Sound Change and the History of English

ISBN-13: 9780199291953 Publisher: Oxford University Press Publication date: 08/02/2007 Series: Oxford Linguistics Ser. Pages: 256 Product dimensions: 9.30(w) x 6.00(h) x 0.80(d) This book addresses the question: why do sound changes happen when and where they do? Jeremy Smith discusses the origins of a series of sound changes in English. He relates his arguments to larger questions about the nature of explanation in history and historical linguistics, and examines the interplay between sound change and social change. Drawing on the latest research in the linguistics and history he shows how insights in one field illuminate the other.After the opening chapter describing the book's approach and a general theoretical framework for the study of sound-change, the author discusses problems of evidence and considers the nature of phonological processes. He then presents detailed investigations of major sound-changes from three transitional periods: first, when English emerged as a language d