Language change over time: lexical and semantic change, borrowing, neologisms, grammatical and orthographic change, and the historical phases of English from Old English to the present.

What this topic is asking

AQA wants you to describe and explain how English has changed over time: changes in vocabulary and meaning, grammar and spelling, the roles of borrowing and neologism, and the broad historical phases from Old English to the present. In the exam this is usually tested through comparison of texts from different periods, so you need the terminology to label changes precisely and the causes to explain them.

Lexical change: how new words form

The key exam skill is matching the right process to the right word. Not every new word is a borrowing: "selfie" is affixation, "brunch" is a blend, "to google" is conversion of a proper noun. Borrowing has been hugely important historically (Norse, Norman French and Latin all enriched English), but in Present Day English internal word formation and technology-driven coinage dominate. Causes of lexical change include need (a word for a new invention), fashion and prestige, and contact through trade, migration and media.

Semantic change: how meanings shift

Use the precise label and a dated example. Semantic change is often gradual and driven by social attitudes, euphemism and metaphor, so it links neatly back to attitudes and to the social meaning of variation. A common pattern is that a word starts neutral, acquires connotations through use, and then shifts wholesale, which is why connotation (from the lexis and semantics level) and semantic change are closely related.

Grammar, orthography and the phases of English

Grammatical change includes the loss of inflections (Old English was heavily inflected; modern English relies on word order), the simplification and fixing of word order, and shifts such as the decline of the second-person "thou" and "thee" in favour of "you". Orthographic change (spelling) was rampant before standardisation, with the same word spelled several ways in one text, but slowed once print and dictionaries imposed conventions, though informal digital writing now generates new variation. Anchor any account in the four phases with approximate dates so your examples are placed in time.

Try this

• Sort five new words ("brunch", "unfriend", "to google", "NHS", "laptop") into their formation processes.
• Take one word and explain whether its change is broadening, narrowing, amelioration or pejoration.
• Place a sample text in a historical phase and justify it from its spelling and grammar.