ATS3673: History and Sociolinguistics of English

As you may or may not know, I like Kate Burridge. Here is my review of the last unit that I took in which she taught. My gushing in that post probably says enough, so I'll try not to go on about it too much here.

Here is how the unit was structured:

• Week 1: Language change and the history of English
• Week 2: Old English (449-1100) - introduction to outer and inner history
• Week 3: Old English - more on the inner history
• Week 4: Middle English (1100-1500) - introduction to outer and inner history
• Week 5: Middle English - more on the inner history
• Week 6: Early Modern English (1500-1800) - introduction to outer and inner history
• Week 7: Early Modern English - more on the inner history
• Week 8: Standardization and purism
• Week 9: Modern English (1800->) - introduction to outer and inner history
• Week 10: Modern English - global aspects
• Week 11: Antipodean Englishes - past and present
• Week 12: Some hands-on experience of texts from the Anglo-Saxon and medieval period

I didn't know much about historical linguistics going into that unit, so don't let that put you off if you feel a little unsure. I did do the unit 'Language Across Time' with Olav, but that was a little different in the sense that it looked more at the processes than the changes themselves, if that makes sense. But yeah, this unit absolutely caters for those with limited historical linguistics exposure. In fact, some of the students in our class hadn't ever done any formal linguistics at all before this semester, so that's pretty neat.

I don't want to ramble about Kate again (well, I do), so to keep it succinct, I'll just say that she is by far and away the best lecturer I've ever had. 10/10.

Bob was new to me. I think due to the shortage of staff this semester, Kate invited him to join her in this unit (there were a few weeks where Kate was unavailable). Bob was really great, too. His weeks tended to be on the social sides of the language, whilst Kate then followed that up with the technical stuff. Bob obviously has a lot of knowledge in the area, and it comes across in his presentations, which are really enjoyable to listen to. I got the impression by the end of the semester that a lot of the content he was covering wasn't going to be examinable (a prediction that came to fruition), but I still immensely enjoyed his lectures.

Both Kate and Bob are ridiculously friendly and keen to answer any questions. In fact, after each lecture, they continued the class less formally at Sir John's. I never took up this offer, but I know that others did, and they enjoyed it very much. I think this sort of thing is what takes a unit from 'good' territory to 'great' territory. They just wanted to share their passion with others similarly passionate. Awesome.

The content itself is structured logically. As you can see above, it starts with Old English, and eventually moves into English of the present day. I learnt a lot in this unit. Interestingly (for me, at least), I didn't take very many notes. This is different for me, because I am a religious note-taker. But I found that the knowledge sort of just stuck deep within me because I was so interested in it; that's probably credit to the lecturers, because there's only so much passion one can have about syntactic structures of the 14th century. So yeah, the only real downside of the lectures was the lecture theatre, which I'm sure will be changed.

Assignment one was an essay on a range of several topics. I did mine on Standard English. I thought that it was generously marked, but the feedback was good. It wasn't a particularly exciting assessment task, but I did enjoy it. I found the second assignment quite difficult, but it was by no means impossible if you had been to the lectures. Kate's notes helped quite a lot here. I think the third assignment was originally going to be another essay, but Kate changed it a bit to be more of a research project, which was good. I liked this one, because (despite the fact that it took a while) it felt more like a mild introduction to Honours.
Really, the only issue I had with the unit (hence the rating of 4.95 rather than 5) was that it didn't have tutes. This is a unit that, in my opinion, requires them, and the unit would have been a lot better off with them. But aside from that, wicked unit. Do it.

One was provided. It wasn't directly related - some of the questions on it we hadn't covered - but it did give a vague idea of what the exam would be like.

4.95 out of 5

What must you buy? What is "recommended"? Do you need it?
The prescribed textbook was A Biography of the English Language (3ed) (2012) by Millward and Hayes, but I had to look that up, because I didn't buy it. I'd recommend against getting the textbook because it's simply superfluous. Kate's unit handout (you'll know what I'm talking about if you've taken any of her other units) is more than sufficient both during the semester and as exam revision.

1x 2 hour seminar per week

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