English 4300   Spring 2001

  

Study Sheet for Test # 2: ME, EModE, American English, Pinker

Middle English(dates for external history: 1066, 1204, 1250, 1415, 1476)

1.How came the French to England? (Aethelraed the Unraed and Edward the Confessor; William's claim versus Harold, William's style and personality; William's appointments to England)

  1. How came the French to stay in England? (the prestige of French and the development of the Universities; Henry I and Henry II development of an Empire; French literature was the best of this period; French was the language of law, court, church).
  2. How came the French to leave England? (King John in 1204; 100 years' war and rise of anti-French sentiment; rise of middle class, the increasing number of non-French speakers; by 1250 French taught to upper-class children as a second language; by 1362 English was recognized as the official language for pleading; Henry V ordered his chancery to write in English in 1415)
  3. What are some of the major internal changes from OE to ME in orthography and sound (mostly consonants)?
  4. Discuss the history of the loss of inflections using the handy chart of inflectional loss. Use an example like stanum?
  5. What are the changes in the function words (pronouns, articles, proposition, demonstratives)? Where did she come from ?
  6. What is the nature of the changes in ME lexicon? What is meant by tri-lingualism in ME?

Early Modern English: The Renaissance (dates:1476, 1485, 1534, 1553, 1611, 1623)

  1. What social conditions affected the rise of EModE (rise of European vernaculars, rise of nation states, printing press, development of trade, revival of learning, Renaissance humanism)? 
  2. Discuss the problems with the development of vernacular (recognition; orthography; vocabulary). What were some of the major factors that contributed to the recognition of the vernacular?
  3. How did the history of the printing press contribute to the problems of English orthography?
  4. What is the Enrichment Movement, and what was the result? 
  5. What were the major changes from ME to EModE in orthography (remember early spelling reforms) and grammar?
  6. What are the major phonetic changes (GVS and some minor changes)? How most likely did Shakespeare pronounce five, house, and tea?
  7. What is the his genitive and the group genitive?
  8. What is the specialized use of 2nd person pronouns?
  9. What is triangle that describes the geographical area from which Standard English emerged? Why this area?

Early Modern English: The Neoclassical Period (Dates: 1649, 1660, 1688, 1755, 1762)

  1. Discuss the so-called "spirit of the age" in the Restoration and 18th century as it related to the desire to control the language?
  2. What was the Ascertainment Movement, and what were its three goals?
  3. What were the pros and cons of the proposition for establishing an English Academy? What were the substitutes for an academy? How did these substitutes work? Discuss the aims of the prescriptive grammarians. (Be sure to talk about Robert Lowth's grammar here).
  4. Explain the structure and function of the progressive and passive progressive verb.
  5. What is the current (or at least very recent) legacy of prescriptive grammar, especially as reported by Pinker in his chapter called "Language Mavens"?

The Modern Period and American Dialects

1.How did the developments of industrial revolution, colonial expansion, and the wars affect the language?

2.Discuss the implications of the rise and enforcement of RP English? (The Education Act of 1870)

3.What is the history of dictionary making in England? Discuss at least Cawdry, Johnson, and the OED?

4.What are the major dialect regions of America?

5.What is the connection between these areas and England?

6.Cite at least one example of a regional dialectal feature of a regional dialect that distinguishes it from another one.

7.How, when, and from where did English come to America?

8.What are the principal differences between the language of those who settled New England and those who settled Jamestown?

9.What are some features of Scotch-Irish dialect in America?

  1. How is it that the Scotch-Irish dialect spread and has become so prominent
  2. Discuss the creole hypothesis of African-American Vernacular English?

Pinker

Chapter 9: Baby Born Talking

  1. What are the predictable stages of first language acquisition?
  2. What is the mental or linguistic structure of how children learn language?
  3. What does the logic of early language errors tell linguists?
  4. What does the high rate of competency of early language tell linguists?
  5. What is meant by the critical period? What ages does it encompass?
  6. What happens when children miss the critical period?
  7. What do these factors tell us about second language acquisition?

Chapter 13: Mind Design

  1. What is meant by SSSM?
  2. What does "relativism" have to do with it?
  3. Why is Pinker impatient with the heredity versus environment debate?
  4. What sorts of universals of people does the CSM show us that the SSSM does not?
  5. What is the analogy with language to all of this? That is how does what we know about language and mind contribute to a new understanding of mind and other areas of learning?

Comprehensive Question

Be prepared to discuss the really big picture of the history of the English language, the major stages and the major changes.