The phenomenon whereby a language's grammar and lexicon change over time.
The phenomenon whereby a language's grammar and lexicon change over time.
Questions tagged [language-change]
192 questions
12
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2 answers
Why do the same phonological changes happen in multiple unrelated languages?
For example, a lot of languages have a historical [y] sound which eventually merged with [i] in different language families. This happened in Greek, Vulgar Latin, Icelandic and Faroese as well as Czech and Slovak. However, they do not belong to the…
Michael Tsang
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6
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1 answer
Has the internet had an effect on language change?
Has the internet or the recent dramatic cheapening of long-distance communication in general had an effect on the way language evolves? I would think (purely speculatively) that it reinforces those languages and dialects1 that already have large…
JohnJamesSmith
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4
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Why do words like thence fall out of use?
It happens sometimes that rather useful words disappear. A word like
thence, for example, is very useful, and has to be replaced if it is
taken out of the language by something less concise (and less elegant),
namely from there. It's rather…
Toothrot
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2
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1 answer
What is a "conservative" language?
(1) Does aconservative language better preserve its roots? (for example, Romanian is said to have best preserved its Latin roots due to being geographically surrounded by countries with non-Romance languages).
(2) Or does conservative refer to the…
user31246
2
votes
2 answers
Generalisation of Grimm's Law?
I am not a linguist, but I was reading the Wikipedia page on Grimm's law.
As far as I understand, this explains a certain evolution of the sounds for in the Germanic languages. Which was obtained while comparing German with other languages sharing…
clem steredenn
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vote
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Are languages converging in the modern era?
I know this question sounds vague, and there may not be much evidence yet, but I suspect it is falsifiable. The question is, in the modern era (post European imperialism, in particular post-mass-media and post-Internet), are the languages of the…
Anomaly
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0
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Do other languages have the same tendency as English to adopt many previously unrelated other words to mean "very good"?
I've noticed that English has many words for "very good" and most of them have an additional meaning as well. For example:
great (more than normal)
fantastic (fanciful)
phenomenal (being a notable phenomenon)
amazing (causing amazement)
wonderful…
T Hummus
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0
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2 answers
Metrics for word stability?
I'm trying to create a static list of words that can be used for encoding large numbers. The words are selected on a variety of factors and I would like to include a measure of the word's stability over time.
Ic () understand that all languages…
Indolering
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0
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Have modern languages slowed down or even stopped from language change?
The question points in the future and so I see the problem of having evidence but an educated guess or quotations of linguists would do, I guess.
It is no secret any longer, though some nationalist Turks I know, passionate advocates of the Sun…
Abdul Al Hazred
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Culture and language
Could you give some examples of how cultures affect languages? It is comprehensible that languages reflect cultures. It would be really helpful if you could provide with at least an example of cultures affecting the way we speak.
V.Lydia
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