1、1,A Cultural History of the English Language,2,Agenda Introduction Old English Middle English Early Modern English Present-Day English World Englishes,3,Introduction,Definition of Language Functions of the Language The Origin of Language Families of Languages The Indo-European Family Languages Chang
2、e,4,What is Language?,Language is a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas,emotions and desires by means of voluntarily produced symbols. Sapir (1921)萨丕尔（1921）: 语言是人类的非本能的交际方式，通过有意发出的声音或写出语言符号等手段，来达到传递思想、交流感情和满足欲望的目的。,Language is a set of sentences, each finite in length and
3、constructed out of a finite set of elements. Chomsky (1957) : 乔姆斯基（1957）：语言是一套句子的集合，每句长度有限，且由有限的语言成分组成。,5,Human Symbols System Communication,6,Funtions of Language?,7,The Origin of Language,The Tower of Babel,8,Five Theories of the Origins of Language,The Bow-Wow Theory The Pooh-Pooh Theory The Ding
4、-Dong Theory The o-he-Ho Theory The La-la Theory Otto Jespersen (1860-1943) , Danish linguist,9,The top 20 languages,1. Mandarin Chinese 2. English 3. Spanish 4. Hindi 5. Arabic 6. Portuguese 7. Bengali 孟加拉语,8. Russian 9. Japanese 10. German 11. French 12. Javaness 13. Korean 14 Italian,D. Crystal,
5、(2001) The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language,10,Language Families,11,Types of Linguistic Classification,Genetic Classification 谱系分类法Typological classification 类型分类法,12,Typologcial classification is to group the langauges into structural types, on the basis of phonology, grammar or vocabulary rather
6、 than in terms of any real or assumed historical relationshop.,13,Isolating, analytic or root languages Inflectional (Fusional) languagesAgglutinating languages Polysynthetic languages,14,Isolating, analytic or root languages : words consist of single morphemes; most words consist only of a root. Ma
7、ndarin Chinese, Vietnamese; 孤立语我 买 橘子 吃,15,Inflectional (Fusional) languages 屈折语: words consist of stem and affixes which often mark several grammatical categories simultaneously. Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, Russian.e.g. The biggest boys have been asking.,16,Agglutinating languages : 粘着语: words are buil
8、t up out of a long sequentce of units, with each unit expressing a particular grammatical meaning, in a clear one-to-one way. Finnish, Hungarian, Estonian, Swahili斯瓦希里人语, Turkish, Japanese form words in this way.Examples in Estonian 1. Ta on kohvikus. he is coffeehousein He is in the coffee house. 2
9、. Lhme kohvikusse. gowe coffeehouseinto Let us go into the coffee house. 3. Ma tulen uuest kohvikust. I come newfrom coffeehousefrom I am coming out of the new coffee house.,17,Polysynthetic languages 多式综合语: words are foten very long and complex, containing a mixture of aglutinating and inflectional
10、 features. They consist of long strings of stems and affixes, which may translate as an entire English sentence, as in Eskimo, Mohawk, Australian languages.1. rikuyki I see you. 2. rikuykiik I see you all. 3. rikuykiku We see you. riku: see yki: first person singular actor and second person singular
11、 object ik: marks object as plural ku: marks actor as plural,18,The Language Families of the World,19,The Indo-European Family,20,Discovery of Sanskrit “The Sanskrit language, , is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than e
12、ither, there is a similar reason, though not quite so forcible, for supposing that both the Celtic , though blended with a very different idiom, had the same origin with the Sanskrit; and the Old Persian might be added to the same family”,Sir William Jones (1746-94),21,22,Germanic,East,North,West,Go
13、thic,Icelandic,Norwegian,Danish,Swedish,High,Low,German Yiddish,Dutch Flemish Afrikaans,Englsih,23,Language Change,What changes? How does language change ?Why,24,Sound changeGrammatical changeSpelling changeSemantic change,25,Some types of semantic change Extension : e.g. office, salary Narrowing :
14、e.g. meat, deer, girl, starve, Shift : e.g. navigator, Figurative use e.g. crane Amelioration: e.g. naughty Pejoration 语义转贬: e.g. nortorious New words and old,26,Some surprising etymologies: villain farm labourer taxation fault finding pretty ingenious 机灵的, 有独创性的, vulgar ordinary sly wise orchard ga
15、rden ( without fruit trees),27,bribe steal dout fear handsome easy to handle ( 15th century) happy lucky silly happy ( 13th century) tall handsome( 14th century) wallet bag for holding goods for journey holiday holy day,28,How does language change?,Change from aboveChange from below,29,William Labov s study,Saks,Macys,Kleins,William Labovs study, 1970s,30,Another study,Marthas Vineyard,31,Movewment of peoples,A shift of power,Technology,32,Homework,GroupworkThe magic power of language,
