Language Change Timeline

Language Change Timeline

1. 1700's

   • Demand for grammatical languages e.g. Latin fell, emphasis on modern english.
   • Industrial rev 1780 onwards, shift from agriculture to industry.
   • 1755 Johnson's dictionary, took 8 yrs, until Oxford English Dictionary, was viewed as pre-eminent english dictionary.
     • Great importance in standardisation of spelling.
     • OED published over 150 yrs later.
     • Also gave phonological information.
     • Had social prestige, most words included quote from most prestigious authors.
   • Non-standard caps of nouns generally died out in C18.
   • Lowth's Short introduction to English grammar, standardising grammar, 1762.
     • Lowth and Johnson - early prescriptivists.

2. 1800's

   • Long S, derived from roman cursive, generally fell out of use late C19, rarely found in good quality London printing after 1800, although lingered provincially for a while.
   • 'Ye' died out C19, fully replaced by the.
   • Social.
     • Late C19, invention of telephone, communication changes.
     • Abolition of slavery 1807.
     • Huge gap between wealthy and poor, distinct social classes.
       • 1848 - Communist manifesto, Marx & Engels.
     • Improvement of communication ont transport, rail, canal, steam ships allowed goods to be transported rapidly, facilitating trade and industry.
       • British Empire causes huge lexical growth.
     • Many movements to obtain greater rights for women, Married Woman's Property act introduced.
   • Noteable literature, Dickens, Brontes, Jane Austen, Mary Shelley - Frankenstein.
     • 1816, Pickering compiled first dictionary of americanisms.
     • First thesaurus created C19.
     • 1820s, grammar and punctuation books for children.

3. 1900's

   • WW1 1914-1918, WW2 1939-1945.
     • War & army brought with it new lexicon.
     • After WW2 high immigration from India, Pakistan & Caribbean, new cultures and lexis came with.
   • Women.
     • Sex discrimination act 1975, work, education and training.
     • Suffragette movement, women got vote 1928.
     • 1970 equal pay act passed.
     • Tech.
       • 1914, first mass produced motor car, they gained great popularity in C20.
       • 1973, first mobile phone.
         • Text speak begins late C20.
           • Numeronym - number used to form abbreviation e.g. gr8 (not in initialisms and acronyms).
       • 1975, first personal computer.
       • Much new lexis introduced to language. Many initialisms and acronyms.
   • 60s youth-based sub-sultures became prevalent.
   • 80s Political correctness, avoiding offence.
   • Sales of Good act, 1979 legislation - advertising must be accurate.

4. 2000's

   • Social Networking & further technological advances, most people have phone/smart phone and pc.
     • Global communication through social media, lead to coining of much new slang, spread through internet.
     • Popularisation of Blackberry (first BB smart phone 2003) - QWERTY keyboard, no longer a need for some text speak.
     • Emoticons, 2011, Apple introduced Emoji keyboard, Emoticons lost popularity.

5. Earlier

   • 1476 - Caxton introduced printing press.
     • Standardized to some extent due to country having wide range of very different dialects, by homogenising regional dislects to South East, as this was most influential area at time.
     • Began standardising spelling, and homogenising a variety of english dialects.
     • By C17, books generally cheaper, literacy rates increasing, however predominantly elite classes still.
   • Between 14th century and 18th century, Great Vowl Shift, meaning vowels were no longer 'phonetic'.
     • Pronunciation of english began to stabilise.
   • Shakespeare writing around late 16th century to early 17th, brought over 1700 new words into language.
   • 1693, first woman's magazine published.
   • Increase in international trade C17, increase in word borrowings.
   • Æ, þ, ȝ, Ash, Thorn and Yogh used in old english, generally disappeared as popularity of printing rose.