tirsdag 7. oktober 2014

Events that shaped English

The Angelo-Saxtons:

They settled in England and gave it its name "Engla land" (Land of the Angels) and its language "Englisc" Most of them were farmers and so Old English was full of words related to farming such as sheep, shepherd, ox, earth and field.

Scandinavian Settlement:
Scandinavian invaders started to come to Britain in the middle of the 9th century. They settled mainly in the northern and eastern areas. Norse had a great influence on English. Basic words such as "take" and "they" are borrowed form Norse.

1066 and after:
English underwent enormous changes after William the Conqueror defated Harold Godwinson at the battle of Hastings in 1066. The inflectional system of Old English broke down and Middle English became quite similar to the English we see today. The numbers of words in the language increased hugley, due to a great number of loanwords from French and Latin.


Standardization:
In the late medieval and early modern periods there was an ongoing process of standardizing English. The London standard became dominant, particulay in printed scripts. Over time a marked change in the pronumciation of English occured. This change is known as the Great Vowel Shift. With these changes Modern English was a reality, although   Shakespeare's English is hardly what we would consider "modern" today. 

Colonization and Globalization:
As English became a world language, it was in turn influenced by new lonworlds as well as many new varieties of English.

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