Linguistic purism in English

2025-07-03T16:39:25Z

2A01:36D:1200:2557:48B8:27AD:FE16:5DD7: /* Modern English */

{{EngvarB|date=August 2024}}
{{Short description|Efforts to reduce foreign terms in English}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2017}}
{{English language}}
[[Linguistic purism|Purism in the linguistic field]] is the historical trend of languages to conserve intact their lexical structure of [[word family|word families]], in opposition to foreign influences which are considered 'impure'. Historically, '''linguistic purism in English''' is a reaction to the great number of [[loanword|borrowings]] in the [[English language]] from other languages, especially [[Old French]], since the [[Norman conquest of England]], and some of its native vocabulary and grammar have been supplanted by features of [[Romance languages|Latinate]] and [[Greek language|Greek]] origin.<ref name=johnson>{{cite news|author=R.L.G.|title=Johnson: What might have been|url=https://www.economist.com/prospero/2014/01/28/johnson-what-might-have-been|newspaper=[[The Economist]]|url-access=subscription|date=28 January 2014|access-date=31 July 2020}}</ref> Efforts to remove or consider the removal of foreign terms in English are often known as '''Anglish''', a term coined by author and humorist [[Paul Jennings (British author)|Paul Jennings]] in 1966.<ref name=cambridge>{{cite web|url=https://www.tcs.cam.ac.uk/anglish-a-brexiteer-s-lingua-franca/|title=Anglish: A Brexiteer's lingua franca?|last=Bidwell|first=Lili|website=[[The Cambridge Student]]|date=25 March 2017|access-date=25 January 2021}}</ref>

English linguistic purism has persisted in diverse forms since the [[inkhorn term]] controversy of the [[early modern period]]. In its mildest form, purism stipulates the use of [[List of Germanic and Latinate equivalents in English|native terms instead of loanwords]]. In stronger forms, new words are coined from [[Germanic languages|Germanic]] roots (such as ''[[wikt:wordstock|wordstock]]'' for ''vocabulary'') or revived from [[history of English|older stages of English]] (such as ''[[wikt:shrithe|shrithe]]'' for ''proceed''). Noted purists of [[Early Modern English]] include [[John Cheke]],<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Cheke|title=Sir John Cheke|access-date=25 January 2021|author=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]}}</ref> [[Thomas Wilson (rhetorician)|Thomas Wilson]],<ref name=wilson>{{cite web|url=http://www.ric.edu/faculty/rpotter/inkhorn.html|title=Texts from the Inkhorn Debate, c. 1560–1640|access-date=25 January 2021|author=[[Rhode Island College]]}}</ref> [[Ralph Lever]],<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Sgarbi |first1=Marco |date=2013 |title=Ralph Lever's ''Art of Reason, Rightly Termed Witcraft'' (1573) |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/24338444 |journal=Bruniana & Campanelliana |volume=19 |issue=1 |pages=149–163 |jstor=24338444 |access-date=25 January 2021}}</ref> [[Richard Rowlands]],<ref>{{cite book|title=Studien zur englischen Philologie|first1=Lorenz|last1=Morsbach|publisher=Halle a.S., Max Niemeyer|year=1910|page=123|url=https://archive.org/details/studienzurengl4045halluoft/page/n261/mode/2up}}</ref> and [[Nathaniel Fairfax]].<ref>{{cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-9088|title=Fairfax, Nathaniel|access-date=25 January 2021|author=[[Dictionary of National Biography|Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]]|year=2004|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/9088|isbn=978-0-19-861412-8}}</ref> Modern linguistic purists include [[William Barnes]],<ref name=johnson /> [[Charles Dickens]],<ref name=dickens>{{cite book|last=Lynne|first=Murphy|title=The Prodigal Tongue|year=2018|publisher=[[Penguin Books]]|isbn=978-1524704889|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CPYsDwAAQBAJ}}</ref> [[Gerard Manley Hopkins]],<ref name=hopkins>{{cite journal |last1=Roper |first1=Jonathan |date=April 2012 |title=English Purisms |url=https://www.euppublishing.com/doi/full/10.3366/vic.2012.0059?src=recsys |journal=Victoriographies |publisher=[[Edinburgh University Press]] |volume=2 |issue=1 |pages=44–59 |doi=10.3366/vic.2012.0059 |access-date=25 January 2021|url-access=subscription }}</ref> [[Elias Molee]],<ref>{{cite book|last=Molee|first=Elias|title=Pure Saxon English, Or, Americans to the Front|year=1890|publisher=[[Rand McNally]]}}</ref> [[Percy Grainger]],<ref name=grainger>{{cite journal |last1=Gillies |first1=M. |date=2019 |title=Percy Grainger: How American was He? |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nineteenth-century-music-review/article/abs/percy-grainger-how-american-was-he/47EE7729107AA2C3D95F4B3AD6DB443F |journal=Nineteenth-Century Music Review |volume=16 |issue=1 |pages=9–26 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |doi=10.1017/S1479409817000568 |s2cid=187266648 |access-date=25 January 2021|url-access=subscription }}</ref> and [[George Orwell]].<ref name="Poole">{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/jan/17/my-problem-with-george-orwell |title=My problem with George Orwell |last=Poole |first=Steven |date=2013-01-17 |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=2021-01-08}}</ref>

==History==

===Middle English===
{{see also|Middle English creole hypothesis}}
English words gave way to borrowings from [[Anglo-Norman language|Anglo-Norman]] following the [[Norman Conquest]] as English lost ground as a language of prestige. Anglo-Norman was used in schools and dominated literature, nobility and higher life, leading a wealth of French loanwords to enter English over the course of several centuries—English only returned to courts of law in 1362, and to government in the following century.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Kay|first1=Christian|last2=Allan|first2=Kathryn|title=English Historical Semantics|chapter=A brief history of the English lexicon|year=2015|publisher=[[Edinburgh University Press]]|isbn=978-0748644773|pages=6–24}}</ref>

Notwithstanding, some texts of early [[Middle English]] engaged in linguistic purism, deliberately avoiding excessive Anglo-Norman influence. [[Layamon's Brut|Layamon's ''Brut'']], composed in the late 12th or early 13th century, espoused several features of Old English poetic style and used a predominantly Anglo-Saxon vocabulary.<ref name="Ackerman">Ackerman, Robert W. (1966) '' Backgrounds to Medieval English Literature''. 1st. New York: Random House, Inc.</ref> ''[[Ancrene Wisse]]'', of the same era, allowed for French and Old Norse loans but maintained conservative spelling and syntax to keep with Old English.<ref>{{cite journal | last=Tolkien | first=J.R.R. |author-link=J.R.R. Tolkien | year=1929 | title=[[Ancrene Wisse and Hali Meiðhad]] | journal= Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association | volume=14 | pages=104–126 }}</ref> ''[[Ayenbite of Inwyt]]'', a [[Kentish Old English|Kentish]] translation of a French treatise on morality written about a century earlier, used [[calque|calques]] to avoid borrowing from French.<ref>{{cite news|last=Herman|first=Louis Jay|title=Remorse From Dan Michel to James Joyce|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/08/opinion/l-remorse-from-dan-michel-to-james-joyce-386189.html|work=[[The New York Times]]|date=8 January 1989|access-date=25 January 2021}}</ref>

===Early Modern English===
Controversy over [[inkhorn term|inkhorn terms]]—foreign loanwords perceived to be needless—persisted in the 16th and 17th centuries. Among others, [[Thomas Elyot]], a [[neologism|neologiser]], borrowed extensively from abroad in support of "the necessary augmentation" of English.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Vos |first1=Alvin |date=October 1976 |title=Humanistic Standards of Diction in the Inkhorn Controversy |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4173916 |journal=Studies in Philology |publisher=[[University of North Carolina Press]] |volume=73 |issue=4 |pages=376–396 |jstor=4173916 |access-date=25 January 2021}}</ref> Linguistic purists such as [[John Cheke]] opposed this borrowing in favour of keeping English "unmixt and unmangled".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://spartacus-educational.com/John_Cheke.htm |title=John Cheke |last=Simkin |first=John|date=September 1997 | website=[[Spartacus Educational]] |access-date=25 January 2021}}</ref> [[Thomas Wilson (rhetorician)|Thomas Wilson]], a contemporary of Cheke, criticised borrowing from foreign languages as seeking an "outlandish English".<ref name=wilson></ref>

===Modern English===
[[File:William Barnes poet.jpg|thumb|200px|[[William Barnes]], a 19th-century poet and linguistic purist]]
With the influx of new industrial and scientific terms from Greek and Latin, linguistic purism saw renewed interest in the 19th century.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Langer|first1=Nils|last2=Davies|first2=Winifred|title=Linguistic Purism in the Germanic Languages|year=2005|publisher=[[De Gruyter]]|isbn=3-11-018337-4|pages=103}}</ref> U.S. President [[Thomas Jefferson]] observed in an 1825 letter that "a taste is reviving in England for the recovery of the Anglo-Saxon dialect".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/98-01-02-5648 |title=From Thomas Jefferson to J. Evelyn Denison, 9 November 1825 |publisher=[[National Archives and Records Administration]] |website=founders.archives.gov |access-date=28 January 2021}}</ref> [[Dorset]] poet, minister, and philologist [[William Barnes]] coined several words to promote "strong old Anglo-Saxon speech", including ''[[wikt:speechcraft|speechcraft]]'' for ''grammar'', ''[[wikt:birdlore|birdlore]]'' for ''ornithology'', and ''[[wikt:bendsome|bendsome]]'' for ''flexible''.<ref>{{cite book|last=Barnes|first=Williams|title=An Outline of English Speech-Craft|year=1878|publisher=[[Charles Kegan Paul|C. Kegan Paul & Co.]]}}</ref> Poet [[Gerard Manley Hopkins]] discussed Barnes in an 1882 letter to [[Robert Bridges]], lamenting the "utter hopelessness" of Barnes's purism but nonetheless writing in support of it, claiming that "no beauty in a language can make up for want of purity".<ref name=hopkins /><ref>{{cite book|title=Linguistic Purism in the Germanic Languages|first1=Nils|last1=Langer|first2=Winifred|last2=Davies|publisher=[[De Gruyter|Walter de Gruyter]]|year=2005|page=328}}</ref> [[Charles Dickens]] emphasised the importance of Germanic elements of English during this period, stressing that a writer should not "seek abroad" for new words.<ref name=dickens />

The fifth rule of vocabulary in ''[[The King's English]]'', published in 1917, suggests that writers should "prefer the Saxon word to the Romance".<ref name=dickens /> In his 1946 essay "[[Politics and the English Language]]", [[George Orwell]] criticised the extensive use of "foreign" words in English.<ref name="Poole" /> [[Australians|Australian]] composer [[Percy Grainger]], a contemporary of Orwell, invented a "blue-eyed English" that he perceived to be linguistically pure and preferred the use of English words in the place of traditional Italian music terms.<ref name=grainger /> One year after Grainger's death, philologist [[Lee Hollander]] emphasised in his 1962 translation of the ''[[Poetic Edda]]''—a collection of [[Old Norse]] poems—that "Germanic material must be drawn upon to the utmost extent ... because of the tang and flavor still residing in the homelier indigenous speech material".<ref>{{cite book|last=Hollander|first=Lee M.|title=The Poetic Edda|year=1986|publisher=[[University of Texas Press]]|isbn=0292764995|page=xxviii}}</ref>

[[Paul Jennings (British author)|Paul Jennings]] coined the term "Anglish" in a three-part series in ''[[Punch magazine|Punch]]'' commemorating the 900th anniversary of the [[Norman conquest of England]].<ref name=cambridge /> Jennings's articles, entitled "1066 and All Saxon" and published in June 1966, envisioned an England in which the conquest had failed and included linguistically pure English passages; Jennings gave "a bow to [[William Barnes#Linguistic purism|William Barnes]]" as an inspiration.<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Jennings |first=Paul |date=June 1966 |title= 1066 and All Saxon |magazine= [[Punch (magazine)|Punch]] |location= London}}</ref> In 1989, [[science fiction]] writer [[Poul Anderson]] released a similarly-written text about basic [[atomic theory]] called ''[[Uncleftish Beholding]]'' composed almost fully of Germanic-rooted words. In 1997, [[Douglas Hofstadter]] jokingly entitled the style "Ander-Saxon".<ref>{{cite book|last=Hofstadter|first=Douglas R.|title=[[Le Ton beau de Marot]]|year=1997|publisher=[[Basic Books]]|isbn=0465086454}}</ref>

The September 2009 publication ''How We'd Talk if the English had Won in 1066'' by David Cowley updates Old English words to today's English spelling, seeking mainstream appeal by covering words in five grades ranging from "easy" to "weird and wonderful" and giving many examples of use with drawings and tests.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/how-wed-talk-if-the-english-had-won-in-1066-david-cowley/1137949846|title=How We'd Talk if the English Had Won in 1066: New Edition 2020|website=[[Barnes & Noble]]|access-date=25 January 2021}}</ref> [[Paul Kingsnorth]]'s 2014 ''[[The Wake (novel)|The Wake]]'' is written in a hybrid of [[Old English]] and [[Modern English]] to account for its 1066 milieu,<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/02/the-wake-paul-kingsnorth-review-literary-triumph |title=The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth review – 'A literary triumph' |last=Thorpe |first=Adam |date=2 April 2014 |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=2021-01-08}}</ref> and Edmund Fairfax's 2017 satiric literary novel ''Outlaws'' is similarly written in a "constructed" form of English consisting almost exclusively of words of Germanic origin.<ref>{{cite book|last=Fairfax|first=Edmund|title=Outlaws|year=2017|publisher=Bokos|isbn=978-0995296503|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MA03swEACAAJ}}</ref> An online newsletter called ''The Anglish Times'' has regularly reported on current events without non-Germanic borrowed words since January 2021.<ref>{{Cite web |title=News Written In Anglish |url=https://theanglishtimes.com/ |access-date=2022-11-15 |website=theanglishtimes.com}}</ref>

==See also==
* [[Linguistic purism]]
* [[Word family]]
* [[Constrained writing]]
* [[Plain English]], a variety of English written specifically for clarity
* [[List of Germanic and Latinate equivalents in English]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{English nationalism}}
{{Germanic languages}}
{{English dialects by continent}}

[[Category:Forms of English]]
[[Category:Linguistic purism|English]]
[[Category:English nationalism]]
[[Category:Germanic languages]]
[[Category:History of the English language]]

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Linguistic purism in English