Factually! with Adam Conover cover image

Why Language is Always Changing with Valerie Fridland

Factually! with Adam Conover

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The Social Trigger and Language Evolution

Sally Kohn is a socio linguist, which means she studies how social triggers and underlying linguistic tendencies interact. She says class plays a huge role in shaping language; during the Middle English periodclass was seminal in forming modern English that we speak today. The lower class spoke English and the upper class spoke French because of unregulated language change without upward pressure on keeping it standard or codifying it. That's really what formed the modern English of today.

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