“Enrichment”

3 textual revolutions 1.Writing 2.Printing 3.Electronics

Change and progress: the Renaissance 1476 Caxton’s printing press –mostly Latin –20,000 English titles by 1640 Increasing literacy – private letters in the 15th cent; ⅓ to ½ literate in Shakespeare’s London (Baugh) Increased commerce, transport Growth of technology and knowledge, increase in the fields of specialization. Latin begins to lose its hold on scientific discourse.

New Vocabulary Need for new words New words are lexical, not structural (open and closed classes)

open and closed classes open classes Lexical, content words closed classes Stuctural, grammatical words nouns adjectives adverbs lexical verbs prepositions pronouns auxiliary verbs

New Vocabulary Need for new words New words are lexical, not structural (open and closed classes) 2 means of augmentation: –From within the language itself compounding, derivation, coinages, recycling... –From outside loans

New Vocabulary Need for new words Lexical vocabulary, not structural (open and closed classes) 2 means of augmentation: From within the language itself compounding, derivation, coinages, recyclin, –From outside loans

Það er alkunnugt hvað hægt er að búa til ný orð á íslensku, bæði samfellinga og allskonar nýgjörvinga. Og hvað er bað sem heimspekingarnir þurfa mest á að halda til að geta komið orðum að því sem þeir hugsa - eru það ekki ný orð handa nýjum hugmyndum? Hvað er það annað en þessi frjósemi málsins sem íslenskan hefir til að bera meir en flest önnur mál? Ágrip af ræðu áhrærandi íslensku eftir Konráð Gíslason (19.öld )

From within the language itself: Icelandic Compounding flugvél farsími kæliskápur sjúkrahús útvarp Recycling sími snælda diskur -væðing Derivation pöntun verslun dreifing fallegur læknir bakari reiði flæði ástúð breidd bót Coinages tölva gemsi piltur stúlka

From within the language itself: English Derivation suffixes: some still productive happiness greatness lovely elderly beautiful hateful greenish reddish Others no longer productive: handsome wedlock hatred hundred kingdom freedom manhood friendship relationship

From within the language itself: English Derivation French or Latin suffixes: -ion –ation –able –ity –ous higly prductive: likeable thinkable eatable regrettable do-able undo-able throw-away-able

From within the language itself: English Derivation prefixes lost early in Norse and Icelandic understand become believe tobreak tohew totere (tear to pieces) toscattter withdraw, withstand withsaken (deny), withcwethen (contradict ) forbid forget forgive forbreak forburn, forhang (=put to death) forcleave

From within the language itself: English Derivation French or Latin prefixes: return remark remember redo remake impossible inelegant illegal (unnecessary) interfere interact submit

From within the language itself: English (Coinages boy.girl... )

From within the language itself: English Derivation Baugh: “Curtailment of OE processes of derivation” § 137 p. 181 Following the Norman conquest, this ability to make new words began to be lost. Why?

“Curtailment of OE processes of derivation” “it is impossible to doubt that the wealth of easily acquired new words had weakened the English habit of word-formation" p.182 end of §138

“Curtailment of OE processes of derivation” Pétur Knútsson ”Learned & Popular etymology” in Íslensk mál OE like Icelandic has a monosyllabic constraint on morphemes úrne gedæghwámlican hláf ús sele tódæg wífmann hláfweard cyning

“Curtailment of OE processes of derivation” Pétur Knútsson 1994 Stress on stem and creation of weak syllables creates polysyllabic phonemes. hláfweard > hláford >laverd > lord wífman > woman leofmann > lemman husband, neighbour i.e. the syllables do not all have clear meanings any more. English loses the monosyllabic constraint

“Curtailment of OE processes of derivation” Pétur Knútsson 1994 This effect is increased by the adoption of foreign words, and may even make it easier for foreign words to be accepted into the language At the same time there is an influx of Latin and later French polysyllabic words apostle history plaster countrey justice prisoun reasoun –If the foreign words have a complex morphological structure in their own language, this structure will not be visible in the language of adoption.

New Vocabulary Need for new words Lexical vocabulary, not structural (open and closed classes) 2 means of augmentation: From within the language itself compounding, derivation, coinages, recycling, –From outside loans

New Vocabulary Need for new words Lexical vocabulary, not structural (open and closed classes) 2 means of augmentation: –From within the language itself compounding, derivation, coinages, recyclin, From outside loans

Loans French vocabulary entered English as the use of French waned.

Baugh: 1000 French words at random before (statistics in footnote to §133, p th edn)

NB first recorded occurence in a written text ! status of French Baugh: 1000 French words at random

Loans French vocabulary entered English as the use of French waned. Same with Latin? See Latin LoansLatin Loans