There are some people who feel that English is a baffling language whose vocabulary has been infiltrated by numerous foreign words and whose grammar seems conflicted at best. For nearly four centuries people have been complaining about the state of English. As early as 1563, school teacher Robert Cawdray (also spelled Cawdrey) was concerned with all of the new words entering English and was worried that the wealthy were adopting foreign words and phrases. Jack Lynch, in his The Lexicographer’s Dilemma: The Evolution of “Proper” English, from Shakespeare to South Park, writes:
“Most worries about the language before the 1660s had to do with its adequacy to express everything that needed to be expressed: did it have all the words it needed, or was it necessary to introduce words and idioms from other languages?”
Jack Lynch also writes:
“Anyone who studies history knows there never was a golden age. English, it seems, has been in a state of crisis, besieged by barbarians, for as long as it has existed.”
In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, England’s population grew rapidly: between 1550 and 1650, it doubled, reaching 5 million. Reflecting this growth a number of new words entered into English: ghetto (1611), suburban (1625), and dialect (1570s).
Concerned about the apparent anarchy of the language and the lack of any standards regarding grammar, spelling, and pronunciation, the Royal Society set up a committee for improving the English language in 1664. The model for the committee was the Academy which had been founded in France some 30 years earlier. Those who promoted this idea included the poet and critic John Dryden and polymath John Evelyn. With regard to the possible goals of this special committee, linguist David Crystal, in his delightful little book The Fight for English: How Language Pundits Ate, Shot, and Left, writes:
“There could be a grammar and a dictionary, collections of dialect words, guides to spelling reform, translations to act as models of excellence.”
The committee, in spite of concerns and good intentions, was not particularly successful in bringing order out of chaos. David Crystal writes:
“Nothing happened. The meetings ended early the following year. We do not know why.”
The idea of an Academy to help save English from further degradation, however, did not die. In the 1680s, the idea of an Academy was championed by Wentworth Dillon, the earl of Roscommon who wanted to refine the language and fix its standard. Once again, the idea failed to gain political support.
In 1697, Daniel Defoe proposed that the King establish a society to polish and refine the language. Defoe wanted to purge the language of all irregularities and innovations. He wanted to eliminate
“that Scum and Excrement of the Mouth…a mere Frenzy of the Tongue, a Vomit of the Brain”
or, in other words, swearing. Defoe’s vision saw an Academy which could decide on right and wrong usage of English. According to Defoe, with an academy “it would be as criminal to coin words as money.” In other words, with an academy, new words would have to be approved and simply introducing new words without approval would be the same as minting money without government approval.
Defoe also had some definite ideas regarding membership in the Academy. He suggested:
“There should be room in this Society for neither Clergyman, Physician, or Lawyer…”
Concerning the composition of the Academy, Defoe writes:
“I wou’d therefore have this Society wholly compos’d of Gentlemen; whereof Twelve to be of the Nobility, if possible, and Twelve Private Gentlemen, and a class of Twelve to be left open for meer merit.”
Today Defoe (shown above) is better known for his novel about Robinson Crusoe than for his attempts to bring order to English.
Another voice for bringing order to English came from Jonathan Swift. Swift was born in Dublin in 1667 to a well-known Royalist family. Among the characteristics of eighteenth-century English which Swift deplored was the tendency to shorten words that should, he believed, retain their full dignified length: such as, rep for ‘reputation,’ incog for ‘incognito’.
In 1712, Jonathan Swift published “Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Tongue.” According to Swift, the English language
“is extremely imperfect;…its daily Improvements are by no means in proportion to its daily Corruptions; …it offends against every Part of Grammar.”
Swift also took up a diatribe against the chaos of English spelling:
“Another Cause (and perhaps borrowed from the former) which hath contributed not a little to the maiming of our Language, is a foolish Opinion, advanced of late Years, that we ought to spell exactly as we speak; which besides the obvious Inconvenience of utterly destroying our Etymology, which be a thing which we should never see an End of.”
A portrait of Jonathon Swift is shown above.
Swift seems to have blamed the corruption of the English language on almost anyone who wrote anything. Like the earlier proposals, Swift’s ideas failed.
By 1700, England had a population of 6 million people. Nearly half of the men and one quarter of the women could read and write at this time. Regional accents and dialects were abundant and reinforced local social identity. In 1754, Philip Stanhope, Lord Chesterfield, wrote:
“It must be owned that our language is at present in a state of anarchy.”
In an attempt to bring some order to this chaos, Samuel Johnson published his book
A Dictionary of the English Language in 1755. This would become popularly known as Johnson’s Dictionary and would be among the most influential dictionaries of the English language. With regard to the possibility of an Academy to organize the English language, Dr. Johnson would write
“We live in an age in which it is kind of publick sport to refuse all respect that cannot be enforced. The edicts of an English academy would probably be read by many, only that they might be sure to disobey them.”
It’s been 260 years since the publication of
Johnson’s Dictionary and lots of people are still complaining about how other people are speaking and writing the English language. David Crystal writes:
“Life and language have moved on, but still people worry. Millions feel linguistically inferior.”