Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
2017
Publication Title
The Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain
Pages
912-925
Publisher Name
John Wiley & Sons
Publisher Location
Hoboken, NJ
Abstract
Grammar and rhetoric were the disciplines charged with teaching correct and effective use of language in antiquity. In the Middle Ages, these disciplines served to maintain Latin as a language of culture, religion, and administration over much of Europe. Grammatical studies flourished in medieval England following the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. Subsequent developments in grammatical and rhetorical studies in Britain in the Middle Ages track deep changes in the social conditioning of literacy and social demands upon literacy. Among the medieval English innovations in these disciplines were the teaching of Latin as a foreign language, the cultural accommodation of grammar and rhetoric to Christianity, the creation of new genres of rhetorical textbooks, and the development of bilingual pedagogies that paired Latin with vernacular languages.
Identifier
978-1-118-39698-8
Recommended Citation
Ian Cornelius, “Grammars and Rhetorics,” in The Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain, ed. Siân Echard and Richard Rouse (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2017), 912–25.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Copyright Statement
© 2017 John Wiley and Sons.
Included in
Classical Literature and Philology Commons, English Language and Literature Commons, Medieval Studies Commons, Reading and Language Commons
Comments
Author Posting. © 2017, John Wiley and Sons. It is posted here by permission of Wiley and Sons for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in The Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+Encyclopedia+of+Medieval+Literature+in+Britain%2C+4+Volume+Set-p-9781118396988