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Abstract :This paper mainly discusses the close relationship between social development and the development of Eng2 lish vocabulary , the changes of it s meaning , and the continuous appearance of new English words. As language ,es2 pecially English vocabulary develops ceaselessly with social development , people should take social factors into con2 sideration in their study of English vocabulary so as to achieve accuracy and purification of English language As a kind of international language , English is widely used throughout the world both on significant occasions and in people’ s daily life. According to relative investigation , more than half of the newspapers and scientific editorials are published in English , eighty percent of formation stored in computers is writ ten in English and three fif ths broadcasting stations are using English around the globe. The massive use of English language gives rise to t remendous difference in u2 sing English among diverse regions , which surely expands English vocabulary to a large extent . It is well known that human society has been changing and developing it self incessantly for thousands of years. As the method of human’s expressing and exchanging ideas , the development of English language is tightly related to that of the human society. " From the sociolingustic point of view , we know that changes in pronunciation and grammar are much slower , but changes in vocabulary are much faster. " [1 ] English vocabulary does not change in isolation. On the con2 t rary , it result s f rom the great social influence on such as2 pect s as historical , political , economic , cultural , scientific , psychological etc. In a word , English vocabulary is insepara2 ble f rom social development . First of all , the development of English vocabulary has close connections with the development of English society. The formation of modern English is a long term covering hundreds of years. Broadly speaking , English history is di2 vided into three periods : Old English Period (450 A. D. - 1100A. D. ) , Middle English Period ( 1100A. D. - 1500A. D. ) and Modern English Period (1500A. D. - ) . Probing in2 to the three periods , we may easily notice that English lan2 guage , especially English vocabulary has always been chan2 ging owing to some important historical event s. " The study of the historical development of the English vocabulary should not be t reated separately f rom the growth of the Eng2 lish language it self ," [2 ] instead , it worth meticulous consid2 eration of historical event s , which have brought about far2 reaching impact on English language. During the Anglo2Saxon Period , no other things was much more significant than the int roduction of Christianity into Britain. In 597A. D. , a Roman priest with the name of Augustine began to do missionary work in Britain , therefore Roman culture was t ransferred into Britain. From then on , Latin words had been making their way into the English , many of which were related to religion. Although lot s of them died out one by one , there are still some that survive in present2day English. For example , nun , priest , shrine , temple , martyr , candle , disciple etc. The t ransitional period ———Middle English Period is characterized by st rong influence of French with the Norman Conquest in 1066. Led by William the conqueror , Normans crossed the English Channel , defeated Anglo2Saxons in the Hustin Battle and united the whole Britain in the