Speaker was Prof, Tony Lodge who spoke about the standardisation of languages. This proved to be an extremely interesting talk about the emergence of ‘standard’ languages from the many localised dialects that existed historically and that were only locally understood. 

A standard language is defined as a variety of language recognised by the whole community as the norm - the yardstick for speaking and writing.

Tony covered the romance languages in Europe - the ‘modern Latin’ and the  standardisation of French and of English. We were taken through the academic understanding of the process of selection - elaboration - codification and acceptance. And with a timeline from the  1st century Roman Empire, 6th century dark ages, 9th century middle ages, 16th century renaissance and 19th century industrialisation.

In France we heard of the patchwork of dialects that existed, with few people able to understand Latin - the ‘High’ language of church, government and learned society. From the ‘Low’ language of everyday speech, the dialect of Paris emerged as a standard, but taking some 400 years for French to fully diverge from Latin - and with no written French until the 12th century.

The talk also linked the standardisation of language with the development of literacy in societies and the profound changes that took place - the setting down of rules, the creation of dictionaries, the grammar books and the - modern - emergence of literacy.

A most interesting talk and an appreciative vote of thanks was proposed by Ann Connell.