The several factors already discussed as giving stability to English grammar – the printing press, popular education, improvements in travel and communication, - have been particularly effective in the century just passed.

Very few changes in the grammatical forms are to be observed:

a) In colloquial speech there is a certain tendency towards an even further loss of inflections:

– The use of who instead of whom in the function of Object in the interrogative:

e.g. Who do you want to see? (in colloquial speech instead of: Whom do you want to see?

- This tendency is also seen in the fact that the Genitive (the Analytical genitive, in particular) is often replaced by the Implicit Genitive (the meaning of the Genitive is expressed just by word-order).

e.g. Cuts in Government expenditure; The United

Nations Organization; The 20th century

literature; A ten per cent wage increase, etc.

In informal colloquial speech, the tendency to use me, him, her, us, them in emphatic position instead of I, he, she, we, they is even stronger than it was before. One frequently hears sentences like ‘Who’s there? It’s me. / It’s only us.’’ That’s him all right.’ According to S. Robertson, the phenomenon is due to the fact that “the sense of case has become so weakened in Modern English and the force of word order so dominant, that the latter overrides the former. […] The objectives of the personal pronouns have been gaining at the expense of the nominatives, which tend more and more to be used only when they are immediately followed by a predicate.” (1979: 295)

b) Among the major changes in the grammar of English are those concerning the comparison of adjectives. Referring to these, Ch. Barber writes “The tendency has been for more / most to encroach on –er/ -est, and it is now normal to say It’s more common than I thought, and He is the most clever of the three. Among the younger generation, it is even becoming normal to use more/ most with monosyllables, and you hear things like He was more rude than I expected. The trend from –er/ -est, to more/ most is in line with the broad development of English over the last thousand years: it is a change from the synthetic to the analytic, from the use of inflections to the use of grammatical words and word - order.”

c) As far as the verb is concerned, the following tendencies can be mentioned:

1. The process of regularizing strong verbs, which has been going on for centuries, continues to replace ‘irregular’ forms by more ‘regular’ ones. The tendency of strong verbs to develop weak forms is to be seen in such recent formations as thrived (instead of throve, thriven); beseech has two forms in use now: the irregular form besought and the regular one: beseeched (Macmillan: 116).

Newly formed verbs (converted from nouns) have continued to join the weak conjugation.

e.g. to welcome: They welcomed us with open arms.

The announcement will be widely welcomed.

The forms broadcast and broadcasted are to be found side by side in Macmillan dictionary (2002: 170); also forecast and forecasted

2. The Subjunctive Mood is not so extensively used as it was in Old English. The Present Subjunctive has been growing more and more obsolete, surviving only in poetry, high prose and official documents:

It was decided that the meeting be reconvened.

In many cases the Present Subjunctive is replaced by the Present Indicative or by a Subjunctive equivalent (auxiliaries such as should, may, might, would).

It was decided that the meeting should be reconvened.

There is an increasing tendency to replace the Subjunctive form were by the form was in the first and third person singular, on the analogy of all other verbs in which The Past Subjunctive is homonymous with the Past Indicative:

e.g. If I was not ill I should go to the concert. (instead of: If I were not ill…)

I wish I was …(instead of I wish I were …)

What was left of the Subjunctive Mood in occasional use has disappeared except in conditions contrary to fact: If I were you…

3. There is a well-marked tendency to generalize the use of will (in the Future Indicative) and that of would (in the Present Conditional or Future in the Past) in the first person singular and plural, a tendency which is perhaps partly due to American influence.

e.g. I will / shall stay.

If I wanted your help I would / should come to you at once.

4. A wide extension of the use of progressive forms is one of the most important developments of the English verb in the modern period. The chief factor in their growth is the use of the –ing form as a noun governed by the preposition on, e.g. He burst out on laughing - This weakened to

He burst out a-laughing - and finally to He burst out laughing.

In the same way, He was on laughing became He was a-laughing and finally: He was laughing.

Today such forms are used in all tenses (is laughing, will be laughing).

The extension of such forms to the passive (the house is being built) was an even later development. It belongs to the very end of the 18th century. At first, the phrase ‘the house is being built’ for ‘the house is building’ was condemned, being considered “an awkward neologism” (cf. A. Baugh & T. Cable, 1978: 293),

5. A very important tendency in Late Modern English is the extension of Verb - adverb combinations.

An important characteristic of the modern vocabulary is the large number of expressions like set out, put off, bring in, made up of a common verb, often of one syllable combined with an adverb.

Unlike the Middle English Verb - adverb combinations, whose meaning clearly reflected both that of the verb and that of the adverb (e.g. climb up, fall down), many Modern English combinations have a meaning which cannot be derived from that of their component parts.

One of the most interesting features of such combinations in modern times is the large number of figurative and idiomatic senses in which they have come to be used. For example, bring about (cause or accomplish), come round (recover normal state), catch on (comprehend), give out (become exhausted), keep on (continue), hold up (rob), lay off (cease to employ), turn over (surrender), size up (estimate), let up (cease), put up with(tolerate), etc.

It will be noticed that many Verb - adverb combinations are substitutes for single verbs such as comprehend, continue, surrender, etc., of more learned or formal character. They often convey a shade of meaning that cannot be expressed in any other manner and they have greatly increased the flexibility of the English language.

The interesting observation has been made that the vocabulary has thus been pursuing a development similar to that which took place in English grammar at an earlier period and which changed the language from a synthetic to an analytic one (Baugh & Cable, 1978: 338).

c) Certain trends in the use of prepositions have become apparent in the last century and a half. The most important trend refers to the position of the preposition in the sentence. In spite of the protest of many 19th century grammarians, prepositions are more and more frequently placed at the end of sentences in colloquial speech in interrogative sentences and in attributive clauses:

e.g. What are you speaking about?

The man I spoke to / about is a lawyer.

d) In the sphere of syntax there are two important characteristics of Late Modern English:

1. A rather striking phenomenon is the fact that, in the press and, to a certain extent, in colloquial speech, the rules concerning the sequence of tenses are not always observed.

There are certain situations in which, to the speaker’s mind, the main clause does not express the min idea, which – in fact – is to be found in the subordinate clause. Thus, in

He made it plain yesterday that he accepts the agreement.

what is essential is the acceptance of the agreement, and not the fact that it was made plain.

Also, in:

It was not disclosed when the test will be conducted.

the carrying out of the test is far more important than the disclosure of the time at which it will take place. Therefore, the speaker or the writer bears in mind, first and foremost, the main idea, not the tense of the predicate in the main clause. What is essential and significant is not the fact of reporting somebody’s words, but the contents of the latter (E. Iarovici, 1973: 255).

2. Another striking characteristic of the period we are dealing with is the growing importance of word order. It does away with the difficulties caused by the reduction of inflexions, by the rapid development of conversion, and by the concentrated, often elliptical way of expressing ideas both in everyday speech and in the press (especially in headlines).

In conclusion, present-day grammatical trends seem to point to certain new synthetic features such as the frequent formation of compounds, but especially to an accentuation of the analytical character of the English language, and this tendency is expressed first of all by the ever growing importance of word order. There are certain factors which entitle us to speak about the progress achieved by the English language. This is reflected in the formation - by internal means – of many new words, including numerous general and abstract terms which enable the speakers to express even the most complex ideas; the strengthening of the systematic character of the English language; its tendency towards simplification and economy of effort.

Diachronic view of the English grammar system