Author: Wright, Laura; editor:
Title: The Development of Standard English, 1300-1800: Theories, Descriptions, Conflicts
Description: Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, (2000). orig.boards. 23x15cm, xi,236 pp, Series: Studies in English Language.. Minor rubbing. VG. ¶ Contents: Theory and Methodology: Approaches to Studying the Standardisation of English: Historical description and the ideology of the standard language; Mythical strands in the ideology of prescriptivism; Rats, bats, sparrows and dogs: biology, linguistics an the nature of standard English; Salience, stima and standard; The ideology of the standard and the development of extraterritorial Englishes; Metropolitan values: migration, mobility, and cultural norms, London 1100-1700; Processes of the Standardisation of English: Standardisation and the language of early statutes; Scientific language and spelling standardisation 1375-1550; Change from above or below? Mapping the loci of linguistic change in the history of Scottish English; Adjective comparison and standardisation processes in American and British English from 1620 to the present; The Spectator, the politics of social networks, and language standardisation in eighteenth-century England; A branching path: low vowel lengthening and its friends in the emerging standard ["There are many questions yet to be answered about how Standard English came into existence. The claim that it developed from a Central Midlands dialect propagated by clerks in the Chancery, the medieval writing office of the king, is one explanation that has dominated textbooks to date. This book reopens the debate about the origins of Standard English, challenging earlier accounts and revealing a far more complex and intriguing history" -Publisher's description]

Keywords: Historical Grammar, Linguistics, Language History, Standard English, Standardization, Germanic Languages, , ,