BLOG

 Text A, which was written in the year 1832 in the language of late modern English, consists of a letter from an Uncle to His Nephew that is going to the oxford college. The letter talks about what the young man should be feeling, like an interest in himself and that he will talk to himself. His uncle also mentions that this interest will grow significantly when he moves away from his family. Through this letter, the author uses a different type of language than the type that we are used to and he uses words like coxcomb. The word coxcomb in the 1800s means conceited fool and over time, the word started being used less and less and generally died out. This can show how over time, as the English language evolves. This is shown in the theory by Micheal Halliday where it states that as the English evolves, words are used until there is no further use and then a new word replaces it. This can provide an explanation as to why the word coxcomb is not being used anymore.

Text B which is a Corpus from the British National Corpus, has two words that it is focusing on. These two words are taste and judgment and the range for this corpus is from the 1980 until 1993. The first word, taste. Originally The word taste used to mean just how a certain substance tasted, whether good, bad, sweet, or salty. Over time, as the English language evolved and began to get more and more complex, the word taste got multiple meanings in the language. For example, In more recent times, the word taste has an alternate meaning. This meaning can show someones opinions on certain things like fashion or the structure of things like buildings (Contemporary, Modern, Classical, etc). This can be proven with the Substratum theory, in which it states that language changed due to spread of it.

The other word that was shown in the corpus was judgment, even though this word hasn't changed that much in meaning throughout the evolution of the English language. It has broadened in meaning a little bit. Judgment could be comprehended in a way of good or in general just how you think of somebody or something. For example, there could be bad judgment as in a bad call or as a morally bad person or something.

Finally, Text C is a Ngram that compares three different phrases that are, apt to be, are likely to be and lastly, tend to be. It shows that the three phases all looked about the same until over time the phrase apt to be started dying out and are likely to be and tend to be being used more and more. This trend started to die down in the past 50 years where the phrase tend to be started to be the most used phrase. Some proof that the phrase “apt to be” was a more commonly used word in the 1800s was in text A where the Uncle used it in his letter to his nephew. “Young men are apt to be guilty”.


Comments

  1. For AO2, I would give you two marks considering your appropriateness for a range of audiences and purposes. Your expression was clear but, at times, didn't flow as easily as it could've. You also had some grammatical errors and impeded communication.

    “The first word, taste. Originally The word taste used to mean just how a certain substance tasted, whether good, bad, sweet, or salty.” This sentence was very hard to understand. ‘The’ is capitalized when it is not supposed to be. The first sentence, “The first word, taste.”, is also weirdly short and choppy. My advice would be to rephrase, for example; “The first word, taste, was originally used to describe how a certain substance taste – good, bad, sweet, or salty.”

    The content is somewhat relevant and your ideas were developed in a limited manner. You made sure to stay on track and address the prompt. You spoke about each text A-C and their elements of language change; “Text A, which was written in the year 1832 in the language of late modern English, consists of a letter from an Uncle to His Nephew that is going to the Oxford college.”, “Text B which is a Corpus from the British National Corpus has two words that it is focusing on.”, “Finally, Text C is a Ngram that compares three different phrases that are, apt to be, are likely to be, and lastly, tend to be.”

    For AO4, I would give you two marks considering your limited but general understanding of linguistic issues, concepts, methods, and/or approaches. You demonstrated an understanding of some linguistic issues.

    “This is shown in the theory by Micheal Halliday where it states that as the English evolve, words are used until there is no further use and then a new word replaces it,” shows us Micheal Halliday’s theory. “This meaning can show someone's opinions on certain things like fashion or the structure of things like buildings (Contemporary, Modern, Classical, etc). This can be proven with the Substratum theory, which states that language changes due to the spread of it,” here you identified substratum theory and explained the language change.

    For AO5, I would give you seven marks. You displayed a clear analysis and synthesize language data from a variety of sources. You had an appropriate selection of language data from at least two sources and a clear analysis of the data.

    Throughout your writing, you spoke about all three texts and their language modifications.
    11/25 - Good Job!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular Posts