English language
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The English language is a language which originated in England and has since spread throughout the British Isles and into various regions where Britain held overseas colonies. English is probably the third or fourth most popular world language in numbers of native speakers (322,000,000 in 1999), but the most popular second and learning language in the world. The cultural, economic, military, political and scientific importance of the United States of America and the United Kingdom for the last two centuries has given English pre-eminent status as a language of international communication. It belongs to the Germanic branch of the Indo-European family of languages.
The closest undoubted living relative of English is Frisian, a language spoken by approximately half a million people in the Dutch province of Friesland, in nearby areas of Germany, and on a few islands in the North Sea. Some people regard Scots as a closely related separate language from English, while others consider it an English dialect. Scots has a tradition as a separate language, as well as somewhat different grammar and vocabulary. (Some would even say that Ebonics is a separate language, but this is extremely debatable.) After Frisian, the next closest relative is the modern Low Saxon language of the eastern Netherlands and northern Germany. Other less closely related living languages include Dutch, Afrikaans, and German. Many French words are also intelligible to an English speaker, as English absorbed a tremendous amount of vocabulary from French after the Norman conquest (see below).
One of the consequences of the French influence is that the vocabulary of English is, to a certain extent, divided between those words which are Germanic (mostly Anglo-Saxon), and those which are "Latinate" (Latin-derived, mostly from Norman French but some borrowed directly from Latin). During the Norman reign England was bilingual (see below), with French the language of government and aristocracy, English the language of the common people. Almost without exception, Germanic words (which include all the basics such as pronouns and conjunctions) are shorter, more informal, and more indicative of common or uneducated speech, while for Latinate words the reverse is true. An English-speaker is often able to choose between Germanic and Latinate synonyms: "come" or "arrive", "sight" or "vision", "freedom" or "liberty". In general, Germanic words are found most commonly in everyday speech, while their more formal (or more educated, or more pretentious, depending on the context) Latinate equivalents are found in the context of more serious speech and writing, such as a courtroom or an encyclopedia article. The overbearing use of Latinate words is often a sign of either pretentiousness (as in the stereotypical policeman's talk of "apprehending the suspect") or obfuscation (as in a military document which says "neutralize" when it means "kill").
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History
English is descended from the language spoken by the Germanic tribes that invaded Britain during late antiquity and the Dark Ages (it is arguable that the Danish contribution occurred as late as the early Middle Ages), although it received outside influences until much later.
The principal invading Germanic tribes were Angles, Saxons and Jutes. Their Anglo-Saxon dialects developed into Old English. Although the most commonly used words today derive from those early Anglo-Saxon roots, its vocabulary was greatly influenced over time firstly by Danish invaders who spoke Old Norse, and then, to an even greater extent, by Norman invaders who spoke French.
For over two hundred years, the Norman French rulers governed and ran the church, educational and court systems in French, and French was the language of the aristocracy. As a result, English changed from its roots to such an extent that Modern English speakers cannot understand Old English. It lost most of its word inflections and gained a great deal of French vocabulary.
By about the time of the Renaissance, the language had evolved into what is known as Middle English, which Modern English speakers can understand with a little difficulty. From the late 1400s, the language changed further into what is described as Modern English. English has continued to assimilate foreign words, especially Latin and Greek, even to the present time. As a result of this history of assimilation, English today is commonly believed to have the largest vocabulary of any language in the world.
In 1755 Samuel Johnson published the first significant English dictionary.
Historic English text samples
Old English
From Beowulf, approximately 900 CE
Hw�t! We Gardena in geardagum, <thorn>eodcyninga, <thorn>rym gefrunon, hu <eth>a �<thorn>elingas ellen fremedon. Oft Scyld Scefing scea<thorn>ena <thorn>reatum,
monegum m�g<thorn>um, meodosetla ofteah, egsode eorlas. Sy<eth><eth>an �rest wear<eth> feasceaft funden, he <thorn>�s frofre gebad, weox under wolcnum, weor<eth>myndum <thorn>ah, o<eth><thorn>�t him �ghwylc <thorn>ara ymbsittendra
Middle English
From The Canterbury Tales by Geoffry Chaucer, 14th century
Here bygynneth the Book of the Tales of Caunterbury
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 heeth
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open eye-
(So priketh hem Nature in hir corages);
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages
Early modern English
From Othello by William Shakespeare, 1603
Iago: Though in the trade of Warre I haue slaine men, Yet do I hold it very stuffe o'th' conscience To do no contriu'd Murder: I lacke Iniquitie Sometime to do me seruice. Nine, or ten times I had thought t'haue yerk'd him here vnder the Ribbes. Othello: 'Tis better as it is.
Modern English
From the United States Declaration of Independence, 1776, by Thomas Jefferson
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
English in the world
English is the first language in Australia, the Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, Guyana, Jamaica, New Zealand, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Trinidad and Tobago, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.
English is also one of the primary languages of Belize (with Spanish), Canada (with French), Dominica, St. Lucia and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (with French), the Federated States of Micronesia, Ireland (with Irish), Liberia (with African languages), Singapore and South Africa (with Afrikaans and other African languages).
It is an official language, but not native, in Fiji, Ghana, Gambia, India, Kiribati, Lesotho, Kenya, Namibia, Nigeria, Malta, the Marshall Islands, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Solomon Islands, Samoa, Sierra Leone, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
English is also the language most often studied as a foreign language in Europe (32.6%) and Japan, followed by French, German and Spanish.
Major Dialects of English
- American English
- Australian English
- English English
- Scottish English
- Canadian English
- Hiberno-English
- Jamaican English
- Newfoundland English
- New Zealand English
- South African English
- Singapore English - sometimes called Singlish
- Malaysian English - sometimes called Manglish
These varieties may, in most cases, contain several subvarieties, such as Cockney within English English and African American Vernacular English (AAVE) (aka Ebonics, spoken among some African-Americans).
Due to its wide use as a second language, English is spoken with many different accents, which may identify the speaker's native language. For some distinctive characteristics of certain accents, see how to tell the origin of an accent.
Phonology
English orthography is historical, not phonological orthography and diverges considerably from the spoken language. This is English's Consonantal System (including dialect sounds):
| Labial | Labio-dental | (Inter)Dental | Alveolar | Alveo-palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
| Stop | p b | t d | k g | ||||
| Fricative | f v | T D | s z | S Z | x¹ | h | |
| Affricate | tS dZ | ||||||
| Approximant | l | r | |||||
| Semi-vowel | w W² | j | |||||
| Nasal | m | n | N |
- This is a velar fricative and is found only in Scots in Gaelic loanwords such as loch (`lax)
- Voiceless w (/W/) is found in Scots and upper-class British.
See also List of Archaic English Words and Their Modern Equivalents, List of words commonly mispronounced, rhotic, singular they, Received Pronunciation, General American pronunciation, Standard Midwestern pronunciation, non-sexist language
Grammar
English grammar is based on that of its Germanic roots, though some scholars during the 1700s and 1800s attempted to impose Latin grammar upon it, with little success. All in all English is a much less inflected language than the bulk of Indo-European languages, placing more of the information in the word order. English is a slightly inflected language, retaining features like:
- Possessive (which has developed into a clitic)
- He is Alfredo's best friend. -'s
- 3rd person singular present
- Alfredo works. -s
- past tense
- Alfredo worked. -ed
- present participle/ progressive
- Alfredo is working. -ing
- past participle
- The car was stolen. -en
- Alfredo has talked to the police. -ed
- plural
- All your sigs are mine. -s
- comparative
- Alfredo is smarter than Ricky. -er
- superlative
- Alfredo has the bluest eyes. -est
Vocabulary
English is noted for the vast size of its active vocabulary and its fluidity. English easily accepts technical terms into common usage and imports new words which often come into common usage. In addition, slang provides new meanings for old words. In fact this fluidity is so pronounced that a distinction often needs to be made from formal and correct forms of English and contemporary usage. See also sociolinguistics.
Loanwords
From African languages
| banana | (via Portuguese or Spanish ) |
| dengue | (from Swahili via Spanish ) |
From Afrikaans
| trek | |
| boorish |
From Native American languages
| alpaca | (from Aymara via Spanish) |
| cannibal | (from Caribbean, via Spanish) |
| canoe | (from Caribbean, via Spanish) |
| chocolate | (from Nahuatl, via Spanish) |
| cocaine | (from Quechua, via Spanish) |
| coyote | (from Nahuatl, via Spanish) |
| Eskimo | (from Cree) |
| hurricane | (from Caribbean, via Spanish) |
| igloo | (from Innuktitut) |
| jaguar | (from Tupi, via Portuguese) |
| kayak | (from Innuktitut) |
| moccasin | (from Algonquian languages) |
| moose | (from Algonquian languages) |
| ocelot | (from Nahuatl, via Spanish) |
| potato | (via Spanish) |
| racoon | (from Algonquian languages) |
| squaw (archaic, pejorative) | (from Cree iskwe) |
| tomato | (from Nahuatl, via Spanish) |
| wigwam | (from Algonquian languages) |
From Arabic
| alcove | (via Spanish alcoba) |
| alcohol | (via Spanish alcohol) |
| algebra | (via Spanish �lgebra) |
From French Thousands of English words came from French.
From German
| pretzel | a traditionally salted and often hard bread snack. |
| stein | a German style beer glass. |
| wanderlust | a nomadic urge. |
| sauerkraut | a mixture of cabbage in brine. |
| frankfurter | a hot dog. |
| hamburger | a sandwich featuring a ground beef patty or often simply ground beef. |
From Greek Thousands of English words came from Greek. Examples include philosophy and philology. 'tele' as in telecommunications also came from Greek.
From Japanese
| judo | A wrestling sport derived from juijitsu; literally "gentle way" |
| kamikaze | suicide attack. Japanese for "divine wind" |
| karaoke | |
| karate | A martial arts style; literally "empty hand" |
| origami | paper crafts |
| sake | a Japanese liquor |
| tycoon | wealthy and powerful businessperson. Japanese for big monarch |
| tsunami | tidal wave |
From Pennsylvania German (Pennsylvania Dutch)
| dunk | to dip |
From Spanish
| alligator | (from el lagarto, "the lizard") |
| canyon | (from ca�on) |
| guerrilla | |
| marijuana | |
| mosquito | |
| mulatto | (from mulato) |
| siesta |
From Portuguese
| tank | (from tanque) |
Basic English is simplified for easy international use. It is used by some aircraft manufacturers and other international businesses to write manuals and communicate. Some English schools in the Far East teach it as an initial practical subset of English.
Special English is a simplied version of English used by the Voice of America. It uses a vocabulary of 1500 words.
External links
- Ethnologue report for English
- A good example of the intricacies of English orthography
- The World's Most Widely Spoken Languages
References
- Adapted from the Wikipedia article, "English language" http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language July 26, 2003
