Format:
x, 311 Seiten
,
Illustrationen, Diagramme
ISBN:
9789027201034
Series Statement:
Advances in historical sociolinguistics (AHS) volume 8
Content:
"Eighteenth-century English is often associated with normative grammar. But to what extent did prescriptivism impact ongoing processes of linguistic change? The authors of this volume examine a variety of linguistic changes in a corpus of personal correspondence, including the auxiliary do, verbal -s and the progressive aspect, and they conclude that direct normative influence on them must have been minimal. The studies are contextualized by discussions of the normative tradition and the correspondence corpus, and of eighteenth-century English society and culture. Basing their work on a variationist sociolinguistic approach, the authors introduce the models and methods they have used to trace the progress of linguistic changes in the "long" eighteenth century, 1680-1800. Aggregate findings are balanced by analysing individuals and their varying participation in these processes. The final chapter places these results in a wider context and considers them in relation to past sociolinguistic work. One of the major findings of the studies is that in most cases the overall pace of change was slow. Factors retarding change include speaker evaluation and repurposing outgoing features, in particular, for certain styles and registers"--
Note:
Includes bibliographical references and index
,
Approaching change in 18th-century English
,
Society and culture in the long 18th century
,
Range of writers in the CEECE
,
Polite society & rhetoric
,
Grammar writing in the eighteenth century
,
The Corpus of Early English Correspondence Extension (CEECE)
,
Data retrieval
,
Quantifying change
,
Basic methods for estimating frequencies
,
Methods for studying changes lacking a variable
,
"Ungenteel" and "rude": On the use of thou in the eighteenth century
,
Going to completion: The diffusion of verbal -s
,
Periphrastic do in eighteenth-century correspondence: Emphasis on no social variation
,
Indefinite pronouns with singular human reference: Recessive and ongoing
,
Ongoing change: The diffusion of the third-person neuter possessive its
,
Incipient and intimate: The progressive aspect
,
Change or variation? Productivity of the suffixes -ness and -ity
,
Normalised frequencies of the phenomena studied
,
Google Books: A shortcut to studying language variability?
,
Conservative and progressive individuals
,
From incipient to mid-range and beyond
,
From nearing completion to completed
,
A wider sociolinguistic perspective
Additional Edition:
ISBN 9789027263834
Additional Edition:
Erscheint auch als Online-Ausgabe Patterns of change in 18th-century English Amsterdam ; Philadelphia : John Benjamins Publishing Company, [2018]
Language:
English
Subjects:
English Studies
Keywords:
Englisch
;
Sprachwandel
;
Soziolinguistik
;
Geschichte 1700-1799
;
Englisch
;
Sprachvariante
;
Sprachwandel
;
Geschichte 1680-1800
;
Aufsatzsammlung
Author information:
Säily, Tanja
