Description: Paris became the largest city in the Western world during the thirteenth century, and has remained influential ever since. This book examines the interlinked history of Parisian speech and the Parisian population through various phases of immigration, dialect-mixing and social stratification from the Middle Ages to the present. It reveals how new urban modes of speech developed during periods of expansion, how the city's elites sought to distinguish their language from that of the masses, and how a working-class vernacular eventually emerged with its own "slang" vocabulary.
Brief description: R. Anthony Lodge is Professor of French Language and Linguistics at the University of St Andrews. He is the author of Le Livre des Manières d'Etienne de Fougères (1979), Le Plus Ancien Registre de comptes des Consuls de Montferrand (1985), French: From Dialect to Standard (1993), Exploring the French Language (With N. Armstrong, Y. Ellis and J. Shelton, 1997) and The Earliest Branches of the Roman de Renart (With K. Varty, 2001).
Review Quotes: "Lodge is well qualified to chart the development of Parisian French over the course of eight centuries...he marshals a convincing array of sources and theoretical models...this accessible study presents a broad tableau, highlighting the interaction of language, social structures, and economic trends, and combining carefully chosen sample texts with stimulating critical reflection." J.R. Iverson, Whitman College, Choice