The modern english period Historical background: Tudor Britain, Stuart Britain

The period from 1475 till 1660 was very important in development of the English language, as in this period the National English language was formed. Before this time, English existed in forms of different dialects which played different roles in different periods of history.

One of them, the London dialect, was the basis for the formation of the National English language.

This process was launched and backed up by the following tendencies and events:

1. The power became highly centralized after the years of discord and the Civil War of Roses. After Henry the VII Tudor established absolute monarchy, London became a bureaucratic and administrative centre, where the documents and bills were issued.

2. Latin was ousted from many spheres under Henry the VIII who split up with the Catholic Church.

3. The invention of printing and subsequent spread of literacy.

4. Oxford and Cambridge, two basic centres of education, were very close to London and also propagated London dialect.

5. Popularity of great literary works by Chaucer, who deliberately created in English.

As a result, people apprehended the literary, written language as the model that must be followed. It was not that easy to change the spelling of words any more; that was why the later phonetic changes in English did not find their reflection in spelling.

In the 16^thcentury the first standard grammars appeared. The first grammarians tried to describe all elements of the language and to find the universal strict rules. In 1755 Dr Johnson issued the first English dictionary.

Until the 17^th century English was spoken only in the British Isles. In the time of Great Geographical discoveries and of first settlements in the New World, the English Language started to spread all round the world. It was the first important premise that made English so popular nowadays.

General Changes in Modern English Phonology

Consonants

1) [χ] was lost and the preceding short vowel became longer: lightMidE [li χt][li: χt], [χ]became [f] in final position:sigh, tough;

2) The consonant [d] becomes [] in the neighborhood of [r]:fader  father, moder  mother;

3) Loss of [l] after low back vowel and before labial or velar consonant: half, palm, talk;

4) Addition of phonemic velar nasal [ŋ,] and voiced alveopalatal fricative [Ʒ];

5) General loss of [r] before consonants or in final position; also regular loss of [r] in unstressed positions or after back vowels in stressed positions: quarter, brother, March;

6) [j] was merged with the preceding consonant after a stressed vowel, thus causing changes in the pronunciation of consonants, for example: [dj] [ʤ], as in soldier.

7) Development of palatal semivowel [j] in medial positions (after the major stress and before unstressed vowel: tenner/tenure, pecular/peculiar; when semivowel [j] followeds, z, t, d, the sounds merged to produce a palatal fricative or affricate:pressure, seizure, creature, soldier(this phenomenon is known as assibilation and is the origin of voiced alveopalatal fricative [Ʒ]).

Short Vowels

Short vowels remained practically unchanged except the following cases:

• Loss of final unstressed -e (exceptions: judges, passes, wanted);

• [a] in general a became [æ]; but later æ > a before r: harm, scarf, hard; also æ  a before voiceless fricatives: staff, class, path; original [a] remained however when the fricative was followed by another vowel: classical, passage;

• a before l became lax o: all, fall, walk; also after w: want, wash, reward; but not if the vowel preceded a velar consonant: wax, wag, quack;

• [u] changed into [ʌ] (started to be pronounced shorter and without lip-rounding: run, mud, gull, cut, hum, cup; but not if preceded by labial and followed by l, or palatal s, or palatal c: full, pull, push, bush, butcher;

• Influence of following r: r tended to lower vowels when following them, fer  far, sterre  star, derk  dark, ferme  farm; often however pronunciation reverted to higher positions: sarvant  servant, sarmon  sermon;

• Rise of long [ə:] – this new vowel appeared in the 16^th century in connection with changes of some vowels before [r], namely it appeared from ir (fir), ur (fur), or after w (word), er (heard);