Important Dates for Language History

Question	Answer
1066	The Normans invaded, led by William the Conqueror. Norman French and English co-existed but following the invasion there was a French-speaking power bias apparent in court, the church and landowners.
1350	The black death had a huge impact on English. As the Latin and French speaking nobles died out they were replaced by barely literate peasants who often only spoke English.
1590	Shakespeare starts writing his plays, inventing new words and grammatical ideas.
1500-1600	The great vowel shift. Vowels went higher. We know it happened because of spelling.
1600	Period of cultural rebirth known as the Renaissance. This is also known as early modern English.
November 1620	The Mayflower brought the persecuted, puritan, English settlers to America where they built a "New England" settlement and were helped by Squanto.
1622	The Weekly News, the first English newspaper, is published in London.
18th century-present	Late modern English developed. Ben Johnson is one writing of this period.
1721	Nathaniel Bailey's Universal Etymological dictionary.
1746	William Caxton set up his printing press, providing the roots for standardisation. Many Greek and Latin texts were translated into English.
1755	Samuel Johnson's dictionary was published. It took him 8 years to do with 6 assistants and was criticised for using archaic words, omitting words he didn't understand, omitting rude words, omitting trade terms and definitions were often inaccurate or biased.
1762	Robert Lowth's short Introduction to English Grammar and Lindley Murray's English Grammar
January 1788	Captain Arthur Phillips transported convicts to Australia.
1816	John Pickering compiles the first dictionary of Americanisms.
1870	Education Act meant that everyone had some form of compulsory access to education about English language.
1876	Alexander Bell invents the telephone.
1942	Friendly American soldiers came to Britain and contributed words such as: gizmo, gobbledegook, pin-up ect.
1958	Singapore made English the official language of business and government. This was after their independence.
March 2000	Pope's first visit to Israel. He addressed people in English.
5th-11th century	Old English prevailed with examples of literature such as Beowulf.
11th-14th century	Middle English prevailed with literature such as The Canterbury Tales. The language was influenced by French, old English and Latin.
15th-17th century	Early modern English developed. Shakespeare was an important influence of this period.
18th century	The birth and rise of the novel and an era of prescriptivism.
1700-1900	The industrial revolution. Machinery makes things easier to mass produce and inventions such as steam power contribute to the language's lexicon.
1914-1918	World war 1
1939-1945	World war 2
1987	National Curriculum introduced. This standardises the level of teaching in schools.
1994	Text messaging is introduced.
1997	The first social networking site is introduced.
1922	The Oxford English dictionary is published.

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Important Dates for Language History

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	Created by Hazel Meades about 10 years ago