Expansion of English

There was no Wales or Scotland only Britain!

England invaded by Anglo-Saxons from around the year 447.

Most of England occupied by AS.

Scotland

Geographically divided into

Southern Uplands

Lowlands

Highlands

In pre-history inhabited by Picts

Scots, Celts from Ireland settled on the west coast of GB around 5th century AD.

 By 700 Anglo-Saxons conquered most of England and Southern Scotland

 Normans spread power to Scotland in 11th century helped by Scottish kings Malcolm & David I.

Union of the crowns of Scotland and England 1603

English and Scottish Parlaiments unified in 1707 (Act of Union)

“Dress act” designed to disarm and finish off clan culture (1746) after Jacobite Rising.

Highland Clearances 18th, 19th centuries. Gaelic-speaking population evicted from land.

Wales

 After 1066 the Normans slowly took over parts of Wales: Pembroke and the Vale of Glamorgan in Southern Wales -1093.

  Edward 1st (1272) In 1277 massive invasion.

  By 1290s Wales virtually an English colony.

  King Edward Ist gave his son, (Edward II), the title Prince of Wales in 1301.

  King Henry VIII, joined England and Wales under the Act of Union in 1536

Ireland

  Norse kingdom established in Ireland in 838.

  Viking influence is checked in 1014 but they remain in Dublin and Waterford.

  Norman nobles invade Ireland 1169-1170.

  Henry II invades. Pope Adrian IV grants him authority over Ireland. Irish and Vikings accept him.

  1210-1300 English Government in Ireland.

  Celtic uprising 1315-1318. Edward Bruce, king of Ireland.

  Henry VII, Henry VIII, Elizabeth I strengthen English control of Ireland.

  The plantation of Ireland: 1586-1641

  Scottish Presbyterian settlers.

United States

  The Colonial Period (1607–1776)

  Humphrey Gilbert claimed the island of Newfoundland (1583).

 Walter Raleigh’s failed settlement at Roanoke, Virginia (1584).

  Jamestown 1607

   Plymouth colony 1620

   Maryland colony 1634

  Colonization of the Carolinas began in 1663

  The Dutch settled Manhattan Island 1613 to 1664

  Quaker colony Pennsylvania 1681 under William Penn (also Dutch and Swedes)

American English

  Plymouth, Massachussets. Settlers mainly from East of England and Midlands. (non-rhotic)

  Virginia Settlers mainly from West Country of England.

United States English Today

  American English

  General American (rhotic)

  Southern States (non-rhotic), (drawl,

  New England (non-rhotic)

  New York (non-rhotic) (dental “d” and “t”)

  African American Vernacular English

  Spanglish

Canada

  Peace of Utrecht (1713) Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Hudson Bay ceded to Britain by French.

  The rest of New France conquered by Britain and ceded in 1763.

  40,000 Loyalists arrived in Nova Scotia and Ontario during and after American War of Independence 1775–1783.

  Dominion of Canada 1867: control of home affairs

Canadian English

  Virtually indistinguishable from American English due to influence of southern neighbour.

  Use of “eh”

  Diphthong for words like about, knife have not been lowered as in RP and General American.

No distinction between initial /hw/ and /w/, making which/witch homophones.

Africa

  The first permanent British settlement on the African continent was made at James Island in the Gambia River in 1661.

  Sierra Leone became British possession in 1787.

  Cape of Good Hope (now part of South Africa) acquired in 1806.

  The British East Africa Protectorate was established in 1896: Kenya, Uganda

  Zanzibar, Tanzania (after WWI)

English in Africa

  English is an official language of 16 countries:

 in West Africa Cameroon (with French), Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone;

  in East Africa Sudan (with Arabic), Uganda;

  in Southern Africa Botswana, Lesotho (with Sesotho), Malawi (with Chichewa), Namibia, South Africa (with Afrikaans and nine indigenous languages), Swaziland, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

  In Kenya and Tanzania, Swahili is the official language, English the second language and medium of higher education.

  Standard English occupies a privileged place in the stratification of languages in these regions, but is largely a minority language learned mainly through formal education. (Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language)

Caribbean

  Early incursions by privateers John Hawkins and Sir Francis Drake brought three boatloads of slaves to the Spanish colonies from Guinea in the years 1562–1580.

  First British settlements: St Kitts in 1623 (Thomas Warner); Barbados (John Powell) in 1627.

  Jamaica taken from Spain in 1655. 

English-speaking Caribbean

  12 independent countries: Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize (on the Central American mainland), Dominica, Grenada, Guyana (on the South American mainland), Jamaica, Saint Kitts/Nevis (known also as Saint Christopher/Nevis), Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago.

  6 dependent territories: Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Anguilla, Turks and Caicos Islands, and Montserrat.

Caribbean English

  Standard English: used by a minority. Now lots of American influence.

  Creoles based on European lexicons and with African substrates.

  The English-based creoles can be viewed as dialects of English or  languages in their own right.

  Mesolect: Somewhere between creole and localized English.

India

  Clive defeated the French company and captured Bengal (1757)

  Power transferred from the English East India Company to the British Crown (1858)

  India: Hindi plus 14 other official languages and English.

  Pakistan: Urdu (official); Punjabi; Sindhi; Pashtu; English

Australia and New Zeland

  Captain James Cook claimed New South Wales as a British possession in 1770.

  British penal colony of New South Wales founded in 1788.

  Tasmania settled in 1803

  New Zealand, visited by Cook from 1769. Became colony in 1840.

Australian English

London English dominant but settlers from all parts of Great Britain.

  Most marked characteristic: Homogeneity but varieties go from Broad Australian, General Australian, and Cultivated Australian.

 New Zealand English indistinguishable from Australian to most outsiders.

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