Language of Queen Elizabeth I

Mel Evans is a Lecturer in English Language at the University of Birmingham. Her research explores the relationship between language variation and change, style, and identity in contemporary and Early Modern English, with a particular interest in the language of the Tudor Court.

• Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations Part 11. Introduction 11.1 Historical Sociolinguistics1.2 Research Question 11.3 Research Question 21.4 Research Question 32. The Elizabeth I Corpus (QEIC) 3. Methodology 3.1 Macro-level Corpora3.2 Comparative Analysis3.3 Social Factors3.4 Interactive Factors3.5 Stylistic Factors3.6 Systemic Factors3.7 Linguistic FactorsPart 2: Results and Analysis4. Affirmative Do 4.1 Results4.2 Social Factors4.3 Systemic Factors4.4 Interactive Factors4.5 Stylistic Factors4.6 Summary5. Negative Do 5.1 Results5.2 Systemic Factors5.3 Social Factors5.4 Interactive Factors5.5 Stylistic Factors5.6 Summary6. The Replacement of Ye by You 6.1 Results6.2 Social Factors6.3 Stylistic Factors6.4 Interactive and Systemic Factors6.5 Summary7. First- and Second-Person Possessive Determiners 7.1 Results7.2 Social Factors7.3 Stylistic Factors7.4 Interactive Factors7.5 Summary8. Multiple Negation vs. Single Negation 8.1 Results8.2 Systemic Factors8.3 Social Factors8.4 Stylistic Factors8.5 Summary9. Animacy and Relative Marker: who/which 9.1 Results9.2 Systemic Factors9.3 Social Factors9.4 Interactive Factors9.5 Stylistic Factors9.6 Objective case: whom/which9.7 Summary10. Which and The Which 10.1 Results10.2 Social Factors10.3 Systemic Factors10.4 Stylistic Factors10.5 Interactive Factors10.6 Summary11. Superlative Adjectives 11.1 Results11.2 Systemic Factors11.3 Interactive Factors11.4 Stylistic Factors11.5 Double Forms11.6 Results11.7 Stylistic Factors11.8 Summary12. Royal We and Other Pronouns of Self-Reference 12.1 Background12.2 Results12.3 Interactive Factors12.4 Stylistic Factors12.5 Comparison with Other Royal Idiolects12.6 Other Pronouns of Self-Reference12.7 Summary13. Spelling 13.1 Background13.2 Methodology13.3 Results: Spelling Consistency13.4 Diachronic Consistency13.5 Graph Combinations13.6 Final 13.7 and 13.8 Combinations13.9 , and 13.10 and 13.11 and 13.12 and 13.13 Idiosyncrasies and Spelling Reform13.14 SummaryPart 3: Research Questions 14. Research Question 1 14.1 The Gender Question14.2 Summary15. Research Question 2 15.1 Case Study 1: The Seymour Letters15.2 Case Study 2: 1576 Parliamentary Speech15.3 Case Study 3: The CEEC Hoby Letter15.4 Case Study 4: 1597 Prayer15.5 Summary16. Research Question 3 16.1 Idiolects and Idiosyncrasy16.2 Adolescence and Adulthood16.3 Linguistic Leadership16.4 Innovators, Early Adopters and Networks16.5 Explaining Progressiveness: Communities of Practice16.6 Hypercorrection and Linguistic Leadership16.7 Stylistic Variation and Historical Sociolinguistics17. Final Word Part 4: Appendix18. Tabular Data 19. The Queen Elizabeth I Corpus (QEIC) 19.1 Correspondence19.2 Speeches19.3 Translations19.4 Queen Elizabeth I Corpus: Text InformationTextual Sources References

“I recommend this work to scholars specialising in Elizabeth I, regardless of their discipline; historical and present-day sociolinguists working particularly with idiolect research; and those interested in historical spelling variation and historical authorship attribution.”  (Cercles, 1 February 2015)