The Cambridge History of the English Language Volume 4 Part 1 pdf

The Cambridge History of the English Language is the first multi-volume work to provide a full account of the history of English Its authoritative coverage extends from areas of central linguistic interest and concern to more specialised topics such as personal and place names The volumes dealing with earlier periods are chronologically based, whilst those dealing with more recent periods are geographically based, thus reflecting the spread of English over the last 300 years Volume IV deals with the history of the English language from 1776 to 1997 An extensive introduction details the changing socio-historical setting in which English has developed in response to a continuing back­ ground of diversity as it was transplanted to North America and beyond Separate chapters on pronunciation, syntax, and vocabulary chronicle the linguistic features of the language during this period, taking as the basis for discussion the common core inherited form the sixteenth century and shared by what ard now the two principal varieties, American and British English In addition, there are chapters on English as a literary language, English grammar and usage, and onomastics THE C A M B R I D G E HISTORY OF THE E N G L I S H L A N G U A G E GENERAL EDITOR VOLUME Richard M Hogg i v 1776-1997 THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE VOLUME i v 1776-1997 E D I T E D BY S U Z A N N E ROMAINE Merton Professor of English Language, University of Oxford CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS C A M B R I D G E UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, Säo Paulo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 R U , UK Published in the United States of America b y Cambridge University Press, N e w York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521264778 © Cambridge University Press 1998 This publication is in copyright Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press First published 1998 Third printing 2007 Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge A catalogue record for this publication is available from the Britsih Library Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data The Cambridge history of the English language Vol edited by Richard M Hogg I S B N 521 26474 X Vol edited by N o r m a n Blake I S B N 521 26475 Vol edited by Suzanne Romaine I S B N 521 26477 Vol edited b y Robert Burchfield I S B N 521 26478 Includes bibliograpical references and index Contents: v The beginning to 1066-v 1066-1476 - v 1776-1997- v English in Britain and Overseas: origins and deveolpment I English language - History I Hogg, Richard M II Blake, N F N o r m a n Francis III Burchfield, R W (Robert Wilson) I V Romaine, Suaznne PE1072.C36 1992 420'.9 91-13881 ISBN-13 978-0-521-26477-8 paperback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of U R L s for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that a n y content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate CONTENTS Zxr/ of figures hist of tables List of contributors General Editor's preface Editor's acknowledgements Contributors' acknowledgements List of abbreviations 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 2.8 INTRODUCTION SuzanneRomaine From Old English to New Englishes: unity in diversity? 1776 and after: an age of revolutions and empires Shifting centres of gravity and the notion of a common core Language, nation, and identity: staking a claim on the past and future Conclusion: a remarkable success story? Further reading V O C A B U L A R Y fohnAlgeo The study of the English vocabulary The growth of the vocabulary Creating as a source of new words Shifting as a source of new words Shortening as a source of new words Composing as a source of new words Blending as a source of new words Borrowing as a source of new words vii pagex xi xii xiii xvii xviii xix 1 22 48 54 56 57 57 61 66 66 71 74 76 76 Contents 2.9 2.10 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.8 5.9 5.10 5.11 Recent neologisms Vocabulary change as a mirror of cultural change Further reading 82 88 91 S Y N T A X DavidDenison Introduction The noun phrase The verbal group Elements of the clause Structure of the clause Composite sentences Notes Textual sources Further reading 92 92 96 130 212 235 255 312 323 326 O N O M A S T I C S RichardCoates Preamble Sources for British names Scholarship Personal names Surnames Place-names Street-names Other categories of nameables Academic writings on names Further Reading 330 330 332 336 339 348 350 365 370 371 371 P H O N O L O G Y MichaelK C MacMahon The soundscapes of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries The historical sources and their interpretation Methods of phonetic/phonological analysis Standards and styles of pronunciation Vowel systems Vowel phonotactics (structural) Vowel phonotactics (lexical-incidental) Vowel realisations Consonant systems Consonant phonotactics (structural) Consonant phonotactics (lexical-incidental) 373 viii 373 375 381 382 403 418 438 448 467 469 483 Contents 5.12 5.13 5.14 5.15 5.16 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 7.6 7.7 Consonant realisations Lexical stress Intonation and rhythm Voice qualities Conclusions Notes Further reading 486 492 517 519 520 522 535 ENGLISH GRAMMAR AND USAGE Edward Finegan Introduction First period: mid-eighteenth century—1830 Second period: - Third period: 1930-pre^ent Conclusions and prospects Further reading 536 536 540 557 579 585 587 L I T E R A R Y L A N G U A G E SylviaAdamson Introduction Breaking the standard Breaking the pentameter The breaking of hypotaxis The problem of metaphor Self-expression and self-representation CODA: the two revolutions and the literary common core Further reading Key to the numbered examples Key to the cited authors 589 589 598 614 630 646 661 679 681 684 689 Glossary of linguistic terms Bibliography Index 693 708 762 ix Suzanne Romaine Were Warriors (1990), part-Maori author Alan Duff presents his characters largely from within by narrating from the vantage point of members of the Heke family, who live in a low-income state housing project called Pine Block Like the Hekes, most of the residents of Pine Block are Maori or part-Maori, but the housing estate is cheek by jowl with the houses of more affluent white middle-class New Zealanders From the outset the novel focuses on the disparities between the residents of Pine Block and their Pakeha (New Zealanders of European origin) neighbours, in particular, the Tramberts, whose house can be seen from the back kitchen window of the Heke's house When the story begins, Beth Heke is looking at the two-storey Trambert house surrounded by large trees and pasture land and thinking to herself The worlds of Them (the Pakeha/White) and Us (Maori/Black) are at once juxtaposed Bastard, she'd think, looking out her back kitchen window Lucky white bastard, at that glimpse of two-storey house through its surround of big old trees and its oh so secure greater surround of rolling green pastureland, while she — Clicking her tongue, Oh to hell with him Or good luck to him, if she wasn't in too bad a mood Good luck to you, white man for being born into your sweet world, and bad luck to you, Beth Heke (who used to be a Ransfield but not that life was so much better then), for being married to an arsehole And yet I love him just can't help myself I love the black, fist-happy bastard And she'd light another smoke, and always went ahh in her mind and some­ times aloud because she liked that first hit against the back of her throat, and she'd squint through the drifts And wonder (OWW, p 7) Since these are the opening lines of the novel, they are crucial in orient­ ing the reader While at first glance, they can be read as narration in the third person, the shifting deixis in tense and pronouns, mark changes in per­ spective, indicating tension in identities and allegiances, e.g the second person you addressed to her white neighbour and theyou to herself reflect­ ing on her own life Although Beth clearly belongs to the Maori world by birth and marriage (and her residence in Pine Block), at times she gazes as an outsider on both the Maori and Pakeha worlds One narrative feature of Duffs prose which contributes to the difficulty of distinguishing the narrator's voice from those of his characters is the use of colloquial and at times non-Standard English, as both the language of narration and of the characters' reported speech and thought The charac­ ters' subjectivities pervade the surrounding authorial report It becomes difficult to say whether the characters' idiom is tinged with the narrator's or 44 Introduction whether the narrator's prose is 'contaminated' by its proximity to the think­ ing characters The similarity of the language of narration, interior mono­ logue and narrated monologue fuses, the narrative into one The only Pakeha characters in the novel are the Tramberts, whose func­ tion is merely to symbolise, even if only stereotypically, the Pakeha world and its privileges vis-d-vis the Maori one The story is not about them and hence we not see them from the inside out, except on one fleeting occa­ sion when Gordon Trambert makes an appearance at the funeral of Beth's teenage daughter, Grace From her perch in a tree from where she can see into the Trambert dining room, Grace, the oldest Heke daughter, who later hangs herself from that tree, becomes the focalising agent for reporting what goes on at the dinner party (OWW, p 117) The reader never really hears what the Tramberts have to say or think about anything The choice of the more distant deictic form that emphasizes the distance between Grace and the Tramberts Nibble-nibble-nibble, then down'd go their knife and fork or whatever it was they were eating the course with, V-ed points in on the plate, dabdab with that bit of cloth at their dainty mouths, picking up that glass of wine, which'd started off as white and then the mother and her husband's come along and filled more glasses with red wine; it had to be red wine unless it was something else a Pine Block girl didn't know about just as she didn't know about red or white wine, only that she'd figured it from TV Each course taking an age to eat For hours this show went on: each person seeming to take a turn at talking (talking) how they do, holding court as they'd say in English at school, then someone replying or responding or saying anything at all, just resuming their eating, their wine sipping, their dabdabs at their mouths with serviettes, which a Pine Block girl knows're called sumpthin else except she doesn't know precisely what Again, it is not entirely clear who thinks or reports what Duff draws our attention to the way in which white New Zealanders of the Tramberts' social status would likely have pronounced talkingby exaggerating its vowel Dining in the midst of such polite conversation and other middle-class trappings such as wine and table napkins is not part of Grace's life, as indi­ cated linguistically in the use of non-U serviette as well as Grace's ignorance of the U alternative If it is the author who is speaking here, then he declines to reveal that he knows that the Tramberts would probably use the word table napkin (see 1.2) Duffs technique is highly reminiscent of that of Virginia Woolf, as described by Auerbach (1968: 536), who characterised its essence as 'a 45 Suzanne Romaine multipersonal representation of consciousness', shifting between the consciousness of different characters who represent multiple points of view rather than narrating the novel from a single point of view, the consciousness of one character By contrast, part-Samoan author Albert Wendt wrote his first and a number of subsequent novels primarily in Standard English in the conven­ tional third person His first novel, Sons for the Return Home (1973), can be read metaphorically as a classic case of alienation The namelessness of the characters is indicative of their lack of identity The intellectual son of Samoan parents who migrate to New Zealand in search of work has been educated in Pakeha institutions, and thus is caught between two worlds, at home in neither Although he is Samoan by birth, he finds he cannot live in Samoa, nor can he accept the Samoan world view He resists assimilation to it and remains outside of it, on the margins He is neither inside nor outside In New Zealand too he is the outside, the Other, although there he is forced to be on the margins by the racism of a white society that pre­ vents his full assimilation at the same time that it demands it Indeed, they must prevent it in order to maintain the boundaries between the centre and the Other Keeping the Other out is a means of self-preservation After his parents have been called to the school principal's office to be congratulated on their youngest son's receipt of the School Certificate, the boy reminds them (SRH, p 13): 'We've been here for nearly thirteen years and they still treat us as strangers As inferiors I speak their language, their peculiar brand of English, as well as any of them They have to pretend I'm their equal, that I'm a New Zealander, because they can't anything else.' The sites of Centre and Margin are not stable throughout the novel Paradoxically and ironically, it is Samoa (literally 'the centre') which is the centre, not just of the parents' lives and aspirations, but also from the Samoan point of view, it is the centre of the universe As the boy sees it, (SRH, p 40): 'Our whole life here is only a preparation for the grand return to our homeland Their hopes and dreams all revolve round our return.' African American critic Henry Louis Gates, Jr (1992: 315) has raised many questions about the nature of the relationship between centre and margin Although novels such as those of Duff and Wendt may appear to trade on the margin, they use the currency of English When they write in English using genres like the novel, which, despite its modernity, has its origin in Western literate traditions, indigenous writers leave themselves open to evaluation by Western critical standards, formulated in metropoli­ tan centres such as London and New York rather than in Apia or Kingston, or even Auckland If, however, these standards are used we must be fully Introduction conscious of their development against particular ideological assumptions rather than take them as neutral, objective and universally valid (see Mudrooroo 1990) Some of the negative critical evaluations of the works by indigenous writers of the Pacific are based on misunderstandings of the difficulties such authors face in integrating oral historical traditions into Western modes of narration in a distinctive way while remaining faithful to the cultural values which give meaning to these traditions Pakeha critic C K Stead, for example, invoked language in questioning Hulme's authenticity as a Maori author In characterising The Bone People as a 'novel by a Pakeha which has won an award [The Pegasus Award for Maori Literature] intended for a Maori', Stead (1985: 104) points out that Hulme was not brought up speaking Maori This demand for authenticity based on language rests on a fundamental misunderstanding of the lin­ guistic situation for many minority peoples, whose efforts to transmit their language have been undermined by policies of forced assimilation An 1871 act prohibited Maori in schools Even Witi Ihimaera and Patricia Grace, whose Maoriness does not seem to be questioned, speak English as their native language Patricia Grace has argued for a national literature in English which includes the Maori point of view The novel as a genre constitutes a strategic site in the discourse of national identity A number of scholars such as Anderson (1991) and Bhabha (1990) have discussed the ways in which nations may be brought into being through narration, thus attesting the critical role of written lit­ erature, in particular, the novel in the service of empire and nation In Said's view (1993: 69), the novel and imperialism are unthinkable without one another Authors such as Ihimaera, Grace, and Wendt are writing novels which validate an indigenous rather than a setder's view of history Ihimaera's novel The Matriarch (1987), for instance, can lay a strong claim to being the novel of modern New Zealand, an epic validating a Maori version of nationhood, which threatens the very foundation and continua­ tion of Pakeha rule in New Zealand In his novel as well as in Albert Wendt's Leaves of the Banyan Tree (1978) local or vernacular histories of families stand for the colonial and post-colonial condition of the Maori and Samoan people respectively While Frederick Jameson (1986: 69) has com­ mented that Third World novels are 'necessarily allegorical' and should be read as 'national allegories', Third World literature has no monopoly on national allegory The authors' choice of narrative voice and plot is to some extent dictated by the necessity to establish themselves as credible narra­ tors of (family) history within their own cultures Both authors also tell us that without acknowledgement and reinstatement of values authentic to 47 Suzanne Romaine the indigenous past, the modern nation-state rests on shaky foundations (Romaine 1997b) As in Joyce's Ireland, history has become a nightmare 1.4 Language, nation, and identity: staking a claim on the past and future Because national identity is not a permanent or static possession, it has to be continually reinvented Although Grillo (1989: 44) has argued that there was an almost total lack of attention to any relationship between language and national identity in England, I believe he is mistaken The role played by language in England's changing conceptions of itself can be seen in both the construction of a glorious past for the language as well as in ever increasing prognostications of a bright future as world language English, like England, was to have its conquests As Dean Trench wrote (1855): What can more clearly point out our ancestors' native land and ours as having fulfilled a glorious past, as being destined for a glorious future, than that they should have acquired for themselves and for those who came after a clear, a strong, a harmonious, a noble language? The energetic activities of intellectuals such as James Murray, Joseph Wright, author of the English Dialect Dictionary, and others were central to the shaping of European nationalism in the nineteenth century, a time when, as Pedersen (1931—43) puts it, 'national wakening and the beginnings of linguistic science go hand in hand' Historians such as Seton-Watson (1977) and Anderson (1991) have observed how nineteenth-century Europe was a golden age of vernacularising lexicographers, grammarians, philologists and dialectologists Their projects too were conceived as chil­ dren of empires Willinsky (1994) singles out the OED, in particular, as the last great gasp of British imperialism' It captured a history of words that fit well with the ideological needs of the emerging nation-state As Willinsky observes (1994: 194), the OED speaks to a 'particular history of national self-definition during a remarkable period in the expansion and collapse of the British empire' Murray's tenure as editor of the OED coincided roughly with the period which historian Eric Hobsbawm (1987) has called the Age of Empire, 1875-1914 With the OED, Murray and other editors were engaged in establishing England and Oxford University Press's claim on the English language and the word trade more generally Britain's expansionist policy brought with it increasing exposure to other languages The British presence in India awakened the attention of 48 Introduction scholars to Sanskrit In 1786 Sir William Jones gave a speech to the Philological Society which was to provide a firm basis for the comparativehistorical study of language In 1839 De Quincey called for a monument of learning and patriotism to be erected to the English language in the form of a history of English from its earliest rudiments The Early English Text Society subsequendy founded by F J Furnivall was to produce a canon of texts Such works would help solidify the unity of nation and language and their continuity from the earliest times Sentiments such as these were at least partly responsible for the replacement of the term Anglo-Saxon by Old English While colonial expansion was underway, there was also a need for more civil servants in the service of empire The opening of the Civil Service to competitive examinations in English language and literature, as recom­ mended by the Trevelyan and Northcote report of 1853 (The Organisation of the Permanent Civil Service), gave impetus to the institutionalisation of English studies The History of the English Language was treated as dis­ tinct from its literature Such notions were instrumental in the establishment of what today we might call 'English studies', i.e the study of English language and literature It had taken some centuries before people were confident enough about English to deem it worthy of study as a subject for teaching and research Now that English is so well established as a discipline, we tend to forget that even as late as the nineteenth century it was not recognised as a legiti­ mate subject The increasing enlargement of the state education system made the clas­ sics-based curriculum increasingly unsuitable for the many new pupils to be encompassed within it Women and the working classes of both sexes would find the classics too intellectually demanding and needed an easier subject James Murray actually credited the women's movement direcdy for the appearance of English studies at Oxford in the nineteenth century 'But for the movement to let women share in the advantages of a university edu­ cation', he said (Murray 1900: 31), 'it is doubtful whether the nineteenth century would have witnessed the establishment of a School of English Language and Literature at Oxford.' The English Dialect Society founded in 1873 (and its American counter­ part, the American Dialect Society in 1889) were spin-offs of the increas­ ing interest focused on the standard literary language in the curriculum These projects were motivated by the fear that if work were not begun to record what was non-standard, it would soon disappear Wyld argued strongly in favour of making the study of the English language a central 49 Suzanne Romaine component in secondary schools There he believed it would be 'beyond controversy' (1906: 34) Wyld could not, of course, have foreseen just how controversial it would indeed become towards the end of the twentieth century as questions about the canon and standards became a major pre­ occupation when the Conservative government launched its National Curriculum Cameron & Bourne (1988) see the Kingman report (1988), which emerged from the Committee of Inquiry into the Teaching of the English Language set up by the UK Secretary of State for Education as a key ideo­ logical text about the state of the English language and its relation to the state of the nation This proposal to make the teaching of English the cornerstone of a national curriculum whose aim is to produce a common culture has to be understood in historical context as a continuation of the spirit of the earlier Newbolt Report (1921) It too had advocated mass education in English language and literature as the basis for a common national culture so that (cited in Crowley 1991: 201): The English people might learn as a whole to regard their own language, first with respect and then with a genuine feeling of pride and affection More than any mere symbol it is actually a part of England; to maltreat it or deliberately debase it would be seen to be an outrage Such a feeling for our native language would be a bind of union between classes and beget the right kind of national pride Yet the National Curriculum was also a reaction to the liberal ideas of the 1960s and 1970s as well Kenneth Baker, Secretary for Education at the time the Kingman committee was set up, commented that while few schools taught traditional grammar, litde had been put in its place A central task for Kingman's committee was to equip teachers with a proper model of grammar Earlier, The Swann Report (1985: 385) had challenged the ethnocentrism of common culture in order to replace it with cultural pluralism, but it made clear at the same time that this conception of culture was to be transmitted through English as the 'central unifying factor in being British' In its concern with grammar, Kingman harked back to earlier ideology about the connection between language and nation 'Language above all else is the defining characteristic of an individual, a community, a nation' (Kingman 1988: 43) As Cameron and Bourne point out (1988:159), part of the meaning of Kingman is nostalgia for the good old days of imperial majesty now faded, and part of what a Conservative Party Campaign slogan called 'Making Britain Great Again' Thus, on numerous occasions in the past century right down to the 5o Introduction present day, the English l a n g u a g e w o u l d b e offered as evidence of the underlying unity that held all together despite superficial differences, par­ ticularly w h e n political a n d cultural crisis threatened In an i n t e r v i e w w i t h M a r g a r e t T h a t c h e r w h e n she w a s P r i m e Minister (JSSewsweek O c t o b e r 1990) a n d stood m u c h to g a i n from aligning herself w i t h then President R o n a l d R e a g a n , she v e r y g e n e r o u s l y c o n c e d e d that S h a k e s p e a r e b e l o n g e d as m u c h to A m e r i c a n s as to Britons in characterising the 'special relation­ s h i p ' that exists b e t w e e n the U n i t e d States a n d Britain S p e a k i n g to an A m e r i c a n interviewer, she observed: the Magna Carta belongs as much to you as it does to us; the writ of habeas corpus belongs as much to you as it does to us There is such a common heritage as well as the language Shakespeare belongs as much to you as he does to us That is what unites us and has united us — rather more than a philosophy, but history as well, and language and mode of thought Indeed, G r a m s c i (1985: - ) observes that: Every time the question of the language surfaces, in one way or another, it means that a series of other problems are coming to the fore: the formation and enlargement of the governing class, the need to establish more intimate and secure relationships between the governing groups and the national-popular mass, in other words to reorganize the cultural hegemony Despite the fact that the N e w b o l t r e p o r t c l a i m e d it w a s not advocating the 'teaching of standard English on a n y g r o u n d s of "social superiority'" or 'the suppression of dialect' (cited in C r o w l e y 9 : ) , as C r o w l e y observes, the attempt to create unity by m e a n s of a class dialect in contra­ distinction to other forms of speech w h i c h are b r a n d e d v u l g a r a n d p r o ­ vincial, is d o o m e d to defeat b e c a u s e it will reinforce divisions rather than m a k e the differences b e t w e e n standard a n d non-standard 'gradually disap­ p e a r ' (Newbolt Report, cited in C r o w l e y 9 : 0 ) Despite democratic rhetoric from s o m e quarters about m a k i n g Standard English accessible to the population as a w h o l e through universal educa­ tion, s o m e always w a n t e d to m a i n t a i n the exclusivity of the club of Standard English speakers R W C h a p m a n , for instance, in extolling the virtues of Oxford (= Standard) English, admitted he w a s 'so u n d e m o c r a ­ tic as to believe that the best, in speech as in other things, can never be w i d e l y a n d rapidly disseminated w i t h o u t d a m a g e to i t s e l f (1932: ) Already, it w a s e x p o s e d to dangers from b o t h w i t h i n its ranks as well as without 'As the speech of a v e r y small minority of English speakers it is 5i Suzanne Romaine obviously e x p o s e d to g r a d u a l absorption b y the surrounding m a s s and perhaps also to deliberate attack It is well k n o w n that English v o c a b u l a r y a n d i d i o m are u n d e r g o i n g penetration from A m e r i c a a n d elsewhere E v e n our g r a m m a r is threatened' (1932: ) T h e division b e t w e e n standard a n d non-standard is s y m b o l i c of other fault lines as large as those of class a n d nation; increasingly, race a n d g e n d e r are at stake too D e b a t e s about l a n g u a g e are thus really about issues of race, gender, class or culture, as can be seen in the controversy over 'political cor­ rectness', w h i c h has also b e e n carried out largely on the battlefield of lan­ guage W h i l e proposals for reforming sexist l a n g u a g e are considerably older than the political correctness controversy, they have b e c o m e caught u p in it, as can be seen in A m e r i c a n prescriptivist J o h n Simon's l u m p i n g together of a variety of g r o u p s discriminated against on g r o u n d s of class, race, sexual orientation, sex a n d ethnicity H e (1980: xiv) objects to the 'notion that in a democratic society l a n g u a g e m u s t a c c o m m o d a t e itself to the w h i m s , idiosyncrasies, dialects, and sheer i g n o r a n c e of underprivileged minorities, especially if these h a p p e n e d to b e black, Hispanic, a n d later on, female or h o m o s e x u a l ' Simon's rejection of l a n g u a g e reform is really a statement about keeping w o m e n (and other minority g r o u p s ) accountable to w h i t e middle-class m a l e standards by maintaining the linguistic status quo A society or nation in control of itself is in control of its g r a m m a r — a n d in control of its w o m e n ! T h e OEUs creators h a d defined themselves as the white, m a l e property- o w n i n g centre of a British Empire T h e dictionary served to codify a history traced through the nation's best writers Earlier, the act of transla­ tion of the Bible into English reflected the connection b e t w e e n l a n g u a g e , nation and empire T h e dissemination of the English Bible to Britain's colonies m a d e it l o o k as if English w e r e the v e r y l a n g u a g e spoken by God A t the centre of this process of national a n d cultural self-definition w a s the act of citation T h e Bible is at the top of the list of b o o k s cited in the OED T h e dictionary derives part of its authority and p o w e r in defining the lan­ g u a g e b y the process of exclusion of texts a n d authors W h a t w a s i n c l u d e d authorised a v i e w of the English l a n g u a g e that w a s in line w i t h England's h e g e m o n y in the last century T h e fact that the g r a m m a r i a n s a n d lexicographers w h o created Standard English a n d set forth its rights and w r o n g s w e r e m a l e has not g o n e u n n o ­ ticed by m o d e r n feminists such as D a l e S p e n d e r (1980) and Julia Penelope (1990) A m u c h earlier m a l e commentator, Elias M o l e e , repelled by lin­ guistic snobbery, r e m a r k e d in 1888 (p ) : 'It looks to m e as if the English l a n g u a g e w e r e constructed b y s o m e eccentric, rich a n d l e a r n e d bachelors 5^ Introduction w h o h a d n o t h i n g else to but h u n t u p the m e a n i n g s of w o r d s in diction­ aries a n d to spell' Bailey ( 9 : ) , w h o cites this remark, notes parenthetically that this description applied aptly to Molle's successors, the Fowler brothers! Symbolically, the first thing B e c k y S h a r p in Thackeray's Vanity Fair (1848) jettisons from the coach w h i c h takes her away from school is D r Johnson's Dictionary In the twentieth century feminists such as M a r y D a l y (1987) w o u l d w r i t e their o w n dictionaries D a l y describes her Websters' First New Intergalactic Wickedary of the English Language as a wickedary, a dictionary for w o m e n spun b y websters S h e plays here on the original m e a n i n g of the w o r d webster&s 'female w e a v e r ' and the fact that the family n a m e Webster is still closely associated w i t h dictionary m a k i n g in the US Standard English w a s clearly conceived of as a m a l e n o r m by b o t h H C W y l d a n d D a n i e l J o n e s In c o m m e n t i n g on the characteristics of w h a t he called 'Received Standard', W y l d (1934: 614) n o t e d that it w a s heard m o s t consistently at its best a m o n g officers of the British Regular Army ' T h e utterance of these m e n is at once clear-cut a n d precise, yet free from affectation; at once downright a n d manly, yet in the highest d e g r e e refined and urbane' S u c h m e n h a d confidence in their speech w i t h o u t reflection o n it F u n d a m e n t a l l y hereditary (at least in the m a l e line!), it sufficed simply that 'their fathers have told them' Similarly, Daniel J o n e s ( : ) in cir­ c u m s c r i b i n g the n o r m s of Standard English pronunciation so n a r r o w l y that they w e r e s y n o n y m o u s w i t h the speech of the southern English fami­ lies, r e m i n d s us that these w e r e families ' w h o s e men-folk have b e e n edu­ cated at the great public b o a r d i n g schools' D e s p i t e negative reactions to feminist l a n g u a g e reform during the 1960s a n d 1970s m a n y g o v e r n m e n t agencies, institutions, professional organiza­ tions and publishing h o u s e s have i m p l e m e n t e d changes, in s o m e case u n d e r legal mandate T h e New York Times, for e x a m p l e , stopped u s i n g titles like Mrs a n d Miss w i t h the n a m e s of w o m e n T h e L o n d o n Times, however, still uses androcentric forms such as spokesman a n d the titles, Mrs a n d Miss, unless a w o m a n has asked to be referred to as Ms T h e Linguistic A s s o c i a t i o n of Great Britain rejected a proposal to a m e n d its constitution, to r e m o v e generic m a s c u l i n e pronouns T h e Linguistic Society of A m e r i c a , on the other hand, has e m b r a c e d r e f o r m a n d issued a set of guidelines as well as established a C o m m i t t e e on the Status of W o m e n in Linguistics Such differences in policy are signals of the social a n d political outlook of editors a n d other influential professionals, w h o play i m p o r t a n t roles as g a t e k e e p e r s in d e t e r m i n i n g w h i c h forms they will a d o p t a n d thereby help sanction and spread Editorial policies, however, affect for the m o s t part 53 Suzanne Romaine only written l a n g u a g e In everyday conversation things m a y b e otherwise For example, although m o s t U S airlines have publicly replaced the t e r m stewardess w i t h flight attendant, as I w a s writing this chapter, I spoke w i t h a y o u n g w o m a n travel agent in the U S w h o w a s still using the older t e r m stew­ ardess British usage, b o t h public a n d private, lags b e h i n d A m e r i c a n u s a g e in m o s t respects For e x a m p l e , in the British National C o r p u s of 100 million w o r d s of spoken a n d written British English l a u n c h e d in 1995 the female m a r k e d form stewardess o c c u r r e d 92 times along w i t h air hostess 51 times, w h i l e the neutral flight attendant occurred only times a n d cabin crew 13 times I have o b s e r v e d m a n y flight attendants on British A i r w a y s flights w e a r i n g n a m e tags identifying t h e m as stewardesses or stewards U s a g e is still in flux a n d w h e r e choices exist, they are symbolic of different beliefs a n d political positions C o m p a r e When Ms Johnson chairperson) / (woman), Miss Johnson was the she insisted that everyone pay their/ his or her dues w i t h When was the chairman, she insisted that everyone pay his dues W h i l e a n a r r o w linguistic analysis w o u l d say they m e a n the same thing and refer to the s a m e state of affairs a n d p e r s o n w h o h a p p e n s to h o l d a particular posi­ tion, choosing one over the others reveals approval or disapproval of, for e x a m p l e , feminism, l a n g u a g e reform, political c o n s e r v a t i s m or liberalism, etc T h e changes b r o u g h t about in the p r o n o u n system in response to femi­ nist activism are actually r e m a r k a b l e considering that there have b e e n vir­ tually n o major changes in the English p r o n o u n s since the M i d d l e English period 1.5 Conclusion: a remarkable success story? A l t h o u g h M c C r u m , C r a n & M a c N e i l (1986) refer rather uncritically to the spread of English as a 'remarkable success story', it has not b e e n w i t h o u t m a n y paradoxes and ironies R o b e r t Louis Stevenson d r e w attention to at least one of these w h e n he o b s e r v e d that the race that has conquered so wide an empire has not yet managed to assimilate the islands whence she sprang Ireland, Wales, and the Scottish mountains still cling, in part, to their Gaelic speech It was but the other day that English triumphed in Cornwall, and they still show in Mousehole, on St Michael's Bay, the house of the last Cornish-speaking woman (cited in Tr eglown 1988: 163) M o s t English speakers take the present position a n d status of English for granted M o s t not realise that English w a s v e r y m u c h itself once a minority l a n g u a g e initially in all of the places w h e r e it has since b e c o m e the 54 Introduction m o t h e r t o n g u e of millions It has g a i n e d its present position by replacing the l a n g u a g e s of i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p s such as the A m e r i c a n Indian, the Celts a n d the Australian A b o r i g i n e s , a n d n o w m a n y more A n o t h e r p a r a d o x in the spread of English is its designation as an official l a n g u a g e only in the outer circle and not in the inner circle of so-called native-speaking countries N o g o v e r n m e n t of the major Anglophone nations has ever felt the n e e d to declare English as its official l a n g u a g e b e c a u s e English has served effectively as a defacto rather than dejure official language Nevertheless, as the d e m o g r a p h y of b o t h Britain a n d the U S are changing at the close of the twentieth century due to the entry of n e w i m m i g r a n t s , the prospect of English being declared official is b e i n g dis­ cussed A g r o u p called U S English has intensified its l o b b y for a constitu­ tional a m e n d m e n t w h i c h w o u l d m a k e English the official l a n g u a g e of the U n i t e d States T h e English L a n g u a g e A c t , already p a s s e d in California a n d other states, m a k e s English the official l a n g u a g e for public use U S English also seeks to repeal laws m a n d a t i n g multilingual ballots a n d voting materi­ als It w e l c o m e s m e m b e r s w h o agree that English is a n d m u s t r e m a i n the only l a n g u a g e of the p e o p l e of the U n i t e d States A similar g r o u p in C a n a d a called A P E C (Alliance for the Preservation of English in C a n a d a ) has as its m o t t o : ' O n e l a n g u a g e unites, two divide.' In Britain similar reactions occurred after a court case in 1988 involving a British m a n of Pakistani descent, w h o requested a Panjabi interpreter b e c a u s e h e spoke limited English T h e j u d g e m a d e taking English lessons a condition of the man's probation c o m m e n t i n g that a n y o n e w h o lived in Britain h a d a duty to u n d e r s t a n d the l a n g u a g e A c o m m u n i t y relations w o r k e r w a s quoted in the press as asking, W h e r e does it say that s o m e b o d y h a s to speak English to b e a British citizen?' T h e a n s w e r is of course ' n o w h e r e ' , but from the treatment of the case in the tabloid press it w o u l d appear that m a n y p e o p l e believe there should be a connection b e t w e e n lan­ g u a g e a n d citizenship (see C a m e r o n & B o u r n e 1988: 152) W h i l e W e l s h obtained legal status w i t h i n Wales in 1967 through the W e l s h L a n g u a g e A c t , the n e w e r l a n g u a g e s of i m m i g r a t i o n like Panjabi etc have n o legal status W h i l e there s e e m s to be n o lack of confidence in exporting native m o d e l s of English as a foreign l a n g u a g e , it is at the s a m e time almost paradoxical to find a m o n g all the major a n g l o p h o n e nations such enor­ m o u s linguistic insecurity a b o u t standards of E n g l i s h usage T h e complaint tradition stretching b a c k to medieval times is intense on b o t h sides of the Atlantic (see R o m a i n e 1991 on its manifestations in Australia) Ferguson a n d H e a t h (1981: xxvii), for instance, c o m m e n t o n prescriptivism in the U S 55 Suzanne Romaine that 'quite possibly n o other nation b u y s so m a n y style m a n u a l s a n d h o w to-improve your l a n g u a g e b o o k s in p r o p o r t i o n to the population' In 1989 Prince Charles a n g e r e d British school teachers b y c o m p l a i n i n g that his staff could not w r i t e or speak English properly A r o u n d the s a m e time the Times Higher Education Supplement carried a front p a g e article in w h i c h several Oxford professors c o m p l a i n e d a b o u t the l o w standards of English u s e d b y students at Oxford University a n d s u g g e s t e d the possibility of introducing remedial instruction It will be the task of future generations of historians a n d linguists to decide w h a t in retrospect w a s decisive a n d h o w m u c h upheaval there w a s in w h a t w e think of today as the m o d e r n period H e r e I have tried to take account not just of revolutions, but also of continuity FURTHER READING I am not aware of any books which relate specifically to the external history of English during the period covered by this volume The standard histories such as Baugh and Cable (1993) are, however, helpful, as are Dick Leith's A Social History of English (London: Roudedge & Kegan Paul, 1983) and Richard W Bailey's Images of English (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1991) 56 VOCABULARY JohnAlgeo V o c a b u l a r y is central to b o t h the system a n d the use of l a n g u a g e W o r d s are w h a t are p r o n o u n c e d and written a n d o r g a n i s e d into sentences a n d other g r a m m a t i c a l combinations, b e i n g the fundamental units of meaning W o r d s are also w h a t o r d i n a r y users think of as l a n g u a g e , for they are accessible a n d reflect m o r e fully the w h o l e culture a n d r e s p o n d more quickly to changes in society than other aspects of l a n g u a g e 2.1 The study of the English vocabulary V o c a b u l a r y study has a l o n g history, g o i n g b a c k in the W e s t e r n w o r l d to Plato's Cratylus T h e study of English vocabulary, however, received a sharp b o o s t w i t h the interest of m e m b e r s of the Philological Society in m a k i n g a N e w English Dictionary, eventually r e n a m e d The Oxford English Dictionary (Murray, Bradley, Craigie & O n i o n s 8 - 3 ) In the m i d d l e of the nine­ teenth century, D e a n Trench ( , 1855), w h o h a d b e e n instrumental in b e g i n n i n g the OED, w a s a significant contributor to the field Caught in the Web of Words (Murray 1977) traces the history of this major dictionary, a n d Empire of Words (Willinsky 1994) critically analyses its strengths a n d w e a k ­ nesses The most important g e n e r a l English dictionary of century is Webster's Third New International Dictionary the twentieth of the English Language, edited b y Philip B a b c o c k G o v e (1961) Its history has b e e n traced b y H e r b e r t C M o r t o n (1994) T h e m o s t i m p o r t a n t n e w specialised diction­ ary of the century is the Dictionary of American English (Cassidy a n d Hall 1985—) T h e history of English l a n g u a g e l e x i c o g r a p h y before the period covered by this v o l u m e h a s b e e n treated b y Starnes and N o y e s (1946), a n d that of A m e r i c a n l e x i c o g r a p h y during the p o s t - 7 period b y A l g e o (1990) 57 John Aigeo T h e study of slang has b e e n of greater p o p u l a r than scholarly interest N o t e w o r t h y treatments of slang are, for British English, the revision of Eric Partridge's Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English by Paul B e a l e (1984) and, for A m e r i c a n English, the revision of H a r o l d W e n t w o r t h a n d Stuart B e r g Flexner's w o r k u n d e r the title New Dictionary of American Slang b y R o b e r t L C h a p m a n (1986) T h e artificial a n d literary concoctions favoured b y Time m a g a z i n e from the m i d 1920s to the m i d 1960s have b e e n r e c o r d e d b y G e o r g e T h o m a s Kurian (1993); they are notable chiefly as e x a m p l e s of w o r d play T h e m o s t i m p o r t a n t scholarly w o r k ever d o n e on the subject of slang is J o n a t h a n Lighter's (1994—) Random Dictionary of American House Historical Slang A w e l l - d e v e l o p e d tradition of scholarship has treated g e n e r a l lexicology, for e x a m p l e , J a n Svartvik's (1996) Words: Proceedings Symposium of an International Scholarly g r a m m a r s often deal w i t h w o r d derivation ( J e s p e r s e n 1942; K r u i s i n g a 1932: 1-174; Quirk, G r e e n b a u m , L e e c h & Svartvik 1985: 5 - ; Z a n d v o o r t 1969: 7 - ) Specialised studies of English w o r d derivation are those b y H a n s M a r c h a n d (1969) a n d H e r b e r t Koziol (1972), w h i c h are diachronic in dating the forms they cite; by Valerie A d a m s (1973) a n d L a u r i e B a u e r (1983), w h i c h not date forms; a n d by G a r l a n d C a n n o n (1987), w h i c h deals w i t h recent n e o l o g i s m s T h e reverse dictionary of M a r t i n L e h n e r t ( , r e v i e w e d b y D e r o l e z 1972) is useful for locating e x a m p l e s of suffixed forms General issues are considered in a n u m b e r of treatments ( M a t t h e w s 1974; P e n n a n e n , ; Stein 1977) Bibliographies of the subject have b e e n m a d e b y R i c h a r d K S e y m o u r (1968) a n d Gabriele Stein (1973) A useful i n d e x to earlier treatments of lexical i t e m s is the Words and Phrases Index (Wall & P r z e b i e n d a 1969—70), w h o s e four v o l u m e s i n d e x w o r d forms treated in the m a i n periodicals devoted to the subject (see also D B a r n h a r t 1994) 2.1.1 Derivation: historical and contemporary A complication for v o c a b u l a r y study is that its diachronic a n d synchronic facts are less distinct than those of other aspects of l a n g u a g e , such as p h o n o l o g y a n d syntax M a n y w o r d s are established in the l a n g u a g e , l e a r n e d as units, a n d repeated W e hear s o m e w o r d s , such as childishness a n d dog biscuit, before w e u s e them; a n d w h e n w e u s e such w o r d s w e are pulling t h e m as w h o l e units out of our m e m o r y O t h e r w o r d s are p r o d u c e d spontaneously according to the lexical patterns of English a n d m a y b e n o n c e forms or be frequently reinvented b y speakers T h e p e r s o n w h o says 58 ... xiii xvii xviii xix 1 22 48 54 56 57 57 61 66 66 71 74 76 76 Contents 2.9 2 .10 3 .1 3.2 3.3 3 .4 3.5 3.6 4. 1 4. 2 4. 3 4. 4 4. 5 4. 6 4. 7 4. 8 5 .1 5.2 5.3 5 .4 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.8 5.9 5 .10 5 .11 Recent neologisms... phonotactics (lexical-incidental) 373 viii 373 375 3 81 382 40 3 41 8 43 8 44 8 46 7 46 9 48 3 Contents 5 .12 5 .13 5. 14 5 .15 5 .16 6 .1 6.2 6.3 6 .4 6.5 7 .1 7.2 7.3 7 .4 7.5 7.6 7.7 Consonant realisations Lexical... i v 17 76 -19 97 THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE VOLUME i v 17 76 -19 97 E D I T E D BY S U Z A N N E ROMAINE Merton Professor of English Language, University of Oxford CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY