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Originally Posted by Glice
The point I was making is that with earlier English literature there isn't the notion of a 'standardised' English; Shakespeare comes to represent the Standarisation of English. It's not that he personally was responsible for it, it's that Canterbury Tales is one form of English that wasn't necessarily the same form of English spoken in, say, Yorkshire or Devon.
The notion of dialect requires the notion of a standardised form of a language which didn't exist prior to Shakespeare epoch, so far as I understand (and please bear in mind, I'm not a linguist by any means).
I have the further problem that I don't really like Shakespeare, but that's neither here nor there.
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Yeah but remember there was no standard spelling at that time and the form that we read Shakespeare in now, although the words are the same, the spelling has been changed.
Oh well I've come to love Shakespeare. And anyway English has changed since then and is still changing. Dictionaries recognise.
This whole conversation shouldn't have happened. I was being an arsehole.
But I would like to point something out: the unconscious refusal of Americans to call English people English and to only call them British. It's quite odd. My theory behind this is that they feel uncomfortable about the word 'English' because if the English are speaking their own language then what are the Americans speaking and why is it different? The word 'British' avoids this and maintains American arrogance and identity which they've had to create, though it shouldn't be a problem for any reasonable person.