[PW] Re: Hypothetical cultural divergence

[Timothy PWEE]

Note that I qualified my argument as being limited for the purposes of
writing a novel. The change in English (Englishes?) caused by the French
influence does make English a bad case for language drift but does set a
lower limit for how long it takes. The upper limit would be 8,000 years if
the Malayo-Polynesian langagues are any indicator.

You can try William Croft's book Explaining Language Change but it might be
a bit theoretical.  David Crystal's How Language Works (my place doesn't
have a copy) may have something too.

Slow

PS One thing which I'm now curious about: can the Irish understand the
Welsh?