PRESENT PROBLEMS IN THE STUDY OF THE ENGLISH 



LANGUAGE 



BY GEOEGE LYMAN KITTREDGE 

 (Professor of English in Harvard University) 



MY theme is Present Problems with regard to the English Lan- 

 guage. I did not choose this theme myself, nor was it, I suppose, 

 assigned me by a committee of philologists or linguistic students. 

 Indeed, it is manifestly not altogether appropriate to the nature of 

 the general subject, to the character of the material with which one 

 deals in linguistic investigations, or to the present state of science in 

 the department of learning which we are met to discuss. In natural 

 science, in philosophy, in social questions, the specialist may no doubt 

 survey the field at any given moment and pronounce categorically 

 that this or that question (or group of questions) presses with peculiar 

 insistence for solution, and that when the solution is arrived at, it 

 will point the way to large discoveries, or. to momentous advances in 

 knowledge or enlightenment. In the investigation of a particular 

 language, however, the case is different. There are problems enough, 

 no doubt, and difficult problems; but who shall venture to say that 

 we are now grappling with principles or theories on which depends 

 either the whole future of our science or the amelioration of the 

 human race? 



Pray do not misunderstand me. It is by no means my -purpose to 

 criticise adversely the managers of this intellectual enterprise. Nor 

 do I intend to belittle the subject which calls us together, and to the 

 study of which we are, each in his own way, so ardently devoted. 

 Least of all would I be taken to mean that there is nothing to talk 

 about. As I have already suggested, we have problems in abundance, 

 an abundance, indeed, which is fairly embarrassing. All I desire is 

 to account for the omissions which you will severally detect in my 

 discussion this afternoon. It is not to be expected that any brief 

 treatment of so complicated a business should not overlook or ignore 

 the pet puzzle of many an individual among this audience. For we are 

 very multifarious in our interests. Look into your hearts, gentlemen, 

 and judge. Some of us are worrying over "w-umlaut"; others pass 

 sleepless nights in meditating on the Kenticisms in Chaucer; to 

 not a few the dog's letter, the snarling littera canina of the old 

 grammarians, is a perpetual stimulus or an ever-puncturing thorn 

 in the flesh. A select number find their refreshment (or dissipation) 

 in unriddling runic puzzles. Others the Middle English dative charms 



