
Historical Texts
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Ensure you cover as many frameworks as are relevant
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Include some grammatical analysis (preferably relating to sentences, clauses and/or verbs)
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Do not forget to analyse how the text achieves its purposes/expresses feelings etc -
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Include points about language change together with standard analytical points:
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Archaicisms
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Shifts in frequency
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Semantic shifts (be specific if possible -
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Orthographic changes, clustering into patterns if at all possible (eg ie/y or u/v/w instability, extra “e”s, double final consonants etc)
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Talking too generally about language change without focus on the text (especially dealing with issues from before the text, like Caxton’s printing press or the Great Vowel Shift)
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Picking out a few points to do with change and not dealing with the more standard textual analysis (how does the text achieve its purposes, who is its audience, what techniques does it use etc)
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