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1 - The History of English

from Part I - English

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 October 2024

Susan Fox
Affiliation:
Universität Bern, Switzerland
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Summary

Couched in socio-economic history, the first chapter provides an overview of the origins and development of the English language in Britain from Anglo-Saxon times to the present day. Both internal and external factors for language variation and change are considered when discussing the major orthographic, lexical, phonological and morphosyntactic developments. The English language and its development will therefore also be viewed in relation to other languages that were spoken, written or printed in the British Isles over the last 1,500 years. The creation and increasing availability of new data sources (access to hitherto un- or underexplored social layers, text types, regions) during the last decade (e.g. historical corpora like the Corpus of Early English Correspondence and databases like Eighteenth Century Collections Online) have led to many new studies on a range of different linguistic variables. Many of the new findings form the basis of the chapter, which aims to complement traditional histories of English.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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  • The History of English
  • Edited by Susan Fox, Universität Bern, Switzerland
  • Book: Language in Britain and Ireland
  • Online publication: 17 October 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108769617.004
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  • The History of English
  • Edited by Susan Fox, Universität Bern, Switzerland
  • Book: Language in Britain and Ireland
  • Online publication: 17 October 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108769617.004
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  • The History of English
  • Edited by Susan Fox, Universität Bern, Switzerland
  • Book: Language in Britain and Ireland
  • Online publication: 17 October 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108769617.004
Available formats
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