Standardization(s) of English
Standard Language
IS:
• An abstract ideology
– Related to prescriptive writers largely from the 18th
Century; however, such attitudes began in earlier periods
• A written form that results from a process of
standardization (selection, codification, elaboration
and acceptance)
IS NOT:
• reflective of the language of any one individual
(not Henry V or Queen Elizabeth II)
• immutable (that is, it is always changing)
Process of Standardization
(after E. Haugen 1966)
1)
Selection
>> choice of a particular variety (actually a mixture of varieties) to serve
as model (e.g. business and administrative English of the 15th
century)
2)
Codification
>> fixing forms – particularly orthography – that make up chosen variety
(usually through an institution such as an Academy [e.g. French] or
through education [e.g. English])
3)
Elaboration
>> use of codified variety available to function in the majority of
contexts
4)
Acceptance
>> language-users begin to perceive elaborated variety as the legitimate
variety
Standardization as a non-linear process;
like all dialects it is always changing
1. Selection
4. Acceptance
2. Codification
3. Elaboration
Two main means of standardization
1) Engineered standardization – When an
individual or group of elites sits down to design
an ‘appropriate’ or ‘correct’ standard variety.
This may take place rather suddenly. (e.g.
Norwegian, Korean, etc.)
2) Circumstantial standardization – The
development of attitudes over time that
encourage a particular standard. This is usually
much more gradual and oftentimes happens
without people even realizing it.
New functions for English at the end of the
medieval period (1400-1500) >>
circumstances ripe for standardization
• By 1423 virtually all of Parliament’s
records are kept in English
• The monarch (Henry V, r.1413-1422)
begins issuing documents in English
• London Brewer’s Guild adopts English
as its official language (1422)
• Nobles and monarchs begin having
their wills written in English (Earl of
Kent, in 1397, one of the first)
• First familiar letters in English begin
appearing at the beginning of the 15th
Century
‘Whereas our mother-tongue, to wit the English tongue, hath in modern
days begun to be honorably enlarged and adorned, for that our most
excellent lord, King Henry V, hath in his letters missive and divers affairs
touching his own person, more willingly chosen to declare the secrets of
his will, for the better understanding of his people, hath with a diligent
mind procured the common idiom (setting aside others) to be
commended by the exercise of writing; and there are many of our craft of
Brewers who have the knowledge of writing and reading in the said
English idiom, but in others, to wit, the Latin and the French, before these
times used, they do not in any wise understand. For which causes with
many others, it being considered how that the greater part of the Lords
and trusty Commons have begun to make their matters to be noted down
in our mother tongue, so we also in our craft, following in some manner
their steps, have decreed to commit to memory the needful things which
concern us [in English].’
(From the abstract book of the London Brewer’s Guild, 1422 [ironically, originally in
Latin; translation from Chambers and Daunt, A Book of London English, 1931])
Need for Standard:
Late Medieval London
England’s center for:
• Trade
• Government
• Immigration
• Merchants
• Social Mobility
• Dialects of English
• Literature in English
• Linguistic Exchange
• Emerging Prestige
The pool of variants:
Some ways of spelling shall/should, pre-1500
shulen (v.(1)) Forms: sg.1 & 3 shal(e, shalle, shel(e, shul(e, shulle, shol(le, shille, shinne,
chal(le, chul, (S) ssal, swal, sse(l, (early) scal, scæl, sceal, sceæl, scule, scyle & sal(le, sa
macronle, sel, sul(e, sil, (early) sæl, seal, sol & (late EM) xal(e, xul, zal & (errors) sha,
schle, schchl, shab, schalt, schulen, salch, psal; sg.2 shalt(e, shald, shelt, shult, sholt,
chalt, shalst, shat, (S) ssalt, sselt, (early) scalt, scald, scælt, scealt, sceald, scelt & salt(e,
salth, xalt, (early) sald, sælt, silt(h, solt & shal(le, sha macronle, shul(e, sho macron
brevele, shel, (K) ssel, (early) scal, sceole, scule & sal(le, sa macronle, (early) sule &
(late EM) xul & (errors) schlat, sselelt, ichalt; pl. shul(l)en, shuln(e, shul(l)eth, shulle,
shul(e, sholle(n, sholleth, shol(e(n, sholi, sho hacekul(l)e, shal(le, sha macronle,
shele(n, shelle, sculle, scollen, scal(e, chul, cho hacekulle, chal(le, (chiefly S) ssul(le,
ssule(n, ssolle(n, ssolleth, ssal, ssel, (early) scullen, scullan, sculeð, scule(n, sculan,
sculon, scylan, scylon, sceole(n, sceolon, scelen, scæl, sceæl & sul(e, solen, sal(le, sa
macronle, zal, (early) sulle(n, swul(l)en, sulen, suleth, solle(n, solleth, sol & (chiefly
late) shun(e, shone, shin(e, shinne, (late) xul(lin, xal(n, xun & (errors) schulien, schlen,
scuhlen, shoren, shalt, scha, sculled, sa, seal; p.sg.1 & 3 shold(e, sholte, shuld(e, sho
hacekulde, shelde, shild, shud(e, shid(e, sculde, chold(e, chuld, cho hacekulde, (S)
ssold(e, ssode, (early) sheolde, sc(e)olde & suld(e, sold(e, sud, (N) suuld, so hacekuld,
sald(e, (early) silde & (chiefly late EM) xold, xuld(e & (errors) schulen, fulde, isceolde,
psuld, sclulde . . .
+
=
(evolutionary analogy from Hope 2000)
biological species need a common ancestor
standard languages DO NOT have a single ancestor
So, why are particular features chosen over others . . ?
But on Tywesdaye I was wyth þe Bysshop
of Hely, whyche shewyth hymselffe goode
and worshypfull, and he seyde þat he
sholde sende to myn oncle Williams þat
he sholde nott procede in no suche mater
till þat he speke wyth hym
(John Paston II to his mother, Margaret, 1479)
I marvel soore that yow sent me noo word
of the letter wych I sent to yow by Master
Wylliam Brown at Ester. I sent yow word
that tym that I xold send yow myn
exspenses . . . I xall wryt to yow in thys
letter the hool som of my exspenses . . .
(Walter Paston to his mother, Margaret, 1479)
The language of two
brothers
‘Colourless’: <sholde>
*Social context: John II
moved in courtly circles;
often in London
East Anglian: <xold>, <xall>
*Social context: Walter was an
academic at fifteenth-century
Oxford
Influence of the Chancery (over-emphasized!)
• Henry V deliberately implemented linguistically
orientated policies that resulted in a group of
clerks (of the Chancery) writing in English based
on the King’s personal usage, forming the basis of
the standard English of today (see Fisher)
>>faulty conclusion: Standard English was planned
The truth: The history of
standard English is
much more complex
than a wholesale
adoption of ‘Chancery’
language
(see esp. Benskin 2004)
Modern vs. medieval standards
(from Smith 1996: 66)
Oh Lord! Spelling Non-Variation
Spellings of LORD in Dictionary of Old English Corpus
Form
Frequency
Percentage
<hlaford>
1325
95.8%
<laford>
31
2.2%
<hlauord>
2
0.1%
<lauord>
26
1.9%
Focus
Fixity
Spellings of LORD in the Linguistic Atlas of Early Middle English (nominative singular only)
*LAUERD *LAUerD *LHOAUERD *LHORD *LOFARD *LOUERD +LAUERD +LAUerD HLAUERD
HLAUORD HLA\UERD HLOUerD LAFARD LAFERRD LAFER^RD LARD LAUD LAUE*RD LAUERD
LAUERDE LAUERd LAUIRD LAUerD LAUerd LA\FER^RD LA\UERD LA\UerD LEA\UERD
LEHAUERD LHORD LORD LOUER>D> LOUERD LOUERED LOUIRD LOUerD LOUerED LOUerL
LaeUERD
Spellings of LORD listed in OED
ME laford, laferde, hlouerd, leverd, lhoaverd, lourde, lowerd, Orm. laferrd,
ME laverd, (ME lavard, læverd), ME lover(e)d, lovuerde, (ME lhord, lorld(e),
ME–15 lorde (ME gen. pl. lordene), ME, 15–17 lard(e, ME– lord. Also Sc. laird
n. In exclamations 15 leard, 16–17 lawd, 17 laud, lurd
The Endings Matter: Morphological Non-Variation
Inflection of Nouns in Dative Plural in Ælfric’s First Series of Catholic Homilies (c. 990)
Ending
Frequency
Percentage
<-um>
1762
98.3%
<-on>
17
1.0%
<-an>
12
0.7%
Focus
Fixity
-Ø
-ES
-A
-AM
-AN
-ANN
-AS
-ÆS
-E
-ED
-EN
-ENE
-ES
-ESS
-EZ
-I
-IN
-IS
-LES
-N
-NA
-NE
-ON
-S
-U
-UM
-US
-UM
-UN
-YS
-Z
220 4.00%
1 0.02%
15 0.27%
1 0.02%
90 1.63%
1 0.02%
16 0.29%
3 0.05%
601 10.92%
1 0.02%
1091 19.81%
22 0.40%
2815 51.13%
131 2.38%
11 0.20%
2 0.04%
6 0.11%
153 2.78%
1 0.02%
28 0.51%
1 0.02%
3 0.05%
7 0.13%
186 3.38%
2 0.04%
6 0.11%
3 0.05%
54 0.98%
1 0.02%
8 0.15%
26 0.47%
Inflection of Plural Nouns Following a Preposition in
Linguistic Atlas of Early Middle English
The Beginnings of Standard Old English
• Origins located in Bishop Æthelwold’s
School at Winchester in the early 970s
• Part of a strongly normative programme
of reform instituted by King Edgar,
including the reform of the coinage and
the adoption of the Regularis concordia, a
set of rules for religious houses.
• Based on West Saxon Dialect; model for
standardisation Latin.
• Established a diglossic system:
• H[igh] Language = ‘Standard Old
English’
• L[ow] Language = Spoken Old English
is a relatively stable language situation in which, in
addition to the primary dialects of the language (which may
include a standard or regional standards), there is a very
divergent, highly codified (often grammatically more complex)
superposed variety, the vehicle of a large and respected body
of written literature, either of an earlier period or in another
speech community, which is learned largely by formal
education and is used for most written and formal spoken
purposes but is not used by any sector of the community for
ordinary conversation.
DIGLOSSIA
The Diffusion of Standard Old English
Elaboration
•
York
•
Latin loans pertaining to scholarship,
science, learning and culture: biblioþece,
grammaticcræft etc
Loan translations like ymbeardian (~ L
circumhabitare), ‘dwell around)
Worcester
Canterbury
Bodmin
1.
2.
3.
4.
Selection
Codification
Elaboration
Acceptance
The Death of Old English, or its Destandardisation?
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
Canterbury CC
50%
Durham
Peterborough
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
1060
1080
1100
1120
1140
1160
1180
1200
1220