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William Duke of Normandy invaded England and won the battle of Hastings in 1066 and with him, he brought Norman French to the country.
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Middle English was born, with English and French well and truely mixed
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Chaucer writes using French flavoured Middle English in the Canterbury Tales
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v/u were interchangeable
y/i were interchangeable
Formal tenor, respected husband ''right reverend and worshipful husband''.
Wife thanking her husband and also asking him for a dress. -
The great vowel shift began
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The renaissance began with thousands of borrowings from all over Europe
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A letter was written by Queen Elizabath I when she was 20 years old, the lexis in the letter was elavated even though it was addressed to her brother who was ill. The letter shows that she was educated as it includes a large metaphor for her longing to see him. The letter also reflects her closeness to her brother as she in concerned for his health.
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The first every national lottery was introduced in 1567 by Queen Elizabath I and it was at this time that England was seeking the expand. The lottery was used to raise money for the large amount of ships that England had, they also wanted to develop ports
All of the people that bought a ticket was promised freedom from arrest for all crimes except muder, felonies, piracy or treason.
In the script for the advertisement, the letters 'i' and 'y' were interchangable. -
The script also contained a great deal of French influence which relifected the stage at which language was at then, this will have been Middle English.
There was also elavated lexis in the script as it was aimed at rich nobels that had the money to spend on a ticket. -
Robert Cawdery produced the first dictionary
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The Mayflower set sail for the New World leadingto the begining of a new and influencial form of English
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Jonathan Swift tried to impose some order upon the english language by proposing the establishment of an academy to rule on the correct forms of English, spelling and grammar.
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18th century philosphers believed that if language was simple then it would help to end disputes and they thought that people were unable to understand each other due to the variastions in language.
In this century Dr Johnson made an important contribution to language as he wrote the dictionary in 1755, he said that it would take him 3 years however it actually took im 7 years. A disadvantage of Dr Johnson writing the dictionary was that most of the words that were included were ideosyncratic. -
Jonathan Swift wanted to set up a Langauge academy to fix the English Language (this was the start of perscriptivism)
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Samuel Johnson published the first English dictionary at this time, introducing some standardisation to the language. A lot of the time his spellings would have been his own opinion as were the spellings of people in different parts of the country.
Johnson didn't work alone. he employed a handful of assisstants and turned the top floor of his house in to a study in order to form the dictionary and work with the team tat he had aquired. -
Latin influences, e.g the currency. No standardisation for spelling. Archaic words. Most likely to be written by a man, very much a man's world, educated.
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Francis Grose created the first dictionary of slang in 1785 "A classical dictionary of the vulgar tongue". He was a former soldier and a champion drinker and he collected slag from all corners of society. He would walk to slums of London at night noting down the words used in brothels, public houses and dens.
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Robert Lowth and Lindley Murray published their grammar book telling people how to speak ''correctly"
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English was the language of rule and government in India, the Caribbean, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Great Britain. parts of Africa, south-east Asia and the pacific.
Pidgin languages developped where there was no Lingua Franca ( a common language) -
Elementary Education Act makes education compulsary from 5 to 10, creationg mass literacy.
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School leaving age was increased.
14 - 1918
15 - 1947
16 - 1972 -
The BBC was born and used Standard English for broadcasting. The World service beamed Standard English all over the world, unifying those without a common language.
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The first home computers with spell checkers and grammar choices were introduced, influencing standardisation further.
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This saw the arrival of the internet, an instant way of communicating with the rest of the world.
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The first text message.
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Latin speaking missionaries arrived in Kent, they used the Roman alphabet but added in runes of their own.
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About 60% of today's English Words are Germanic in origin, Anglo-Saxon or Old Norse
Their language evolved in to Old English
Through this time, the country gradually became Christian -
Alfred the Great came to the throne (King of Wessex)
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