3. English in Germanic group of languages and in the Indo – European family. The English language in the world.

Germanic Branch

English : Dutch : Flemish : Frisian : Afrikaans German : Yiddish : Danish : Swedish : Norwegian Faroes : Icelandic Anglo Saxon : Old Norse : Frankish : Gothic Lombardo : Visigoth : Vandal

The most widely studied language family in the world is the Indo-European. There are a number of reasons for this:

• Many of the most important languages of the world are Indo-European. These languages are official or co-official in many countries and are important in academic, technical and world organisations.

Examples: English, Spanish, French, German, Russian.

Indeed, more than half the world's population speak one or more of these languages either as a mother tongue or as a business language.

• Languages that are essential in multinational contexts or with large numbers of speakers.

Examples: Portuguese, Hindi, German, Bengali.

• Some of the great classical languages of religion, culture and philosophy were Indo-European.

Examples: Latin, Greek, Persian, Sanskrit, Pali.

• Languages that are scattered around the world as their speakers are part of diasporas.

Examples: Greek, Yiddish, Polish, Armenian, Romany, Kurdish, Italian, Punjabi, Gujarati.

The Indo-European languages tend to be inflected (ie verbs and nouns have different endings depending on their part in a sentence). Some languages (eg English) have lost many of the inflections during their evolution. The Indo-European languages stretch from the Americas through Europe to North India. The Indo-European Family was originally thought to have originated in the forests north of the Black Sea (in what is now Ukraine) during the Neoloithic period (about 7000BC). Modern research appears to indicate an origin in Anatolia (Modern Turkey). Either way, the people bagan to migrate between 3500BC and 2500BC, spreading west to Europe, south to the Mediterranian, north to Scandinavia, and east to India.

The Germanic Branch

These languages originate from Old Norse and Saxon. Due to the influence of early Christian missionaries, the vast majority of the Celtic and Germanic languages use the Latin Alphabet.

They include English, the second most spoken language in the world, the most widespread, the language of technology, and the language with the largest vocabulary. A useful language to have as your mother tongue.

Dutch and German are the closest major languages related to English. An even closer relative is Frisian.

Flemish and Afrikaans are varieties of Dutch while Yiddish is a variety of German. Yiddish is written using the Hebrew script.

Three of the four (mainland) Scandinavian languages belong to this branch: (Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish). Swedish has tones, unusual in European languages. The fourth Scandinavian language, Finnish, belongs to a different family.

Icelandic is the least changed of the Germanic Languages - being close to Old Norse. Another old language is Faroese.

Gothic (Central Europe), Frankish (France), Lombardo (Danube region), Visigoth (Iberian Peninsula) and Vandal (North Africa) are extinct languages from this branch.

German has a system of four cases and three genders for its nouns. Case is the property where a noun takes a different ending depending on its role in a sentence. An example in English would be the forms: lady, lady's, ladies and ladies'. The genders are masculine, feminine and neuter. German has three dialects spoken in northern Germany, southern Germany and Austria, and a very different form spoken in Switzerland.

English has lost gender and case. Only a few words form their plurals like German (ox, oxen and child, children). Most now add an s, having been influenced by Norman French.

English is a West Germanic language that was first spoken in early medieval England and is now a global lingua franca.^[4][5] It is an official language of almost 60 sovereign states, the most commonly spoken language in the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Australia, Ireland, and New Zealand, and a widely spoken language in countries in the Caribbean, Africa, and southeast Asia.^[6] It is the third most common native language in the world, after Mandarin and Spanish.^[7] It is widely learned as a second language and is an official language of the United Nations, of the European Union, and of many other world and regional international organisations.

English has developed over the course of more than 1,400 years. The earliest forms of English, a set of Anglo-Frisian dialectsbrought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the fifth century, are called Old English. Middle English began in the late 11th century with the Norman conquest of England.^[8] Early Modern English began in the late 15th century with the introduction of the printing press to London and the Great Vowel Shift. Through the worldwide influence of the British Empire, Modern English spread around the world from the 17th to mid-20th centuries. Through newspapers, books, the telegraph, the telephone, phonograph records, radio, satellite television, and the Internet, as well as the emergence of the United States as a global superpower, English has become the leading language of international discourse and the lingua franca in many regions and in professional contexts such as science.

There is little morphological inflection in Modern English, and the syntax is generally isolating. English relies on auxiliary verbs and word order for the expression of complex tenses, aspect and mood, as well as passive constructions, interrogatives and negation. Despite noticeable variation between the forms of English spoken in different world regions, English-speakers from around the world can communicate with one another effectively. Different accents are distinguished only by phonological differences from the standard language, whereas dialects also display grammatical and lexical differences.

4.Canges in the system of adjective categories:

Number

Gender

Case

The evolution of adjective. In OE the adjective was declined to show the gender, case and number of the noun it modified; it had a five-case paradigm and two types of declension, weak and strong. In ME lost all its grammatical categories with the exception of the degrees of comparison. The first category to disappear was Gender, which ceased to be distinguished by the adjective in the 11th c.

The number of cases shown in the adjective paradigm was reduced: the Instr. case had fused with the Dat. by the end of OE; In the 13th c. case could be shown only by some variable adjective endings in the strong declension (but not by the weak forms); towards the end of the century all case distinctions were lost.

Adjectives lost agreement with the noun, but the weak ending -e still remained.

Degrees of Comparison - In OE the forms of the comparative and the superlative degree, like

all the grammatical forms, were synthetic: they were built by adding the suffixes -ra and -estl-ost, to the form of the positive degree. In ME the comparative degree is formed with the suffix -er, and superlative with the suffix – est.

The alternation of root-vowels in Early NE survived in the adjective old, elder, eldest, where the difference in meaning from older, oldest, made the formal distinction essential

Adjectives in OE

The adjective in OE could change for number, gender and case. Those were dependent grammatical categories or forms of agreement of the adjective with the noun it modified or with the subject of the sentence – if the adjective was a predicative. Like nouns, adjectives had three genders and two numbers. The category of case in adjectives differed from that of nouns: in addition to the four cases of nouns they had one more case, Instr. It was used when the adjective served as an attribute to a noun in the Dat. case expressing an instrumental meaning.

Adjectives can be declined either strong/weak.

Historically adjective is a younger class of words as compared to noun & it has borrowed many inflections from nouns & pronouns. Declensions (unlike nouns adjectives could be declined both ways):1. strong A-sterm, O-stemi, when adjective was used attributeliy without any determined (articles, demonstrative & possesive pronouns) when used predicatively 2. weak N-sterm, when an adjective was preceded by demonstrative pronoun or genitive case. Some adjectives were declined always strong: call, , oper; others always weak: ilca (=some).

The endings of adjectives showed agreement between noun &. adjective. There were a lot of anonymous forms -> inflections were lost & adjective became an unchangeable part of speech. Gender- first cathegory to disappear (1 r1 century) Cases: 1.instrumental ease fell together with dative (end ofOE) 2. all other cases disappeared by the end of 13th century

The difference between the strong and weak declension of adjectives was not only formal but also semantic. The choice of the declension was determined by a number of factors: the syntactical function of the adjective, the degree of comparison and the presence of noun determiners. The adjective had a strong form when used predicatively and when used attributively without any determiners. The weak form was employed when the adjective was preceded by a demonstrative pronoun or the Gen. case of personal pronouns.

Degrees of comparison Most OE adjectives distinguished between three degrees of comparison: positive, comparative and superlative. The regular means used to form the comparative and the superlative from the positive were the suffixes –ra and –est/-ost. Sometimes suffixation was accompanied by an interchange of the root-vowel.

The adjective in OE could change for number, gender and case. Those were dependent grammatical categories or forms of agreement of the adjective with the noun it modified or with the subject of the sentence – if the adjective was a predicative. Like nouns, adjectives had three genders and two numbers. The category of case in adjectives differed from that of nouns: in addition to the four cases of nouns they had one more case, Instr. It was used when the adjective served as an attribute to a noun in the Dat. case expressing an instrumental meaning.

Historically the Adjective is a younger class of words as compared to the Noun. So it has borrowed many of its categories and inflections from the Noun and the Pronoun.

The Adjective had the following categories: Gender. It still existed in OE but was the first category to disappear in the 11^th c. Case. -At the end of OE Period Instrumental Case fell together with Dative Case due to the homonymy of inflections; -All other cases disappeared by the end of the 13^th c. also due to the homonymy of inflections.

System of Declensions. The system of declension was inherited from PG. Adjectives had two declensions that had to do also with the category of determination – strong (definite) and weak (indefinite) – and unlike nouns practically all adjectives could be declined both ways (by strong and weak declension). So an adjective did not belong to a particular declension, its declension depended on several factors: Strong (definite) from a-stem and o-stem: when Adj used attributively without any determiners (dem. pronouns); Adj used predicatively. Weak (indefinite) from n-stem when Adj preceded by a demonstrative pronoun or Genitive Case of a noun;

The difference between the strong and weak declension of adjectives was not only formal but also semantic. The choice of the declension was determined by a number of factors: the syntactical function of the adjective, the degree of comparison and the presence of noun determiners. The adjective had a strong form when used predicatively and when used attributively without any determiners. The weak form was employed when the adjective was preceded by a demonstrative pronoun or the Gen. case of personal pronouns.

The development of the adjective in ME (decay of grammatical categories and declensions).

The decay of grammatical categories of the adj proceeded in the following order. The first category to disappear was Gender, which ceased to be distinguished by the adj in the 11^th c.

The number of cases was reduced: the Instr. Case had fused with the Dat. By the end of OE; distinction of other cases in Early ME was unsteady.

In the 14^th c. the difference between the strong and weak form is sometimes shown in the sg with the help of ending –e.

In the 14^th c. pl forms were sometimes contrasted to the sg forms with the help of ending –e.

In the age of Chaucer the paradigm of the adj consisted of 4 forms distinguished by a single vocalic ending –e.

Adjs ending vowels and polysyllabic adjs took no endings and could not show the difference between sg and pl forms or strong and weak forms.

Certain distinctions between weak and strong forms, and also between pl and sg are found in the works of 14^th . writers like Chaucer and Gower.

In ME the following changes happened:

• In most cases inflections -er, -est were used to form the comparative and the superlative degrees;

• Root-sound interchange fell into disuse (long – longer – longest), though in some cases it was preserved as an exception from the rule (e.g. old – elder – eldest; far – further – furthest);

A new way of formation of the degrees of comparison appeared: more + Adj (comparative) || most + Adj (superlative)…..It was applicable to all adjectives and was interchangeable with -er, -est way of formation till 17^th – 18^th c. In NE, during the Normalisation Period, the modern rule appeared and this way was applicable only to a certain group of adjectives.

Adjective gradation. All three alternatives easier, more easy, and more easier, were acceptable in this period. In standard English, the rule by which -er and -est are preferred in monosyllabic words and more and most are used in polysyllabic ones, with variation in disyllabic words, was established by the late seventeenth century. In regional dialects -er continued to be preferred in all words, however long. The double comparative was generally used for emphasis (and was praised by the dramatist Ben Jonson).

4.Historical Changes in the system of sounds

-Vowels

Consonants

The evolution of consonant English consonants were on the whole far more stable than vowels. A large number of consonants have probably remained unchanged through all historical periods. Thus we can assume that the sonorants [m, n, l], plosives [p,b, t, d] and also [k, g] in most positions have not been subjected to any noticeable changes. The most important developments in the history of English consonants were the growth of new sets of sounds, - affricates and sibilants.

Growth of sibilants and affricates

In OE there were no affricates and no sibilants, except [s, z]. the new type of consonants developed from OE palatal plosives [k’, g’], which had split from the corresponding velar plosives [k] and [g], and also from the consonant cluster [sk’]. The three new phonemes which arose from these sources were [t∫], [dз] and [∫]. In Early ME they began to be indicated by special letters and digraphs, which came into use mainly under the influence of the French scribal tradition – ch, tch, g, dg, sh, ssh, sch. As a result of these changes – and also as a result of the vocalization of [γ] – the consonant system in Late ME was in some respects different from the OE system.

Palatal sonsonant finished palatalization: k-g, sk-∫ -sh. All palatal consonants disappeared. There was some dropping(сочетание) of consonants in initial position before sonorant. Hlof-lof, hlafa-lord. In Southern dialect –f- in initial position turn into –v-. Vocalization of -з- in the initial position before front vowel. з- formed new diphthong after front vowels. з – j –initial, з – I – final. (dæз –day [ai], weз – wei [ei], fæзer –fair [ai] –middle position)

NE From the combination of /ng/ appeared a phoneme / ŋ/.

Loss of consonants in some groups: Voiceless velar fricative lost in /night/; pronounced as f in /laugh/. [b] dropped in final -mb cluster (dumb, comb). [l] dropped between[ a] or [o] and consonant (half, walk, talk, folk). [r] dropped sometimes before [s] (Worcestershire). [k] and [g] dropped before/n/in initial position (knee, knight, gnat-nat). [g] in -ing endings (more commonly pronounced [ɪn]). Finally, assibilation occurred when the alveolars [s], [d], [t], and [z] preceded the palatal glide [j], producing the palatal consonants: [š], [ǰ], [č], [ž]. Zj-ж(decision), tj-ч(nature), dj-dз(solder). /w/dropped before /r/ in the initial position(wright-right). /h/ is dropped in the middle position –which-wich. /p/ is not pronounced in the initial position –physiology. NE vocalization of /r/(diphton-on) between the vowel and /r/ appeared, then /r/ was reduced(сокращена). Results: /e:/-/i:/-/iэ/-here, dear. /з:/-/e:/-/зэ/bear and /iэ/-clear. /a:/-/ei:/-/зэ/ -care, dare. /o:/-/u:/-/uэ/-poor, moor.

The following chart shows the phonetic symbol for the Old English vowel, the phonetic symbol for a typical Modem English development of the vowel, and the typical spelling of the Modem English development according to the Modern English key words.

The vowels in OE.The development of vowels in Early OE consisted of the modification of separate vowels, and also of the modification of entire sets of vowels. The change begins with growing variation in pronunciation, which manifests itself in the appearance of numerous allophones: after the stage of increased variation, some allophones prevail over the others and a replacement takes place. It may result in the splitting of phonemes and their numerical growth, which fills in the “empty boxes” of the system or introduces new distinctive features. It may also lead to the merging of old phonemes, as their new prevailing allophones can fall together.

The vocalic system in OE included 2 subsystems: monophthongs, diphthongs. All vowels existed in the pairs: ææдолг, a ā, e ē, o ō, i ī , u ū, y y долг (У готтов не было ā, ææдолг, ō) В виде пар существовали и дифтонги: ea eaдолг, eo eoдолг, ie ieдолг. The major factor in OE was a category of quantity vowels. It means, that all OE vowels, including diphthongs, could be both long and short. It it the system of vowels on the beginning of OE. The new system came with Anglo-Saxon tribes (жоанная): In most cases these new processes represent result of influence of the next sounds and called the COMBINATORY CHANGES.

The OE consonant

The consonants were subdivided:

1. On a way/mode of an articulation: constrictives -смычные and fricatives-щелевые and Sonants

2By place of an articulation: labial-губной, guttural(velar) заднеяз-е, dental consonants.