Towards an Analytic Language

Studienarbeit aus dem Jahr 2010 im Fachbereich Didaktik für das Fach Englisch - Grammatik Stil Arbeitstechnik Note: 13 Universität zu Köln Veranstaltung: English Grammar: Synchronic and Diachronic Aspects Sprache: Deutsch Abstract: The terms 'synthetic language' and 'analytic language' in connection with linguistic typo?logy have become commonplaces in contemporary lingusitics. They refer to morphological or rather morpho-syntactic characteristics of languages. Whereas analytic languages have very few affixes (for example Modern English) synthetic languages have many (for example Latin Old English). (O'Grady et al. 1997: 334) Using the quantifiers 'very few' and 'many' this definition by O'Grady et al. shows that it might be problematic to speak about synthetic and analytic languages as 'fixed' or 'closed categories' in a structuralist way. They rather denote prototypical categories or general tendencies as there is hardly any language which entirely belongs to one or the other category. Even a prototypically analytic language like Present-Day English (PDE) has both grammaticalized synthetic elements and tendencies towards new syntheticity as O'Grady et al. or Danchev have shown. In a synthetic language four lexiacal categories are usually concerned with inflectio?n: verbs nouns pronouns and adjectives. Since Old English the earliest stage of the English language the inflectional system has continuously been reduced and in PDE most grammatical relations are expressed through analytic constructions. The tense system of Old English consisted of two morphologically marked tenses the present and the preterite. Futurity could be expressed through 'futurate' constructions employing present tense or rarely be supported by a certain set of lexical verbs functioning as auxiliaries without losing their lexical meaning e.g. willan = to want or sculan = must. These verbs were unlike today fully inflected. (...)This paper will show that the decline