Favorite History of English Texts

[Kathryn Remlinger]

The texts that have worked the best for my students (English majors with emphases in education or literature, and who've had at least an intro to lx course) are Crystal's The Stories of English and The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Langauge, Graddoll et al's Changing English, Trudgill & Watts' Alternative Histories of English, Melcher and Shaw's World Englishes. I've used Algeo and Pyles, but students found it a little dense, and it also doesn't have the focus on variation and World Englishes that I include in the course. I've also used Fennel  and liked it, but some students thought it was too difficult.  I also have supplemented with articles from Machen and Scott's English in its Social Contexts.

Best,
Kate

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Date:    Wed, 30 Jul 2008 23:52:19 -0400
From:    James Harbeck <jharbeck at SYMPATICO.CA>
Subject: favourite English history/general intro texts

If you were teaching a course on the history and structure of the
English language, basically an introduction to linguistics and the
history of English for third- and fourth-year students for whom the
course will likely be the only linguistics course they take, what
text would you use? (I won't be, but someone I'm related to will;
he's been out of academe for some time and so is brushing up on
what's currently preferred for such uses, and I said I'd ask around
too.) The one text I can think of is Algeo and Pyles, though I'm not
sure whether the balance of focus in it is just right for the
specific course in question. And O'Grady doesn't really cover
history. Plus this is a one-semester course.

Thanks,
James Harbeck.

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End of ADS-L Digest - 29 Jul 2008 to 30 Jul 2008 (#2008-213)
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Kathryn Remlinger, Professor
Department of English: Linguistics
Grand Valley State University
243 Lake Huron Hall
1 Campus Drive
Allendale, Michigan 49401 USA
tel: 616-331-3122
fax: 616-331-3430

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org