she is a professor of language and communication and was born in 1938. her book 'language change: progress or decay' explored how language change is happening and whether it is a positive or negative thing. she describes language change using three metaphors:
- the damp spoon
- the crumbling castle
- the infectious disease
The infectious disease:
This model suggests the idea that we catch language from one another. She believes that language spreads through social contact and people pick up some language from others and apply it to their own speech. this model has a descriptive approach as it is not perceived as negative.
The damp spoon:
jean aitchison described language change as a damp spoon because she found it distasteful when seeing a damp spoon dipped in a sugar bowl due to peoples laziness not to find another spoon to use. she found that this metaphor describes language change as she perceives language change as being lazy.
The crumbling castle:
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