The History of English

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The History of English The most commonly spoken language in our day, would be English or as some people might call it “ The Lingua Franca “. It is a language, which is taken almost a thousand years to evolve, mainly through its borrowings from other languages such as French and Latin. It is actually classified as part of the Germanic group of languages. Even though it is the most commonly spoken language today, it is not without its faults, which would be its phonetic symbols only, representing one sound and each sound would have its appropriate symbol. Most European languages are very similar to those spoken in India and Persia, assuming that most of the European peoples are descendants of the original Aryans, speaking the common language called Indo-European. As time went on, each civilization ( Greek, Roman and later English ) broke away from the above mentioned language and started to develop their own closely linked one. (Lecture notes, M. Disney) The English language was brought to the British Isles by the Germanic tribes (Saxons and Jutes), they settled there between the fifth and sixth centuries. The English spoken then was so different from our present version of English that a Modern English reader would not be able to comprehend the text. The main difference between the two was actually the vocabulary. They had a complicated system of nouns and adjectives, and had many different forms according to their grammatical relationship. (Lecture notes, M. Disney) During the past thousand years there have been many contributions towards the development of the English language. These contributors have been mainly, due to the invasions ... ... middle of paper ... ...is still one of the easiest and most proficient languages of our time. Due to its borrowings from many different languages it has become easy to learn , for most cultures would have quite a lot of similarities associated with it. Not to mention that most legal documents and charters have been written and officiated in English it has become a necessity for almost all countries to teach and subject their peoples to English as at least their second language. (1215 words Bibliography: ) REFERENCES 1) Internet 1, WWW.dartmouth.edu/artsci/eng18/index.html, 5/2/200, by Molly Overholt. 2) Internet 2, www.ucla.edu/lang/histb/index.html, 5/2/2000, Yvonne ladser. 3) Lecture notes, Mr. Mark Disney, English 102 4) Howard M. Richards, Cultural development, pages 324-329

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