95486

V Word order patterns were regularized. The order of Subject-Verb-Object becomes the standard for the simple declarative sentence.

v Other word order patterns came to be used for special kinds of expression; for example, in asking a qnestion or stressing a point, you wonld invert the order as Verb-Subject-Object.

Major sound changes:

*    OE began to lose some of tlie characteristic consonant dusters (e.g. hr- in hring ‘ring’) that gave it its distinctive sound

*    Certain OE words underwent a special sound change called metathcsis

*    This is the inversion of soiuids in order. During the late OE and early M E period, certain words permanently metathesized their sounds: 6nd>bird; axian>ask; thurgh>through; beor/if>bright.

Other changes:

*    Some strong verbs (need, help, wax) changed to weak ones (OE heołpan-hulport-holpen>ModE help-helped)

*    The system of making meaning was changing and at the same time newer French words were inflecting the language (e.g. OE earm replaced by French poor)

*    For example, parts of the poem “The Owi and the Nightingale” (c.1200) employed a Continental poetic stmcture (French influence) with a vocabulary that was primarily Anglo-Saxon.

Conquering Language: What did the Normans do to English?

■    The Normans brought new vocabulary to the English language, and in the process, they changed radically the ways in which words were formed,

■    Stress patterns were madę in sentences, and verbal constructions and idioms were produced

■    The Normans only initiated a series of borrowing periods from French.

■    Why do new words enter a language?

Rcasons for borrowing:

*    If the donor of language is of greater prestige in the field of borrowed words:

*    French terms for government, political organization, high culture (esp. cookery), and educated discourse came to be preferred.

*    If there is a vacant slot for the word in the receiving language.

*    i.e. if there is no native word for a concept or thing, and the new language community brings that thing or concept in, then it comes with the new word.

*    New words affected word stress. When new words enter a language, they can be subject to variable word stress.

*    Most French words that came into English were polysyllabic, and the variable stress on the word leads in some cases to differences in meaning and use (e.g. photograph-photography)

*    For example, record is a verb, but record is a noun; canon (first syllable stressed), but canonization (4* syllable stressed).

*    This variable word stress is a key feature of the Romance languages, and it affects the sound pattem of English.

*    Changes also occurred in poetry.