PS-History of English: Migration and the History of English
Berit Johannsen
Kommentar
The English language and its varieties have been shaped in various ways by different migration movements in the past 1500 years. In this class, we will look at what can happen to language when people move to a different place.
You will learn about important migration movements in the history of English, as well as basic concepts in sociolinguistics and the study of language and dialect contact. More specifically, you will learn about processes such as borrowing and code-switching, language transfer, dialect levelling and how new varieties and dialects are formed. In addition, you will learn how researchers have studied specific aspects of these topics empirically and you will be introduced to different data sources (corpora, text collections, dictionaries) and methods of analysis, which will allow you to conduct your own small case studies of migration-related linguistic phenomena in the history of English.
Regular and active participation in this class includes working on a small case study and presenting the project design in a brief elevator pitch at the end of the semester. The module exam consists of a term paper (2000 words) about your case study.
This seminar is complemented by the module lecture.
Schließen12 Termine
Regelmäßige Termine der Lehrveranstaltung