_

Good luck to you then, in your learning of English!_5_ Nobody can learn to swim for you. Nobody can learn English for you. You learn for yourself, and you will master the language if you really want to. Language is not to be taught, language is to be learnt.

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ENGLISH IS GREAT

English is the official language of 54 different countries and is spoken by over a billion and a half people worldwide.Adding together native speakers, people who speak English as a second language or an additional language and people who are learning English, and it’s the most commonly spoken language across the globe.So what makes English so great?And why do people want to learn English?

This is the British Library in London.It’s the national library of Great Britain and there are over a hundred and fifty million items here from every age of the written word. Let’s go inside.

***
The Library’s collection has developed over two hundred and fifty years and it keeps on growing.

There are books, magazines and manuscripts, maps, music and so much more.Every year, 3 million new items are added, so an extra 12 kilometres of shelves have to be put up.Roger Walshe is the Head of Learning.

1_ Roger: Well, there are lots of reasons.But I think perhaps more importantly, we have documents here that go right back a thousand years to the beginning of the language.And so what you can see is how this changed and evolved over time.And when you see it changing like that, you get a feeling for where it might be going in the future.

2_ Richard: So, Roger, what’s this?

3_ Richard: So how has English changed over time?

4_ Richard: That’s amazing. So what does this tell us about the English language?

5_ Richard: So what impact has technology had on the English language?

6_ Richard: Roger, why is the British Library a good place to come to find out about the English language?

7_ Roger: Well, it has two big impacts: one is that lots of new technical words come into the language.

We see this in the Industrial Revolution over a hundred years ago.But the other, bigger influence
is that it enables people all over the world speaking English to communicate with each other, underneath YouTube clips or in chat rooms, and they’re influencing each other's English.

8_ Roger: Absolutely.We’ve got some great stuff.If you’d just like to follow me...

9_ Roger: Well, this is one of the treasures in the British Library’s collections.English goes back about a thousand years to Old English.This is Middle English, about five hundred years ago, and it’s the first
book ever printed in the English language.

10_ Richard: That’s great, Roger. Is there anything you can show me?

11_ Richard: So who actually printed this?

12_ Richard: Right.

13_ Richard: Incredible... And this looks a lot more modern here, what’s this over here?

14_ Roger: This was printed by William Caxton.Very famous.He went on to print Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, the first bestseller in the English language.And one of the difficulties you have as an early printer is that there’s no standard language.There’s no dictionary, there’s no grammars, there’s no guides to usage really, so he often had to make up how to spell words himself.

15_ Richard: And is the spelling consistent throughout the book?

16_ Roger: Well, it tells us that it’s very versatile. It tells us that people play with it and sometimes the changes they make stay. Some of those changes were made 500 years ago, some of them were made 100 years ago. But some of the changes we make now in internet chatrooms and the way we talk to each other and the way people around the world use English will become the future of English as well. I’d never really thought about English changing, but of course new words are being added all the time and not all types of English are the same.

17_ Roger: Well, no, it’s not, even on this page here.This is a kind of a foreword - an introduction to the work.He says he translates it from the French.He has here ‘to French‘: f - r - e - n - s - s - h - e.

18_ Roger: That’s how he spells French. But if you go down to the centre of the page here, you’ve got ‘French’ again, and it’s got one ‘s’ in it: f - r - e - n - s - h - e.

19_ Roger: Oh, it’s changed hugely.If you look back to old English - like a thousand years, it’s almost like German.Very, very difficult to read, only a few people can do so.Then you look up to, say, Shakespeare's period: early modern English.Printing has come in and that begins to standardise the language.

20_ Roger: This is a very different work. It’s something we chose. It’s from 1867, we’re all familiar with how people use mobile phones now to text each other - SMS. And they shorten words and they use letters to get their message across. This is a poem written in the nineteenth century in which somebody has done exactly that; he says 'I wrote to you before' - he uses a number 2, letter ‘B’, the number 4.

(BritishCouncil)

 

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