It is generally accepted today that the grammars and vocabularies of the spoken and the written English differ in important ways. Is it known when this distinction between the English grammars become recognized - for example, mentioned in a book or an article?
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spoken language always has more colloquialisms, some of which eventually make their way into written language. That's one way how language evolves. – msam Feb 04 '14 at 15:35
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@msam I understand that the distinction has been there for roughly as long as the written language exists. However, my question is not when the split happened, but when it became recognized by scientists who study language grammars (specifically, English grammars). – Sergey Kalinichenko Feb 04 '14 at 15:40
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Researchers became aware of the differences, or least seriously wrote about them, only with the development of technology to record speech. Before that, the written language was paramount. For some it still, mistakenly, is.
Barrie England
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