Re: English questions

Thomas Leigh wrote:

> Can anyone give me an approximate time frame for the following? (a)
> when the Great Vowel Shift took place(b) when the phoneme /x/
> disappeared(c) when /y/ unrounded (derounded? What's the term?) to /i/
>  I assume (b) must have happened before (a), since e.g. /nixt/ had to
> have become /ni:t/ (loss of /x/ compensatory lengthening) before the
> GVS in order for Modern English to have ended up with /najt/. (And
> while I'm at it, I know that the slashes / / are supposed to enclose
> phonetic representation, not phonemic representation, but I can't
> remember what you're supposed to put around the latter, so if anyone
> could remind me I'd be grateful.) Also, does anyone know why Modern
> English ended up with /x/>/f/ in a few words (e.g. laugh, enough)
> rather than /x/ just dropping as it did in most words? Yes, I know
> that sentence was ungrammatical, but it's early and I can't figure out
> how to say it well. :) I'd also be grateful for any recommendations
> for good sources of information (books, websites, anything) on the
> historical development of English. I've studied some Anglo-Saxon, and
> of course Modern English is my native language, but I'm really quite
> clueless about all the inbetween bits.
>
> A book: From Old English to Standard{1} English  Dennis Freeborn
> MacMillan Press Ltd
>
> available from Amazon.co.uk (a few editions available latest mentioned
> 1998)
>
> Supplementary materials available from author{2} (which I as yet don't
> have):
>
> Text Commentary Book
> Word Book
> Cassette with readings of several of the texts included in the book
>
> {1}Standard = English standard; it doesn't cover American or any other
> national standards
>
> {2} Check inside book for contact details (if you buy it)
>
> David Barrow