The History of English Spelling

ISBN-13: 9781405190244 / Angielski / Twarda / 2011 / 392 str.

Upward;¬Abar;¬Abar

Opis

The History of English Spelling reveals the history of Modern English spelling, tracing its origins and development from Old English up to the present day.

• Includes a wealth of information and data on English spelling not available anywhere else
• Features a complementary website with additional material at www.historyofenglishspelling.info
• Includes detailed coverage of the contributions from French, Latin, Greek - and the many other languages - to our current orthography
• Serves as a companion volume to Geoffrey Hughes's A History of English Words in the same series

The book envisaged by Upward aimed to provide a comprehensive description of English spelling past and present, with chapters covering the development of the alphabet, the spelling of Old English and its effect on the spelling of Modern English, the contributions to English spelling of Latin, French, Greek, and other languages, and the sound–symbol relationship in current English spelling. Other chapters were to cover the sociological, psychological and educational aspects of the complexity and unpredictability of modern English spelling, with, finally, a look at how English spelling might develop in the future.
ODES ["Origins and Development of English Spelling", original title of project] has essentially the same aims as the book envisaged by Upward. Although it will be considerably shorter than Upward’s intended book, it will, within the limitations of space, retain as much as possible of the wealth of examples collected by Upward, which was an important feature of his work.

At the time of Upward’s death, four chapters of the proposed work had been completed: an introductory chapter, and three chapters covering respectively the development of the English alphabet, and the elements of Old English and of Latin and French that have contributed to present–day English spelling. A fifth chapter, on the Greek contribution to English, was almost complete. These chapters include a great deal of original research by Upward.

These five chapters, plus Upward’s outlines of the later chapters, form the basis of the book for which this is a proposal, which has been given the working title of The Origins and Development ofEnglish Spelling. A detailed analysis of the proposed contents follows in Section 4 below.

Recenzje

Summing Up:  Highly recommended.  All readers.   ( Choice, 1 October 2012)

Spis treści

List of Figures and Tables viii

Preface ix

Abbreviations and Symbols xi

Language Periods Referred to in the Text xiv

1 Introduction and Overview 1

2 England and English from the Romans to the Vikings 14

3 The Old English Roots of Modern English Spelling 33

4 The Decline and Revival of English in the Middle English Period 65

5 The Franco–Latin Element 86

6 Some Sound and Spelling Developments in Middle and Modern English 173

7 The Greek Contribution 194

8 The Exotic Input 228

9 Reformers, Lexicographers and the Parting of the Ways 293

Glossary of Technical Terms 315

Bibliography 320

Language and Dialect Index 324

Word and Word–Element Index 328

General Index 373

O autorze

Christopher Upward (1938–2002) was a Senior Lecturer in German at Aston University in Birmingham until his retirement in 1995. For many years Upward was a member of the committee of the Simplified Spelling Society (now known as the English Spelling Society), and Editor–in–Chief of the Journal of the Simplified Spelling Society. He was also an Associate Editor of The Oxford Companion to the English Language (1992), and prepared two editions of Cut Spelling: A handbook to the simplification of written English by omission of redundant letters (Simplified Spelling Society 1992, 1996).

George Davidson is a freelance lexicographer, book compiler and editor. He has written several books on English grammar, usage, spelling, and vocabulary, such as How to Punctuate (2005) and Improve Your Spelling (2005)., and has edited numerous books, including the 150^th Anniversary Edition of Roget s Thesaurus of English Words & Phrases (2002).  He has formerly worked as a French teacher and lecturer in linguistics.

Blurb

Few languages are riddled with as many spelling inconsistencies and irregularities as English. Why is there such dissonance between the sounds of English and the spelling used to represent them? The answer lies in the history of the language itself. The History of English Spelling reveals the rich and complex history of Modern English spelling, tracing its origins and development from Old English up to the present day. The book provides a highly detailed, letter–by–letter analysis of the Old English basis of Modern English spelling, followed by in–depth coverage of the contributions from French, Latin, Greek, and the many other languages that have contributed to current orthography. Upward and Davidson also explore events in the socio–political history of England as an explanatory setting for developments in spelling, along with the works of a number of lexicographers (especially Johnson and Webster), and various proposals for spelling reform. The History of English Spelling reveals the richness of the complex and often frustrating alphabetic spelling system used in the English language.

A complementary website with additional research material can be found at www.historyofenglishspelling.info