Dr Robert Kiełtyka

Approaches to the study in the field of semantics There are several different perspectives to semantics which have emerged across the ages. The aim of the following pages is to present the most influential approaches to semantics, i.e. traditional semantics, behavioural semantics, Saussure's (1959) ...

Synchronic and diachronic semantics With regard to the semantically-oriented linguistic investigation, it may be carried from two different points of view, namely, synchronic and diachronic. The division between these two dimensions of investigation in linguistics was introduced by de Saussure (195...

Modern English - English spoken on the territory of the British Isles from the middle of the 15th century onwards. In fact, many authors postulate the existence of Early Modern English, as contrasted with Late Modern English which should be recognised because the leap from Middle English to Modern E...

Attitudes toward American English language Attitudes toward American English were mixed. Early attitudes of British writers were often patronizing. Reactions to New North American vocabulary terms were often strong, eg. A. Gil (1621) condemns importation of words such as maize and canoe into the l...

Central French period of borrowing (13th-14th): Many of the major concept words in administration and high culture come trom the Central French period of borrowing) We can give many examples, but what is most interesting is to notice how we can tell when the word entered the language. There is a ...

A standard English accompanies the rise of Chancery - “Chancery” comes from the word chanal or chapel of the king, where the chaplains (priests) kapelan of the court originally spent their time between services writing the king's letters. - By the end of 14c, Chancery came to be the place where off...

DIALECTS OF MIDDLE ENGLISH MidE is, one scholar has written, “parexcellence the dialectical phase of English,in the sense that while dialects have been spoken at all periods, it was in MidE that divergent local usage was normal indicated in writing” (Strang, p. 225). This fact means that we can use...

Four ways in which Old English made new words: Determinative compounding: common to all the Germanic languages, this kind of compounding forms new words by yoking together two normally independent nouns, e.g. Earhring (earring); bocstaef (book-staff, i.e., letter); or an adjective and a noun, e.g....

Norman French period of borrowing (11th-12th century): Religious terms: prophet, saint, Baptist, miracle, paradise, sacrament, etc. Social and political terms: prince, dame, master, court, rent, poor, rich, prison, crown, purple, prove, etc. Te...

Old English Dialects North of the Humber River was Northumbrian. This was the dialect that became the standard of a great religious and literary culture in the 8th and 9th centuries. In the middle of the country, between the Humber river to the north and the Thames to the south, was Mercia, a loos...