Late Modern English to Present Day (1700–Present)

The Late Modern English (LModE) period — from approximately 1700 to the present — is characterised by explosive vocabulary growth, the global spread of English through colonialism and technology, intense debates about linguistic authority, and the emergence of multiple national and regional varieties. While the grammatical structure of English has remained relatively stable since 1700, the language's lexicon, social distribution, and global reach have changed beyond recognition.

---

The Age of Codification (18th Century)

The 18th century was the great age of prescriptive codification — the systematic attempt to fix, regulate, and improve the English language through dictionaries and grammars.

Samuel Johnson's Dictionary (1755)

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) published A Dictionary of the English Language in 1755, the most significant English dictionary before the Oxford English Dictionary.

Johnson's dictionary was a landmark for several reasons: