CAUSES OF LANGUAGE CHANGE , NATURAL TENDENCIES AND THERAPEUTIC CHANGES

CAUSES OF LANGUAGE CHANGE
Here is no more reason for language to change than for jacket to have three buttons one year and two the next, asserted one well-known linguistics, arguing that all change is due to accidental, social factors. This viewpoint cannot be correct, for two reasons, first similar changes recur the world over. There are certain tendencies inherent in languages, which possibly get triggered by social factors, but which are there waiting in the wings as it were, for something to set them off as with an avalanche: a lone skier who disturbed the snow was perhaps the immediate trigger, but there were deeper underlying causes which already existed, before that skier arrived.
Furthermore, language patterning never breaks down. This is the second reason why changes cannot be simply accidental. The patterns within language enable the mind to handle large amounts of linguistic information without strain. If change was random, the organization would collapse.
NATURAL TENDENCIES
There are numerous natural tendencies, and some of them are stronger than others. They can be triggered by social factors, or may be held at bay for centuries, perhaps held in check by other opposing tendencies.
A widespread tendency is for the ends of words to disappear in cases where this has largely occurred already, as in the Polynesian languages, Italian, and French, many English speakers claim the language ‘sounds beautiful’, ‘has flowing sounds’. But when it begins to happen to our own language, and people leave [t] off the end of words such as as hot, what, and replace it with a ‘glottal stop’- a closure at the back of the vocal tract with no actual sound emitted-then many people get upset, and talk about ‘sloppiness’, and ‘disgraceful swallowing of sounds’.
Not all tendencies are major, noticeable ones. Others can be minor, affecting only one sound in a particular position: the sound [e] tends to become [i] before [ƞ], so England is now pronounced as if it were spelled ‘Ingland’. A [b] tends to be inserted between [m] and [l], so the word bramble is from an earlier bremel. And so on.
THERAPEUTIC CHANGES
Therapeutic changes restore patterns which have been damaged by previous changes. A number of examples of this are provided by the use of analogy, the ability to reason from parallel cases, which is a fundamental feature of human language.
In language change, analogy tends to restore similar forms to items which have become separated by sound changes. For example, changes in the vowel system resulted in the separation of the adjective old from it comparative from elder.