The English language has constantly been going through an evolutionary process.
The English language began to develop when the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes invaded England from across the North Sea in the 5th Century AD. Up until around the 1100s, "Old English" was spoken.
In the period of 1100-1500 AD, when the Normans invaded and ruled England, French was spoken amongst the royal court while the lower classes continued to speak English. At this point, as expected, many French words were added to the English language. Towards the end of this era, there was a significant change as the pronunciation of vowels became shorter and shorter.
In the 1600s, the invention of printing also led to a fundamental shift in the English language. "Printing brought standardization to English. Spelling and grammar became fixed, and the dialect of London, where most publishing houses were, became the standard (English Club)".
As English speakers today, if we were to go to England in the 5th, 8th, 12th, 15th or 18th centuries, we would barely be able to converse with the people. If we went back 50 years ago, the language would still be slightly different to what it is today.
The evolution of the English language is a constant process that is speeding up in line with technological advances and in a world in which we live that expects us all to 'go, go, go'.
As teachers going out into a world where language continues to be a fundamental pillar to our society and is also undergoing rapid change, we need to make sure that we embrace netspeak, txtspk and whatever comes next. Otherwise, there will be a "Words Their Way" written for us by our students and they will be able to assess and categorise what developmental phase we are in and give us word sorts based on this (electronically, of course).
Kate, you're absolutely right: language continues to evolve, as it always has. Linguists like David Crystal suggest that the process may in fact have sped up in recent decades thanks to the proliferation of digital communications. Whether or not that's the case, we still need to come to terms with the fact that language is never fixed or stable but will always move on. The interesting and challenging situations, of course, are those borderline contexts where the process of change has begun but isn't yet far enough advanced to have become established.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I look forward to the day when we might accept 'i' instead of "I" as standard, thereby doing away with an unnecessary historical oddity. However, that day is probably still a little way off ...
I enjoyed reading about the historical evolution of the English language. Its amazing how far English has come and continues to evolve!
ReplyDeleteYour closing comment about our future students potentially dictating correct English made me chuckle..