Universitt zu Kln Philosophische Fakultt Englisches Seminar I

WiSe 2014/15
Hauptseminar: Textlinguistics: Synchronic and diachronic perspectives
Dozent: Prof. Dr. Thomas Kohnen
Referent: Romina Erberich, Alexander Kals

Scientific Writing
1. Scientific Writing
a) General information

no set definition of scientific writing as a text-type or genre: definition depends on

context.

divided into several fields (some are still true today): medicine, mathematics,
astrology, anatomy, technology etc.

Classification of medieval medical material: academic treatises or specialised treatises,

surgical texts, and remedybooks.
b) Historical developments

Periods of the scientific register:

1150-1350: spareness of vernacular texts, gradual struggle for the use of English, lack
of written texts.
1350-1500: first writings, re-emergence of English (as opposed to French), 2 cultural
events which influended this evolution: pritning press 1476 (widespread of texts, new
sources of knowledge), discovery of new world 1492, increase of translations, new
vocabulary through spreading books/literacy.
1500-1640 onwards: vocabulary enlargement and adoption (need for new vocabulary
to name scientific terms and findings), until 18th dual situation Latin - English

1660: Royal Society is founded; 1665: The first exclusively scientific journal, the
Philosophical Transactions are established. The Society undertook a programme to
imporve the language and endorsed short, factual writing without prefaces, apologies,
or rhetorical flourishes.

c) Relevant Concepts

Scientific writing has high prestige, thus it is likely to be imitated and is suitable for
conscious modelling from above.

2. Vernacularisation

a) General information

Late fourteenth century: "vernacularisation boom", writing of all levels and genres
were translated into or composed in English, mainly in the city of London. A similar
vernacularisation process took place in various countries in Europe.

3. Standardisation

Scientific writing resisted standardization longer than other registers

Late Middle English: Standardisation was a selection process of variant forms towards
which scribes tended.

curial style / English of the chancery / centered in London

Taavitsainen finds that many early scientific texts before the national standard are
written in a distinct form similar to the Central Midland Standard which was also used
by Lollard writings. She suspects this was a consciously created language form for
scientific writing, created to ensure the highest comprehensibility. The spread of
CMS reaches a peak at the turn of the 15th century, but wanes afterwards. Possible
explanations include low prestige due its connection to Lollardy.

The English used and promoted by the Royal Society and in the Philosophical
Transactions were highly influential on the standardisation of Modern English.

Publication of dictionaries from the 17th century onwards, culminating in Johnson's

dictionary and the OED, were further steps in the standardisation of English.

4. Language of scientific writing

a) Discourse forms

Graeco-Roman writing provided a standard and influenced the macro- and micro
structure of scientific writing

Most typical form in Late Mediaval and Early Modern scientific writing: discourse is
structured by turntaking between questions and answers, the typical form of
Scholasticism.

The more complicated pattern of questiones (lectio, meditatio, questio) was simplified
in English.

The earliest texts in the corpus do not have a strict pattern. A fixed formula emerges in
the sixteenth century (Guido's Questions, 1579)

Between the 16th and 17th century methodological concerns led to a shift from
scholastic to dialectic methods.

b) Lexical developments

The increase of borrowed terms within medical writing, mainly from Latin, starts in
the 14th century and drops sharply after 1500. This would be earlier than in other
registers.

c) Syntactic and stylistic features

Features of scholasticism: reference to authorities, prescriptive phrases, information =

absolute truth, high degree of (perceived) reliability.
Often direct address to involve the reader

In academic medical writing and surgical treatises, phrases such as it is to note or "it
is to wit" are transferred from Latin ("notandum est", "sciendum est"). Remedy books
do not show these features.

The Royal Society established a certain style of expository writing: its features include
first-person narration, subjective point of view and expressions of low modality.

5. Task
Robert Record, The Pathway to Knowledge, containing the First Principles of
Geometry ... bothe for the use of Instrumentes Geometricall and Astronomicall,
and also for Projection of Plattes (London, 1551)
Here it is to be noted, that in a tria~gle
al the angles bee called (^innera~gles^)
except ani side bee drawenne forth in lengthe,
for then is that fourthe corner caled an
(^vtter corner^) , as in this exa~ple
because A, B, is drawen in length, therfore
the a~gle C, is called an vtter a~gle
And thus haue I done with tria~guled
figures, and nowe foloweth (^quadrangles^) ,
which are figures of iiij. corners
and of iiij. lines also, of whiche there
be diuers kindes, but chiefely
v. that is to say, a (^square
quadrate^) , whose sides bee
all equall, and al the angles
square, as you se here in this
figure Q.

5. Literature

Crespo Garcia, Begona. 2004. "The scientific register in the History of English: a corpusbased study" In: Studia Neophilogica 76: 125-139.
Gramley, Stephan. 2012. The history of English: an Introduction. Oxon: Routledge.
Kohnen, Thmas. 2014. Textbooks in English Language and Linguistics. Introduction to the
History of English. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang GmbH.
Taavitsainen, Irma. 2000. "Science". In: Brown, Peter (ed.). A companion to Chaucer. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers, 378-386.
Taavitsainen, Irma, Patha, Pivi. 2010. "Scientific discourse". In: Taavitsainen, Irma, Jucker,
Andreas (eds.). Historical Pragmatics. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 549-572.
Taavitsainen, Irma. . "Language history and the scientific register". In: PPPPPPP
Taavitsainen, Irma. 2010. "Early English scientific writing: New Corpora, new approaches".
In: Diaz Vera, Javier E., Caballero, Rosario (eds.). Textual Healing: Studies in Medieval
English Medical, Scientific and Technical Texts. Bern: Peter Lang GmbH, 177-206.