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| Preface | p. v |
| Language and the English Language: an Introduction | p. 1 |
| A Definition of Language | p. 2 |
| Language as System | p. 2 |
| Language Signs | p. 5 |
| Language as Speech | p. 6 |
| Language as Convention | p. 9 |
| Language as Human | p. 14 |
| Language as Communication | p. 16 |
| Other Characteristics of Language | p. 17 |
| Why Study the History of English? | p. 18 |
| The Sounds of Current English | p. 22 |
| The Organs of Speech | p. 22 |
| Consonants of Current English | p. 23 |
| Vowels of Current English | p. 26 |
| Stress | p. 31 |
| Kinds of Sound Change | p. 31 |
| Causes of Sound Change | p. 34 |
| The Phoneme | p. 35 |
| Differing Transcriptions | p. 37 |
| Letters and Sounds: a Brief History of Writing | p. 39 |
| Ideographic and Syllabic Writing | p. 39 |
| From Semitic Writing to the Greek Alphabet | p. 40 |
| The Romans Adopt the Greek Alphabet | p. 41 |
| The History of English Writing | p. 44 |
| The Spelling of English Consonant Sounds | p. 46 |
| The Spelling of English Vowel Sounds | p. 49 |
| Spelling Pronunciations and Pronunciation Spellings | p. 51 |
| Writing and History | p. 53 |
| The Backgrounds of English | p. 55 |
| Indo-European Origins | p. 55 |
| Language Typology and Language Families | p. 57 |
| Non-Indo-European Languages | p. 59 |
| Main Divisions of the Indo-European Group | p. 61 |
| Cognate Words in the Indo-European Languages | p. 70 |
| Inflection in the Indo-European Languages | p. 71 |
| Word Order in the Indo-European Languages | p. 75 |
| Major Changes from Indo-European to Germanic | p. 76 |
| First Sound Shift | p. 78 |
| West Germanic Languages | p. 82 |
| The old English Period (449-1100) | p. 86 |
| Some Key Events in the Old English Period | p. 86 |
| History of the Anglo-Saxons | p. 87 |
| Pronunciation and Spelling | p. 95 |
| Vocabulary | p. 99 |
| Grammar, Concord, and Inflection | p. 101 |
| Nouns | p. 102 |
| Modifiers | p. 106 |
| Pronouns | p. 108 |
| Verbs | p. 110 |
| Syntax | p. 116 |
| Old English Illustrated | p. 118 |
| The Middle English Period (1100-1500) | p. 123 |
| Some Key Events in the Middle English Period | p. 123 |
| The Background of the Norman Conquest | p. 124 |
| The Reascendancy of English | p. 125 |
| Foreign Influences on Vocabulary | p. 126 |
| Middle English Spelling | p. 127 |
| The Rise of a London Standard | p. 131 |
| Changes in Pronunciation | p. 134 |
| Changes in Grammar | p. 141 |
| Nouns, Pronouns, and Adjectives | p. 142 |
| Verbs | p. 147 |
| Word Order | p. 149 |
| Middle English Illustrated | p. 150 |
| The Early Modern English Period (1500-1800): Society, Spellings, and Sounds | p. 153 |
| Some Key Events in the Early Modern Period | p. 153 |
| The Transition from Middle to Modern English | p. 155 |
| The Orthography of Early Modern English | p. 156 |
| The Great Vowel Shift | p. 160 |
| Other Vowels | p. 163 |
| Early Modern English Consonants | p. 166 |
| Evidence for Early Modern Pronunciation | p. 168 |
| Early Modern English Illustrated | p. 169 |
| The Early Modern English Period (1500-1800): Forms, Syntax, and Usage | p. 173 |
| The Study of Language | p. 174 |
| Nouns | p. 178 |
| Adjectives and Adverbs | p. 181 |
| Pronouns | p. 182 |
| Verbs | p. 189 |
| Prepositions | p. 199 |
| Early Modern English Further Illustrated | p. 199 |
| Late Modern English (1800-21st Century) | p. 201 |
| Some Key Events in the Late Modern Period | p. 201 |
| The National Varieties of English | p. 202 |
| National Differences in Word Choice | p. 205 |
| Syntactical and Morphological Differences | p. 209 |
| British and American Purism | p. 209 |
| National Differences in Pronunciation | p. 212 |
| British and American Spelling | p. 215 |
| Variation within National Varieties | p. 216 |
| World English | p. 222 |
| The Essential Oneness of All English | p. 224 |
| Words and Meanings | p. 227 |
| Semantics and Change of Meaning | p. 228 |
| Generalization and Specialization | p. 230 |
| Transfer of Meaning | p. 231 |
| Pejoration and Amelioration | p. 234 |
| Taboo and Euphemism | p. 235 |
| The Fate of Intensifying Words | p. 238 |
| Some Circumstances of Semantic Change | p. 239 |
| Semantic Change Is Inevitable | p. 243 |
| New Words From Old | p. 245 |
| Creating Words | p. 245 |
| Combining Words: Compounding | p. 248 |
| Combining Word Parts: Affixing | p. 252 |
| Shortening Words | p. 257 |
| Blending Words | p. 262 |
| Shifting Words to New Uses | p. 265 |
| Sources of New Words | p. 268 |
| Foreign Elements in the English Word Stock | p. 271 |
| Latin and Greek Loanwords | p. 272 |
| Celtic Loanwords | p. 276 |
| Scandinavian Loanwords | p. 277 |
| French Loanwords | p. 279 |
| Spanish and Portuguese Loanwords | p. 283 |
| Italian Loanwords | p. 284 |
| Germanic Loanwords | p. 285 |
| Loanwords from the East | p. 288 |
| Other Sources | p. 291 |
| The Sources of Recent Loanwords | p. 292 |
| English Remains English | p. 293 |
| Selected Bibliography | p. 295 |
| Glossary | p. 311 |
| Index of Modern English Words and Affixes | p. 335 |
| Index of Persons, Places, and Topics | p. 357 |
| Table of Contents provided by Rittenhouse. All Rights Reserved. |