The Development Of English Language: The Evolution Of Language

912 Words4 Pages
The evolution of language The study of language evolution has been the concern of many scholars over the time. It was considered like storytelling and has played a crucial part in developing other fields that are connected to it. Scholars have been aware that language change over time. In addition, it was known that many of European languages are originated from ancient languages such as English, which is descending from Anglo- Saxon. This change did not happen by chance but through a long period. Languages develop and varies over time, and the history of their development can be recreated by comparing modern languages to determine which character their ascendants languages must have had in order for the later developmental stages to occur.…show more content…
Firstly old English (Anglo – Saxon) which contains four main dialects: 1-Northumbrain: spoken North of the river Humber 2- Mercian: in the Midlands from East Anglia across Westward to the borders of Wales in the west. 3- Kentish: in the south-east. 4- West Saxon: in the south and south-west. The second stage started for about after century and half from the Norman Conquest in 1066, French was the language of the ruling class and administration for a period. Then during the thirteenth century English came back to be used in literature, it was very different from the language of Anglo-Saxon as the Norman French had a great influence on English grammar and vocabulary. By the end of the hundred years' war in the fifteenth century, English had become conscious of its own independent national identity and was transformed from state to one with educated and wealthy, which was an important element in the formation of Middle…show more content…
There was the revival of Latin as a literary language. However, this did not last for a long time as the great literary work and plays, that were wrote in the Elizabethan, and post-Elizabethan period were wrote in English, Meantime Britain occupied number of places around the world and established many colonization. This lead to the circulation of English language in these colonizations including Australia, New Zealand and North America in the seventeenth century. Moreover, by the nineteenth century English became the language of the world in all fields. Not only in United States, Australia, Canada and New Zealand where most of the settlers are descending from Britain but also in India and other African and Asian countries within the British empire. This means that English became the language of the world as Latin once was almost 2000 years earlier for the same reasons. In addition, the subscribing factor here is that both Latin and English were in origins nothing but small tribes' local dialects, italic in one case and Germanic in the

More about The Development Of English Language: The Evolution Of Language

Open Document