Sonntag, 05. November 2006
Dear diary
Theme music for to the present entry is “under the influence” from James Morisson
“What ever I do I’m under the influence of you...”
under normal circumstances it is a love song, but I thought that some parts and the title would perfectly match up with today’s topic.
Development of English (I wasn't able to put the diagramm in)
The diagramm shows that English vocabulary is taken from all different resources (wine- lat. vino, guitar –fr. guitarre etc.).
But it was astonishing to hear that Enlish and german were pretty much the same 2000 years ago. Both language refer to Old germanic. After the seperation of different tribes, different varieties were spoken. Finally we talked about the brothers Grimm, who did a research on the change of the Germanic language and the question why the Germanic language became different from the other European languages. They focused on the languagechange.
To come back to my song for today, Mr. Gibbon said a nice sentence:”We all say that we are German, or English, or what ever, but in fact we are Welsh!” ;-) or to say with the song’s words “what ever I do I’m under the influence of Welsh...
Tasks:
Task: Prepare reports for discussion on ...
– What are the following, and how old are they ? -
● Indo-European
also called the indo Arien or Indo Germanic language. The Indo european language comprises most of the language families in Europe, which are spoken by the largest group of speakers(three billion native speakers). It is the family of several hundred related language families and dialects, including the major languages like French, English, German etc. The first historical attestion of the Indo European languages were the Anatolien languages from 4000-8000 BC.
● Proto-Germanic
Proto Germanic was unwritten. So there are no realistic documents, that can proof the existens of the language. But one can compare languages to each other to adduce as evidence. Proto Germanic is the common ancestor (proto-language) of all Germanic languages, including modern English and German. Some loanwords exist in neighbouring non-Germanic languages which are believed to have been borrowed from Germanic during the Proto-Germanic phase; an example is Finnish and Estonian kuningas "king", which closely resembles the reconstructed Proto-Germanic *kuningaz. (www.wikipedia.de)
● Old English
Between the mid-fifth century and the mid-twelfth century, Old English, the early form of English was spoken in parts of what is now England and southern Scotland. It is closely related to Old Frisian and Old Saxon because it is West germanic Language. It also experienced heavy influence from Old Norse, a member of the related North Germanic group of languages
● Middle English
The name is given by historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman invasion of 1066 and the mid-to-late 15th century, when the Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, began to become widespread, a process aided by the introduction of the printing press into England by William Caxton in the 1470s, and slightly later by Richard Pynson. By this time the Northumbrian dialect spoken in south east Scotland was developing into the Scots language. The language of England as spoken after this time, up to 1650, is known as Early Modern English. (www.wikipedia.de)
● Early Modern English
It refers to the stage of the English language used from about the end of the Middle English period (the latter half of the 1400s) to 1650. Thus, the first edition of the King James Bible and the works of William Shakespeare both belong to the late phase of Early Modern English, although the King James Bible intentionally keeps some archaisms that were not common even when it was published.The standardization of English spelling falls within the Early Modern English period, and is influenced by conventions predating the Great Vowel Shift, explaining the archaic non-phonetic spelling of contemporary Modern English.
– What are the main differences between English and
German?
One of the Differences is the SVO rule. German does not have such a “simple” sentence structure. It makes a difference saying: “Ich war gestern hier.” (SVO) or “Gerstern war ich hier”. Furthermore we have a different use of the tenses. The German “Perfekt” is similar in use to the English “Simple Past” and not to the Present perfect.
English contains different sounds. Etc. But we learned that some thousend years ago English and German were pretty much the same. So there must be of course more similarities than differences.
Mittwoch, 25. Oktober 2006
Dear diary,
...here I go again on my own, walking down the only road I've ever known..." (whitesnake)
Our first session starts with a very nice song of John Lennon. It puts me into good humour, so I thought about an appropriate song for my first "session entry". Whitesnake with "here I go again on my own" crossed my mind first and I think it fits perfectly to my new situation.( I put it on this homepage first, but then a good soul told me that I am not allowed to offer free musicdownloads. UPS. Of course I erased it immediatly. So for all those who like to hear the song while reading, I have two possibilities: You have to hum the song along while download the original text, or I will rend you my CD... :-)
Mr. Gibbon starts with some organisational details. Then we had a closer look on the main issues of language. It was fascinating to see the connections between the different language (especially Hungary and Finish). then we started with a quizz.
Quizz:
1. why is a potfolio important?
It is important because it provides a wide range of material. Aditionally it afford the opportunity to reflect the single sessions again. That will help to store and retrieve the pieces of information easier.
2. what should a portfolio contain, and how are these components defined?
The portfolio should contain summaries of the lectures, which doesn’t mean a flow trace but a result memorandum. That means we don’t have to reflect the session word by word, but rather focus on the most important facts and the pieces of information we found interesting. Aaditionally it should include the answered quizzes, and finished tasks aswell as a glossary of all important terms. The glossary should include important terms aswell as unknown terms, with a definition.
3. Why should the portfolio be on a webpage?
It provides an easy access and interaction than via paper or email. Besides it offers means f becoming familiar with everyday use of electronic media (especially important for all, who like to become teachers.) it is a sourse of material for the whole class and a form of applied text linguistics.
4. How do you make a website?
It is possible to run our own web server, for example on a DSL line or with the Apache server. Furthermore we are allowed to use the university website to upload our own html files. The last presented option was to use blogging software and make a webblog (blog).
5. what is a website?
A website is a hypertext document with embedded document objects, linked document objects and therefore it is a text.
6.What is a hypertext?
A hypertextdocument is a text either with conventional hierarchical parts or as a complex network of parts. Hypertext is a way of organizing material that attempts to overcome the inherent limitations of traditional text and in particular its linearity (www. Wikipedia.com) For example: Any document on the World Wide Web, electronic dictionary, blog, e-commerce site, online Encyclopaedias like the Encyclopaedia Britannica or the Brockhaus. But the most important is the World wide Web itself.
7. What is a text, what are its main properties?
In linguistics a text is a communicative act, fulfilling the seven constitutive and the three regulative principles of textuality. Both speech and written language, or language in other media can be seen as a text within linguistics. (www.wikipedia.com). I was not able anymore to understand the foils. I hope I will find some answers in the next session.
hear you next week,
Sandra
Dear diary,
"I brought home the bacon :-)" I have my own webpage now. To be honest, I have never been very interested in computer staff, and designing a webpage has never been on my to do list for the future. But with taking a very interested linguistic course this term, it was put on my list. But I think I will take to it, by discovering all the interesting features of your page. Ok 3,2,1 START...
three cheers for our good cooperation 
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