Language reform is a type of language planning by massive change to a language. The usual tools of language reform are simplification and purification. Simplification makes the language easier to use by regularizing vocabulary and grammar. Purification makes the language conform to a version of the language perceived as 'purer'.
Note that language reforms occur at a punctual point in time; this article does not discuss changes in languages that took place over several centuries, such as the Great Vowel Shift.
Read more about Language Reform: Simplification, Purification, Examples, Instances in Popular Culture
Famous quotes containing the words language and/or reform:
“If when a businessman speaks of minority employment, or air pollution, or poverty, he speaks in the language of a certified public accountant analyzing a corporate balance sheet, who is to know that he understands the human problems behind the statistical ones? If the businessman would stop talking like a computer printout or a page from the corporate annual report, other people would stop thinking he had a cash register for a heart. It is as simple as that—but that isn’t simple.”
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