Chapter 2 PART TWO.ppt

1、Chapter 2 “The Sources of the English Vocabulary” (II),March 1st,Preview,I. The Divisions of the History of the English Language II. The Native Words and the Borrowed Words in the English Vocabulary III. Assignments,Question: How did the English language appear and grow?,Question: Is English classif

2、ied as a Germanic language?,I. The Divisions of the History of the English Language,The history of the English language really started with the arrival of three Germanic tribes who invaded Britain during the 5th century AD. These tribes, the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes, crossed the North Sea fr

3、om what today is Denmark and northern Germany.,At that time the inhabitants of Britain spoke a Celtic language. But most of the Celtic speakers were pushed west and north by the invaders mainly into what is now Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The Angles came from Englaland and their language was called

4、 Englisc from which the words England and English are derived.,Early Modern English (15001700),Late Modern English (1700Present),Old English (4501150) Middle English ( 11501500),Modern English (1500Now),1. Old English (450-1150 AD),The invading Germanic tribes spoke similar languages, which in Brita

5、in developed into what we now call Old English. To modern English users, Old English seems strange and remote because of its Germanic structure. To summarize, it was rather different from Modern English in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar.,First, the pronunciation of the Old English is differe

6、nt from that of the Modern English. Especially, long vowels have changed a lot.,1. Old English (450-1150 AD),stone (Mod. E.) st n (O. E.) bone (Mod. E.) b n (O. E.) sheep (Mod. E.) sc ap (O. E.) shoot (Mod. E.) sc otan (O. E.) kin (Mod. E.) cynn (O. E.) naked (Mod. E.) nacod (O. E.),Second, the voca

7、bulary of Old English consisted mainly of Anglo-Saxon words. But when the Norman Conquest in 1066 brought French to England, much of the English vocabulary was replaced by words borrowed from French and Latin. About 85 percent of the Old English vocabulary was no longer in use during this period.,1.

8、 Old English (450-1150 AD),Third, like the Germanic language, Old English was a highly inflected language and it had a complete system of declensions with four cases and conjugations.,a. Old English nouns and adjectives have four cases: the nominative case, the genitive case (属格)，the dative case(与格)

9、, and the accusative case. Nominative indicates the subject of the sentence Genitive expresses the possessive meaning: whose? Dative expresses the object towards which the action is directed, especially after the verbs like “say”, “give”. Accusative expresses the object immediately affected by the a

10、ction (what?), the direct object.,1. Old English (450-1150 AD),The adjectives can be declined in case, gender and number. To be more specific, adjectives must follow sequence with nouns which they define and that is the reason why the same adjective can be masculine, neuter and feminine.,1. Old Engl

11、ish (450-1150 AD),b. All the nouns in Old English are marked for gender. There are three genders: masculine(阳性), feminine(阴性), and neuter(中性).,1. Old English (450-1150 AD),d (masc.) pile eofor (masc.) a boar feging (fem.) conjunction prd (fem.) pride gewrit (neut.) a letter fcen (neut.) crime, evil,

12、1. Old English (450-1150 AD),Question: Can you identify the grammatical gender for each of the following words? so sunne (the sun) se mna (the Moon) at wf (the woman/wife),It is interesting that in Old English, the grammatical gender of nouns actually do not correspond to its natural gender, though

13、the nouns may refer to people. For example, in Old English, “so sunne (the Sun)” was feminine, “se mna (the Moon)” was masculine, and “at wf (the woman/wife)” was neuter.,1. Old English (450-1150 AD),c. Verbs are inflected for each person of their subject in the singular and plural.,Question: How ca

14、n we translate “I love you” and “You love me” into Old English? lufian: to love 1st Person : ic (N), mec/ m (A); 2nd Person: (N), c/ (A).,1. Old English (450-1150 AD), “I love you.” Ic lufie c. Or: c lufie ic. “You love me.” lufast mec. Or: Mec lufast .,2. Middle English (1150-1500),In 1066 William

15、the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy (part of modern France), invaded and conquered England. The new conquerors (called the Normans) brought with them a kind of French, which became the language of the Royal Court, and the ruling and business classes.,2. Middle English (1150-1500),For a period there

16、was a kind of linguistic class division, where the lower classes spoke English and the upper classes spoke French. In the 14th century English became dominant in Britain again, but with many French words added. This language is called Middle English.,2. Middle English (1150-1500),a. In grammar, Engl

17、ish has changed from a highly inflected language to an analytic language. More attention was paid to the relation of words in a sentence by means of word order, prepositions or auxiliary verb, rather than by inflections.,Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote The droghte of March hath perced to th

18、e roote Question: What is your understanding of the two lines? Where are the subject and the object of the sentence?,b. In this period, many Old English words were lost, but thousands of words borrowed from French and Latin came into the English vocabulary. air: “mixture of gases, atmosphere” Old Fr

19、ench “air”, also Latin “ erem”, Greek “ r”; air: “appearance, manner, bearing” Middle French “air”, or Old French “aire”, meaning “disposition, quality” air: “melody, tune” Italian “aria”, meaning “melody”,2. Middle English (1150-1500),Question: What is your feeling about the following excerpt, in t

20、erms of vocabulary and syntax?,Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote The droghte of March hath perced to the roote And bathed every veyne in swich licour, Of which vertu engendred is the flour; Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth Inspired hath in every holt and heath The tendre croppes, and

21、the yonge sonne Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne ;,When in April the sweet showers fall That pierce Marchs drought to the root and all And bathed every vein in liquor that has power To generate therein and sire the flower; When Zephyr also has with his sweet breath, Filled again, in every holt

22、 and heath, The tender shoots and leaves, and the young sun His half-course in the sign of the Ram has run,3. Modern English, Early Modern English (1500-1700) The Early Modern English period extends from 1500 to 1700. The chief influence of this time was the great humanistic movement of the Renaissa

23、nce. Owing to the study of the Latin and Greek classics, the influence of Latin and Greek on English was great. Modern English word “expectation” Latin word “expectationem”, meaning “anticipation”, which was made of “expectare” or “exspectare” and “-ation” (a suffix forming nouns),To be, or not to b

24、e, I theres the point, To Die, to fleepe, is that all? I all: No, to fleepe, to dreame, I mary there it goes, For in that dreame of death, when wee awake, And borne before a everlafting Iudge, From whence no paffenger ever returnd, The vndifcouered country, at whofe fight The happy fmile,and the acc

25、urfed damnd.,To be, or not to be, aye theres the point, To Die, to sleep, is that all? Aye all: No, to sleep, to dream, aye marry there it goes, For in that dream of death, when we awake, And borne before an everlasting Judge, From whence no passenger ever returned, The undiscovered country, at whos

26、e sight The happy smile, and the accursed damned., Late Modern English (1700-Present),The main difference between Early Modern English and Late Modern English is the rapid vocabulary expansion. Many factors contribute to this:,a. The 18th century was a time of stabilizing and purifying the English l

27、anguage. In 1755, A Dictionary of the English Language edited by Samuel Johnson was published. b. French greatly influenced English. The word “routine”, for example, came from the French word “routine”, meaning “way, path, course”.,Late Modern English (1700-Present),Late Modern English (1700-Present

28、),c. The territorial expansion of the English Empire in this period resulted in the expansion of the English vocabulary. d. In every field of science and technology new words and expressions constantly appear in the English vocabulary.,II. Native Words, Borrowed Words and Foreign Elements in the Eng

29、lish Language,1. Words of Native Origin The native elements are the basic stock of words or the core of the English vocabulary. In structure they are mostly monosyllabic words, i.e. words that contain only one syllable, such as, “put”, “strong” or “cow”., In meaning they express the fundamental conc

30、epts dealing with everyday object and things. bread, water, fish, meat; air, sun, earth, snow, rain, frost, spring, summer, autumn; head, foot, arm, hand; horse, cow, dog, cat, calf, sheep; oak, pine, fir; apple, pear, plum; white, red, green, black; live, work; come, go, run,1. Words of Native Orig

31、in, In grammar they include most parts of speech, e.g. auxiliaries, modals, pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions, adverbs and numerals.,2)The Characteristics of Native words, The polysemic character, or plurality of meanings:,- Wisely, and slow. They stumble that run fast. - Governments first duty i

32、s to protect the people, not run their lives. - The software will run on any PC. - The buses dont run on Sundays. - Conan Doyles stories ran in The Strand magazine. - Salinas is running for a second term as President., The collocability: Many commonly-used expressions or phrases in English are made

33、of native words. an eye for an eye to be in the public eye to do somebody in the eye in the eye(s) of the law to see eye to eye with, Word-forming ability: Question: Can you give any words derived from or compounded by the word “child” (O. E. cild)?,2. Borrowed Words in the English Vocabulary,Beside

34、s native words, the English vocabulary includes a bulk of borrowed words, or loan-words, the words taken from foreign languages. Latin, Greek and French are the three languages that have contributed most to the English language. Of them, the Latin and Greek elements in the English vocabulary are cal

35、led the classical elements.,1) The Causes and Means of Borrowings into English:, Historical Causes: a)English shares many common words and similar grammatical structures with West Germanic languages; For example, dort, Professor, skill, skin, sky, scrape, student, bask,b)More than 50% of the English

36、 vocabulary is derived from Latin. “wine” Old English “win” Latin “vinum” “monger” Old English “mangere” Latin “mango”,Question: Can you give any words that are compounded by the word “monger”? cheesemonger, costermonger, fishmonger, ironmonger, rumour-monger, scandalmonger, toolmonger, warmonger, ,

37、church, bishop, altar, angel, martyr, mass, minister, temple allurement, allusion, atmosphere, expectation, motor, recipe, tractor, vacuum,c) Conquest and military occupation by the Norman invaders result in the great influx of French words. administration, assembly, government, parliament; arrest,

38、pledge clerk, clergy, devotion, faith, passion blouse, cloak, collar, boot, beef, pork, mutton, biscuit, caf, chef, menu baroque, art, beauty, painting, tragedy, renaissance, Social Causes: a) Through commerce and trade with foreign countries; b)Through cultural contacts and exchanges with foreign c

39、ountries; the borrowings from Spanish, Portuguese: cocoa, banana, potato, tobacco, canoe, mosquito,Question: Can you give any English words that are borrowed from the Chinese language? chopsticks, litchi, loquat, wok, tofu, kung fu,c) Through the rapid development of mass media (radio, TV, newspaper

40、s, magazines, movies, etc.) with foreign countries;,2) The classification of foreign borrowings:,The foreign borrowings can be divided into four categories according to their features: Aliens = foreign Aliens are words borrowed from a foreign language without any change of the foreign sound and spelling. They are usually considered as foreign words.,