History of the English Language
Tentative Syllabus
ENGL 5300.01
HUM 131
MW 5:30-6:45
Instructor: Dr Micheal Crafton
Office hours: MW 3-5
Office location: TLC 2-225
Course: ENGL 5300 Studies in the English Language
Required texts and other readings/materials:
SL Lerer, Seth. Inventing English: A
Portable History of the Language.
DC Crystal,
David. How Language Works: How Babies Babble, Words
Change Meaning, and Languages Live or Die.
Required
for certification in Secondary English Education. May be repeated for credit as topic
varies.
Brief Description:
Why do we spell might with a “gh”
that we don’t pronounce? What in the world does the “Ye” in phrases
like “Ye Webbe” mean? What are these
extra e’s there for? If Shakespeare is not written in Old English,
then what is? And why would the academic
world call Shakespeare’s English modern?
Are other nations that adopt English changing its future? We shall answer a few of these and other
questions in this a survey of the major periods of the development of the
English Language from pre-Old English to Present Day English and some varieties
therein. Some attention will be paid the basics of linguistic analysis and the
relationship between language and social change. By the end of the quarter,
students will understand: the basic concepts of comparative linguistics; the
most significant external historical causes of change in the English language;
the key internal changes in the history of English; the pronunciation of Old
English and Middle English, at least well enough to demonstrate to high school
students; the fundamental difference between the grammars of Old English and
Modern English; the concept of dialect or variety in English; the difference
between grammar and usage and the difference between prescriptive, descriptive,
and scientific grammars.
Course description
- A sustained analysis of a particular linguistic theme,
an approach to, or a regional expression of the English language. Regular
offerings in the history of the English language and its development from
Anglo-Saxon to contemporary varieties of world English will rotate with
other topics. May be repeated for credit as topic varies.
- A further specific description pertaining to this
section of the course may be added.
Graduate Course Goals
- Students will be able to demonstrate an in-depth
understanding of the general principles of comparative linguistics.
- Students will develop an advanced understanding of significant
historical causes of change in the English language.
- Students will develop an advanced understanding of the
fundamental difference between the grammar and usage of English.
- Students will develop the ability to understand and
articulate the concept of dialect or variety in English.
- Students will apply the tools of language analysis to
"real-world" situations of teaching students in composition and
literature classes.
- Students will show comprehension and an application of
theoretical and critical foundations for the interpretation of literature
of the period through an annotated bibliography and/or oral presentation
of 10-12 secondary sources.
- Students will reveal in both oral and written work a
discipline-specific critical facility through convincing and
well-supported analysis of course-related material.
- Students will display their command of academic English
and of the tenets of sound composition by means of thesis-driven
analytical prose, including at least 12-15 pages of research-based writing.
- Students will be capable of conducting independent and
meaningful course-related research and of synthesizing it in the form of a
correctly documented research paper prepared according to current
professional standards.
Graduate Program Goals
- This course prepares students to complete successfully
the comprehensive oral examination that is required for all M.A. degree
candidates.
- This course may count towards secondary certification
in English
- This course provides students with literary,
historical, and critical contexts related to texts on the department's
required reading list.
- Oral presentations in the course strengthen students'
presentation skills and prepare them further for the oral comprehensive
examination which is required for the M.A. degree.
- Gaining further knowledge of texts in this area
strengthens students' content area knowledge, prepares them for taking
nationally recognized standardized examinations (such as the advanced GRE
subject examination in English), and further prepares them for careers in
teaching, writing, and business or advanced graduate-level study.
ASSIGNMENTS AND THEIR GRADE WEIGHTS :
1.Exam # 1 = 20 %
2.Exam # 2 = 20 %
3.Exam # 3 = 30 % (counts more because of comprehensive
essay question)
4.Project = 30 %
Writing Assignments:
(Counts 30% of total grade): A standard research paper (12 pages long, 8
to 10 references) on a topic related to the history of the language (e.g.
teaching dialects of English, theories of the Great Vowel Shift, dialectal
variations in Chaucer). (For more information see below.)
Class Policies:
Attendance: Since
this class meets only twice a week, attendance is all the more important. Attendance should be understood as more than
merely occupying space in a passive manner; rather, it should be understand as
a productive act. In fact, it should be
considered a production in the way that creating a paper or report is
considered as a production. In order to get full credit, your presence must be
known, and it must be known as that of a prepared student working to make the
class an event of learning, of intellectual and artistic exchange, or just
exchange.
Late Work:
Generally, my policy for unexcused late work is that it loses a third of a letter
grade for every day it is late. Therefore, if a paper is due on Monday and you
turn it in on Wednesday, then 2/3rds of a letter grade will be taken off. A C would be reduced to a D+. There are, of course, extenuating circumstances,
but these need to be explained and documented.
Plagiarism:
Intentional plagiarism, that is, the conscious adoption of someone else's
writing or ideas as your own is a profanation of everything I hold important.
If a student is clearly guilty of this, the result will be an F for the class
and a report to the disciplinary officials of the University. See the English Department website on
plagiarism for more detail.
http://www.westga.edu/%7Eengdept/Plagiarism/index.html
Daily Assignments:
All chapter references and
page number references are to the texts listed above.
Week 1: English
and Englishes
M
18 Introduction; Handout
from Atlas of Human Languages; Overview
of course; Introduction to web sites.
W
20 SL Introduction;
DC Chapters 1-3; Introduction of Journal Assignment.
-------------------------------
Week 2: Writing and Sounds
M 25 DC Chapters 4-8; Introduction
to IPA; (Some terms: phonetic, lexical, semantic, syntactic, morphological, graphemic)
W
27 DC Chapter
9-12; Fun with the IPA Handout
-------------------------------
Week 3: Writing and Sounds
M 1 Labor Day: No Class!! Make some joyful phonemes!
W
3 DC Chapters 16-24;
History of Writing http://www.ancientscripts.com/ and other sites.
-------------------------------
Week 4: Cont’d and Dialects
M 8 DC Chapters 45-48, 50
W 10 DC Chapters 51-55; Handout
------------------------------
Week 5: Indo-European and Language Families
M 15
DC Chapters 56-57; Indo-European
Hypothesis; Sir William Jones
W 17 DC Chapters 58-62; Handout Reading:
Proto-Germanic; Grimm’s Law
-------------------------------
Week 6: Story of English: Old English
M
22 Exam # 1
W 24 SL Chapter 1; Caedmon’s Hymn
-------------------------------
Week 7: Story of English:
Old English
M
29 SL Chapter 2
W 1 SL Chapter 3 (The
-------------------------------
Week 8: Story of English: Middle English
M
6 SL Chapter 3-4
W 8 SL Chapter 5; Chaucer’s
General Prologue Renaissance and Enrichment
-------------------------------
Week 9: Story of English: Middle English and Dialects
M 13 SL Chapter 6; Pearl Poet and
Piers Plowman; Reeve’s Tale
W
15 SL
Chapter 7; Great Vowel Shift
-------------------------------
Week 10: Story of English: Wrap
up Old and Middle
M
20 Review
W
22 Exam # 2
-------------------------------
Week 11: Story of English:
Renaissance
M 27 SL Chapter 8: Emerging
Standard Prose
W
29 SL
Chapter 9; Shakespeare
-------------------------------
Week 12: Story of English: Renaissance and
Neoclassicism
M
3 SL Chapter 10;
Enrichment – New Words
W
5 SL Chapter 11;
Spelling Reform
-------------------------------
Week 13: Story of English: Grammars and Dictionaries
and American English
M 10 SL Chapter 12; Johnson’s
Dictionary
W
12 SL
Chapter 13; Webster and
-------------------------------
Week 14: Story of English:
American English
M
17 SL Chapter
14: American Regionalism
W
19 SL Chapter 15: Mark
Twain (American Chaucer?)
-------------------------------
Week 15: Story of English:
American English
M
24 SL Chapter
16: African American English
W
26 Thanksgiving Holidays
-------------------------------
Week 15: Final Things
M 1 SL Chapter 17: OED, Modern
Linguistics, and World Englishes
W
3 Last Day of
Class: Student Presentations and Course Evaluation
-------------------------------
Final Exam: Monday, December
8th 5:30-7:30 Exam # 3
Class
Project
1. A
standard research paper (10 pages long, 8 to 10 references) on a topic related
to the history of the language (e.g. teaching dialects of English, theories of
the Great Vowel Shift, dialectal variations in Chaucer).
For
a list of useful web sites see the following:
http://ebbs.english.vt.edu/hel/hel.html
http://www.westga.edu/~mcrafton/links.html