On January 29 2011 07:39 Scrimpton wrote: In the same vein I don't think you can compare 100-200 years of American authorship to 1000+ years of Germanic/Anglo Germanic, renaissance and modern English pennings.
This is assuming that American English just appeared as a brand new language with no connection to said tradition of Germanic/Anglo literature and language that had come before. Why do you think we speak English over here? A ton of people from England and Scotland came over here and brought the language, and what we speak today is closer to British English of 1750 than British English today is (see the rise of non-rhotic speech in England after the revolution) You can't say that our ancestors leaving England to come over here means they have no connection to what was written in England before they left, and you have that odd little fact that your spoken language has diverged more than ours since the split. But don't let that get in the way of your superiority complex
On January 29 2011 03:36 ggrrg wrote: I don't see any particular reason why British English should be adopted all over the world. You haven't given one either. On the other hand, a worldwide readjustment to BE would cause complications in all countries involved.
On January 29 2011 00:35 HardCorey wrote: I think that Grammar is considerably more important than spelling. English grammar is very complicated and most people don't even understand the basics and just assume that they are grammatically correct because it, "just sounds right."
The words of a man that hasn't studied any other languages. English grammar is kind of easy in comparison to Romance languages, a piece of cake in comparison to Slavic and Scandinavian languages, and not even comparable to something like Finnish.
Mark Twain: "My philological studies have satisfied me that a gifted person ought to learn English (barring spelling and pronouncing) in thirty hours, French in thirty days, and German in thirty years."
I'm sorry but english grammar is pretty much the #1 reason why so much of the world has trouble learning english
This is not supposed to sound rude, but I'm absolutely certain that you have never learned any foreign language. Grammar rules in English are not only very few but also very simple. First of all there is basically no conjugations in English with "be" being the only exception I can think of of the top of my head and of course the added "s" in 3rd person simple present: simple past: I/you/he/she/it/we/you/they went/played/sang/etc. simple future I: I/you/he/she/it/we/you/they will go/play/sing/etc. And it's the same in all other tenses. In languages like French or German (and many more as a matter of fact) you conjugate differently for every person and for all tenses. There are of course some rules but there are also many irregular verbs, which increases the difficulty by a lot.
In English it's also pretty clear cut when to use every tense (past and future progressive tenses are somewhat tricky but neither are they a necessity to speak fluently nor are they that difficult). In French for example it's a total pain in the ass to figure out, how to utilize tenses properly (especially past tenses and subjonctif).
Another thing that makes English significantly easier than any language in Europe that I'm aware of is the lack of genders. In other languages you have to learn the gender for every single word you know (In French/Spanish/Italian only 2 genders, German/Bulgarian/Russian amongst others even 3 genders).
In the end, the main reason (at least in my eyes, but I'm certain that many people will agree with me) that makes English grammar look like a joke in comparison to a multitude of other languages is the lack of declensions. That's tables upon tables of grammatic rules that you have to learn for all cases in a given language. For example, in German you have 4 cases, in Latin - 5, in Russian - 6, in Finnish - 15. For somebody who's never had to deal with declensions, I guess, it's not even possible to imagine how hard it is to learn all the rules and irregularities related to them. A little anecdote that I believe could help you at least get a glimpse on this problem: I know dozens of people who come from different European countries and have intensely studied German for years in high school. Those people have come to Germany and have been living here for years (many of them study in the same university I do) and not a single one can speak without making any mistakes with declensions because of the insane difficulty they bear.
In my opinion, the main difficulty in the English language is the spelling and the pronunciation, because both lack rules (or at least have too many exceptions). Unlike German or Bulgarian, in English you rarely spell a word the way you pronounce it. The lack of rules for pronunciation also complicates things (e.g. "ea": cleave vs meadow). Another difficulty in English is the extensive use of prepositions after verbs (e.g. come in, come out, come off, come on, come about, come along, come by, etc). This is one of the most difficult things in the English language, and rarely seen in any other language. However, you really don't need to know all of those different forms to speak correctly and fluently.
I am not a native English speaker. In fact, it's only my third language. My mother tongue is Bulgarian. I learned to speak German and English fluently and have studied French, Spanish and Latin. From my experience, I can assure you that the English grammar is by far the easiest one. French and Spanish grammar rules are probably the next ones that follow in difficulty, but still significantly more complicated than English. As far as German and Bulgarian grammar is concerned, I deem it impossible for most people to learn to use it correctly unless they have moved and lived there at age 10-11 or younger.
I've studied arabic and spanish, and a little german and japanese.
Prepositions are grammar, by the way.
And I really don't believe you've studied english extensively. Being a native speaker, and having had to study my own grammar, I can assure you it is very complicated, and rife with rules and exceptions. Verb conjugation in english is varied in almost every word and there are far more examples than just to be as how conjugation changes.
But there is more to grammar than conjugation, and not a lot of it has to do necessarily with how 'complicated' it is, but sometimes just how different it is. Plus. you have the added bonus of being a gamer, which GREATLY increases your learning of basic english.
First of all, I believe I did not express myself clearly about what I meant with the use of "prepositions after verbs". I wasn't talking about the general rules of how to use prepositions, which in fact are grammatical rules (those are rather simple). I had phrasal verbs in mind, which obey no grammatical rules whatsoever (I just realized that some of the examples I gave in my previous post are not phrasal verbs...). Phrasal verbs have to be learned like vocabulary.
As far as my English knowledge is concerned, I believe that it goes vastly beyong being simply "basic English" and I can guarantee you that games do not deserve any credit for that. In my 13 years of taking English classes, I have gone through numerous schoolbooks, which covered English grammar pretty extensively and I'd say I have a pretty good idea about the simplicity of it.
If you really have studied German, there is no way you could possibly claim that its grammar is simpler than the English one. I have absolutely no knowledge about Arabic or Japanese so I cannot comment on them, but in Europe there is no language that has a simpler grammar than English and I have yet to meet a person in my surroundings that has a different opinion.
edit: I just have to edit this in... verb conjugations!? really?. This is the main reason why so many people perceive English as extremely easy. There are basically no conjugations (bar "be" and 3rd person "s"). In every tense for every verb, there is only one conjugation for all numbers and persons. I dare you to prove me wrong.
Having studied spanish for 5 years, living in a country where many people speak spanish, and having a spanish sister in law, A mother who speaks french, and a neighbor who is italian, that the romance languages have easier grammar. The only exception to that is generally future tense in verbs, which is annoying. I don't know why you think they're so complicated.
German is complicated, but only in the sense that there are three genders added, and the rules pertaining to which words applied to which gender vary a lot. I haven't studied german much, but from my experience, that's the only thing that was very convoluted and difficult.
On January 29 2011 07:39 Scrimpton wrote: In the same vein I don't think you can compare 100-200 years of American authorship to 1000+ years of Germanic/Anglo Germanic, renaissance and modern English pennings.
This is assuming that American English just appeared as a brand new language with no connection to said tradition of Germanic/Anglo literature and language that had come before. Why do you think we speak English over here? A ton of people from England and Scotland came over here and brought the language, and what we speak today is closer to British English of 1750 than British English today is (see the rise of non-rhotic speech in England after the revolution) You can't say that our ancestors leaving England to come over here means they have no connection to what was written in England before they left, and you have that odd little fact that your spoken language has diverged more than ours since the split. But don't let that get in the way of your superiority complex
Unfortunately, this is a little ironic, and one of the main complaints of British writers is that American media spends far too much time trying to sound clever by creating/using words that in the rest of the world have become obsolete. (this was a highly notable trend at the start of the last decade, i believe this peaked in 2003-7. Perhaps as a backlash to the image created by George W. )
Unfortunately this "superiority" complex you refer to doesn't exist, rather an inferiority complex on your end, Clinging to the past and hoping to sound smart whilst you teeter ever closer to the edge of acceptable language use.
Fortunately language evolves and moves forwards, we look forward and embrace changes, additions.. it's what makes our language so expressive and enjoyable to explore. Use the past in reference to how things have changed, evolved what has been and what we can enjoy in the future.
So sure, point out that your version of English is somehow "purer" and therefore better, the rest of us will strive towards something we can all understand and appreciate.
Unfortunately I kind of feel rude now, it's as if i gg'd you before you were ready to leave.. alas good friend.. there is always the next thread
Lighten up bro.
(edit if you want to continue this, PM me.. it's getting a little.. off topic from the OP and i doubt i'll be checking back to this thread again.. of course its much more likely for you to not PM me, as you won't gain any critical acclaim and fame for discussing out of the limelight of a crowd)
English has deep problems with its ridiculously random/inconsistent way of spelling. I mean look at something like -ough. Why is -ough pronounced like 10 different ways depending on the word its in?
These are some problems that need to be dealt with. Slight differences in American/British English is no where near as significant.
We need some kind of consistent phonetics instead of this case-by-case stuff.
On January 30 2011 04:57 Befree wrote: English has deep problems with its ridiculously random/inconsistent way of spelling. I mean look at something like -ough. Why is -ough pronounced like 10 different ways depending on the word its in?
These are some problems that need to be dealt with. Slight differences in American/British English is no where near as significant.
We need some kind of consistent phonetics instead of this case-by-case stuff.
The language becomes more and more regular.
The only problem is this happens faster with rare words.
ie the standard past tense is -ed... verbs with an irregular past tense slowly get replaced (slunk->slinked, wed->wedded) but the more commonly the word is used the slower it happens. (was->be'ed or ised will take a million years or so)
Honestly, my main complaint with the language (besides some random spellings that make no sense) is the lack of a gender neutral 3rd person pronoun that still connotes a "human" aspect.
He did this, she did this. Most people ended up using "they" as a replacement (which is not officially "correct"), or using some weird wordings to include "one." You can't refer to people as "it"s or anything like that so it's a real pain to find ways around it.
As long as people can get the message across, I really don't give a fuck. Arguing about which version of English is the best is like arguing over whose religion is best. It's not really worth it.
Sure, a standard English language would be nice, but it's probably too late for that.
Languages evolve as the living things they are, nothing you can do to fight it except accepting the changes.
They even made an study about the changes in the way of speaking of the UK Queen during her christmas messages, the analysis dictated she changed it a lot over time, even when the english spoken in the area around the palace is suposed to be the most correct one
On January 29 2011 00:25 Perscienter wrote: English is the most important lingua franca in the world and it still lacks a coherent spelling and pronunciation. Especially the former needs to be reformed. Since English has been introduced as a second language in so many countries, it often deteriorates in this regions. Then again not even the U.S.-Americans speak Oxford British English. They had to invent their own style for whatever reasons in the first place.
My suggestion is this: adopt the British spelling. U.S.-exclusive vocabulary should be included in the language. Only one English language should be taught in today's schools over the world.
Is it really so difficult to write harbour with a 'u'?
What do you think?
As long as two people speaking (or writing) to each other can understand each other, who cares? I personally am opposed to it limits linguistic variation (and by consequence, a portion of national identity).
There's a similar situation in French. Accents change from region to region (in Canada, probably every 100km the accent changes, and every province has its own linguistic variations). As for the English speakers, I'd be tempted to say that this is less prevalent.
The idea of a «standardized» French language came into play at some point in the past, but in reality it was «Everyone adopt Paris French or else». Obviously it didn't catch on. I mean, for general information, (journalists and that kind of thing) at an international level, people will sometimes use it, (modifying their accent to resemble that found in Paris), but in general, people speak the way they learn to speak. This is all of course at an oral level though.
As for written French, there isn't much disparity. Either a word is correctly written, or it isn't. It's already standardized, at least, to the best of my knowledge.
P.S. American English spelling is actually standard British spelling at the time where they won their War of Independence. Brits are the ones who changed their spelling afterwards.
On January 29 2011 07:39 Scrimpton wrote: In the same vein I don't think you can compare 100-200 years of American authorship to 1000+ years of Germanic/Anglo Germanic, renaissance and modern English pennings.
This is assuming that American English just appeared as a brand new language with no connection to said tradition of Germanic/Anglo literature and language that had come before. Why do you think we speak English over here? A ton of people from England and Scotland came over here and brought the language, and what we speak today is closer to British English of 1750 than British English today is (see the rise of non-rhotic speech in England after the revolution) You can't say that our ancestors leaving England to come over here means they have no connection to what was written in England before they left, and you have that odd little fact that your spoken language has diverged more than ours since the split. But don't let that get in the way of your superiority complex
Unfortunately, this is a little ironic, and one of the main complaints of British writers is that American media spends far too much time trying to sound clever by creating/using words that in the rest of the world have become obsolete. (this was a highly notable trend at the start of the last decade, i believe this peaked in 2003-7. Perhaps as a backlash to the image created by George W. )
Unfortunately this "superiority" complex you refer to doesn't exist, rather an inferiority complex on your end, Clinging to the past and hoping to sound smart whilst you teeter ever closer to the edge of acceptable language use.
Fortunately language evolves and moves forwards, we look forward and embrace changes, additions.. it's what makes our language so expressive and enjoyable to explore. Use the past in reference to how things have changed, evolved what has been and what we can enjoy in the future.
So sure, point out that your version of English is somehow "purer" and therefore better, the rest of us will strive towards something we can all understand and appreciate.
Unfortunately I kind of feel rude now, it's as if i gg'd you before you were ready to leave.. alas good friend.. there is always the next thread
(edit if you want to continue this, PM me.. it's getting a little.. off topic from the OP and i doubt i'll be checking back to this thread again.. of course its much more likely for you to not PM me, as you won't gain any critical acclaim and fame for discussing out of the limelight of a crowd)
Scrimpton, all Mamiya pointed out was that your original assertion:
...America doesn't really have much of a linguistic history in the way that british english does, Poets, play-writes authors.
is wrong. And Mamiya is right. You are wrong. And yeah maybe he was arguing that a little combatatively, but that doesn't make his position incorrect.
See American English has just as much "linguistic history" as British English. In fact, the history of American English and British English from about 500 to 1800 CE are the exact same history. American speakers didn't start from linguistic scratch when they crossed the Pacific, and American poets, playwrights, and authors didn't start from literary scratch either. They were at the same point in the English tradition that their British contemporaries were across the pond.
American English and British English are two branches off the same trunk. If you want to lop off American English and compare British English + trunk to American English + nothing, of course you're going to conclude that British English is richer. But that's a silly thing do to, and it's completely arbitrary.
Take your old friend Beowulf for example. That's an English poem, right? Well, of course. Nevertheless, all the best evidence suggests that the story of Beowulf circulated amongst the Germanic tribes well before the Anglo-Saxon migration to England. Those Angles and Saxons maintained and extended a Germanic tradition even as they made a geographical relocation to England. The linguistic history of German didn't stop once they island-hopped. It persisted.
And America was the same thing. The Americans were just as a legitimate extension of the English tradition as the Anglo-Saxons were of the Germanic. They brought over the language, the literature, the everything. That's just how emigration works.
Not to mention (as I, coincidentally, have already mentioned) American language and literature has seen substantial contributions from almost every single country on the planet. So if you want to get embroiled in some penis-measuring contest about whether modern American English or modern British English have the lengthier "linguistic history" or have a larger cadre of "Poets, play-writes authors" behind them, you really need to consider the fact that American English participates in a great deal more language and language-arts traditions than does British English.
All this to say: it might embarrass you if American English were the lingua franca of the world (which I'm not even sure that it is. I think that's an open question, and I think a great deal of experts would conclude that, in fact, British English is far more widely spread than American English because the Queen's English stayed behind as a remnant of the British Empire). But the only reason that this would embarrass you is that you take an artificially narrow and rather ungenerous view of American English in the first place.
When did the American accent evolve into THE American accent, I mean I always just assumed it evolved from English+Scottish+Irish+native NA's english. Did George Washington have an English accent or was it around that time that the American accent was evolving,
On January 30 2011 08:37 Laids wrote: Maybe this off-topic but I've always wondered :>
When did the American accent evolve into THE American accent, I mean I always just assumed it evolved from English+Scottish+Irish+native NA's english. Did George Washington have an English accent or was it around that time that the American accent was evolving,
I don't really have a problem with irregularities in spelling, the only practical example of how it affects you is when you're writing a comment on youtube. Dissimilar spelling however, isn't the cause of new generation coined phrases and expressions, it's just a natural feature of cultural identity. Almost as insignificant as the "u" in harbour but important nonetheless.
The real thing we should be trying to standardize is the metric measuring system.
On January 30 2011 09:44 Dr. ROCKZO wrote: I don't really have a problem with irregularities in spelling, the only practical example of how it affects you is when you're writing a comment on youtube. Dissimilar spelling however, isn't the cause of new generation coined phrases and expressions, it's just a natural feature of cultural identity. Almost as insignificant as the "u" in harbour but important nonetheless.
The real thing we should be trying to standardize is the metric measuring system.
I will never cook using grams and litres. You'll have to take my pints and ounces out of my cold, dead hands.
I don't get it. I have studied romance languages and have been presented with situations where one thing must be remembered because it is a unique case. Why is this a problem with English? I don't even know if language is something that can be "perfected", since one could just as easily argue that a language devoid of regional colloquialisms is imperfect because it is in fact dead. Until one version of English becomes impossible to understand to another English speaker from another part of the world (excluding accents) then I really don't see the problem.
Edit: The metric system, however, is another story. Not that I'm not fond of my lbs and gallons
On January 30 2011 08:37 Laids wrote: Maybe this off-topic but I've always wondered :>
When did the American accent evolve into THE American accent, I mean I always just assumed it evolved from English+Scottish+Irish+native NA's english. Did George Washington have an English accent or was it around that time that the American accent was evolving,
A lot of guys in this thread (like yours truly) have pointed out that there is no one American accent/dialect/etc., and they're right. That's simplifying things. Accents vary tremendously within cities. Once you get on the scale of states, regions, countries, etc.--you're talking truly massive variation. I mean to the point where some American dialects are basically mutually unintelligible.
And as for when American accents began to diverge from British ones, the answer is that they began to diverge as soon as the Americans and the British parted ways. But the important thing to remember is that [i]all language[i] is always in flux. Change is a constant of language. So it's not like the American just branched off and the British continued unchanged. In reality they both branched off the same stem (and both the branches and the stems were already composed of a huge variety of accents already... it get's complicated to visualize I know. That's why the "family tree" metaphor for language is equal parts helpful concept and total lie).
EPT
