The English Language

[StringJunky]

I thought it might be a good idea to have a thread where people can just pop in a question about any aspect of the English language that puzzles them or just want a quick answer to. The only caveat I would add is that this is an international forum, so we should be mindful and respectful of the differences in convention; American-English and British-English in particular.

Edited April 27, 2012 by StringJunky

[John Cuthber]

I think you may have just annoyed the Scots and Welsh.

[StringJunky]

LOL! I think I'm in the clear because die-hard Scots and Welsh speak Gaelic don't they?

[Sergeant Bilko]

I think that you have just annoyed the Welsh even more, the Welsh language is a Celtic language, Gaelic is Irish and Scottish.

[StringJunky]

I think that you have just annoyed the Welsh even more, the Welsh language is a Celtic language, Gaelic is Irish and Scottish.

 

In my probable ignorance, I have seen the two as synonymous.

[John Cuthber]

The Gaelic languages are also Celtic.

(so are a few others)

 

I think we need to distinguish between what would be called

" English English" (if that were not a bit silly because it's tautology) and

"American English" which is a bit silly because it's fundamentally not American.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigenous_languages_of_the_Americas

 

Meanwhile, back at what might have been the topic.

 

How many of you can confidently read this out loud?

 

I take it you already know

Of tough and bough and cough and dough?

Others may stumble but not you

On hiccough, thorough, slough and through.

Well done! And now you wish perhaps,

To learn of less familiar traps?

 

Beware of heard, a dreadful word

That looks like beard and sounds like bird.

And dead, it's said like bed, not bead-

for goodness' sake don't call it 'deed'!

Watch out for meat and great and threat

(they rhyme with suite and straight and debt).

 

A moth is not a moth in mother,

Nor both in bother, broth, or brother,

And here is not a match for there,

Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,

And then there's doze and rose and lose-

Just look them up- and goose and choose,

And cork and work and card and ward

And font and front and word and sword,

And do and go and thwart and cart-

Come, I've hardly made a start!

A dreadful language? Man alive!

I'd mastered it when I was five.

 

And those are the easy ones which made it into bad poetry.

How would you pronounce Slough and slough?

I think there are 11 different ways to read "ough", but can anyone beat that tally?

[StringJunky]

 

How would you pronounce Slough and slough?

 

Slow, with the -ow as in sow (female pig), which is a UK town and sluff which means to shed something, like skin.

 

It got me thinking John that poem...nice one.

 

I can only find 6 sounds for the suffix -ough: oh, uff, ow, ooh, uh, off. What's the others?

[imatfaal]

Up - JC's poem even included it - hiccough - excuse me. You might also want to look for a large body of water in Northern Ireland for another.

[StringJunky]

Up - JC's poem even included it - hiccough - excuse me. You might also want to look for a large body of water in Northern Ireland for another.

 

Yeah, thanks. Didn't know hiccough can be pronounced 'hiccup' as well...learn summat new every everyday.

 

Lough - it's got a couple of pronunciations.

[JohnB]

American-English

 

Do they speak it there? That last I heard they hadn't used it in years.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wxdCApymG0

[imatfaal]

I love the fact that the epitome of British-English is often depicted through a play written by an Irishman and changed into a musical by a New-Yorker - at least Rex Harrison was English

[Joatmon]

You might like to use punctuation so that this makes a sentence - "James while John had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher".

[ecoli]

A thread for grammar nazis to vent! This is either the best idea ever or the worst.

[Joatmon]

A thread for grammar nazis to vent! This is either the best idea ever or the worst.

I went to 2 grammar stalags when I was a kid. I don't remember armbands with swastikas being part of the school uniform.

 

 

 

[tomgwyther]

A thread for grammar nazis to vent! This is either the best idea ever or the worst.

Quite possibly the best. I suppose it depends on whether or not you're a grammar Nazi.

Shouldn't the clauses of 'Best idea' and 'Worst' be separated with a semi colon?

 

To go slightly off topic, why do so many English actors put on American accents in Television and film? The same can't really be said of American actors emulation English accents on the screen.

e.g.

 

Hugh Laurie as Dr. House in 'House'.

Damien Lewis as Sgt Brody in 'Homeland'.

Lee Evens played an American in 'Something about Mary'.

Miranda Richardson plays Katherine Rhomur in the TV series 'Rubicon'

Marina Sirtis as Dinna troi in 'Star trek the next generation'.

Gillian Anderson as Scully in the 'X-Files' (Although born in Chicago, she grew up in London with English and Irish parents and a British accent)

Eddie Izzard as Wayne Malloy in 'The riches'.

Dominic west as Jimmy McNulty in 'The wire'.

Ian McShane as Al Swearengen in 'Deawood' (I think i saw him in 'Dallas' too)

 

There are probably more.

So what is it about English actors which makes them play American characters better than Americans do?

[John Cuthber]

BTW, would someone like to explain to the scriptwriter/ librettist in that video clip that it should say "By rights she should be taken out and hanged"

[Ophiolite]

LOL! I think I'm in the clear because die-hard Scots and Welsh speak Gaelic don't they?

Gaelic is the language of the Highlander. The Lowlander speaks Lallan Scots, or Braid Scots, or the Doric, an Anglo-Saxon dialect of Germanic origin and arguably a language distinct from English. Being intellectually superior to the rest, Scots are equally fluent in their mither tongue and in English. The Welsh, in contrast, are good at rugby and shag sheep.

[michel123456]

Is English the language of Eng people? and England the land of Eng people?

Isn't it the language of people from Angelland (or Angleland), the land of Angle people, like in Angleterre in French, with an "A" instead of "E", as in Anglican church (and not Englican?)

 

When did the A mutate in E ? (with a different pronunciation?)

[StringJunky]

Is English the language of Eng people? and England the land of Eng people?

Isn't it the language of people from Angelland (or Angleland), the land of Angle people, like in Angleterre in French, with an "A" instead of "E", as in Anglican church (and not Englican?)

 

When did the A mutate in E ? (with a different pronunciation?)

 

The name "England" is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means "land of the Angles".[15] The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages. The Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea.[16] According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the first known use of "England" to refer to the southern part of the island of Great Britain occurs in 897, and its modern spelling was first used in 1538.[17]

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/England

[iNow]

Gaelic is the language of the Highlander.

There can be only one!

[michel123456]

The name "England" is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means "land of the Angles".[15] The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages. The Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea.[16] According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the first known use of "England" to refer to the southern part of the island of Great Britain occurs in 897, and its modern spelling was first used in 1538.[17]

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/England

 

bolded mine.

 

So the A changed in E circa 1538?

That is 46 years after the discovery of America? (1492)

[StringJunky]

Gaelic is the language of the Highlander. The Lowlander speaks Lallan Scots, or Braid Scots, or the Doric, an Anglo-Saxon dialect of Germanic origin and arguably a language distinct from English. Being intellectually superior to the rest, Scots are equally fluent in their mither tongue and in English. The Welsh, in contrast, are good at rugby and shag sheep.

 

Note: In their mother-tongue and English....we sassenachs don't need to learn Gaelic.

 

Seriously, English is a massively 'mongrel' language, evolved from and still evolving to incorporate language elements from all over the world. There must be something in this flexibility that makes it a good candidate as a global language. Are there other languages with such diverse roots?

 

I find it ironic that because we were militarily overwhelmed, raped and pillaged by so many nations throughout history, we have integrated and consolidated the genes of many nations to be the strong force that we are now...how's that for evolution by natural selection.

[Ophiolite]

Scots are equally fluent in their mither tongue and in English.

 

While stylistically non-standard the repetition of in gives the phrase more oratorical power. As Winston Churchill said of prepositions at the end of sentences, "It is something up with which I shall not put."

[CaptainPanic]

Isn't it the language of people from Angelland (or Angleland), the land of Angle people, like in Angleterre in French, with an "A" instead of "E", as in Anglican church (and not Englican?)

 

When did the A mutate in E ? (with a different pronunciation?)

Probably around the same time as Londinium became London in the English language, and Londres in the French, Spanish and Catalan, Londen in the Dutch and Frisian language, Llundain in Welsh, either Lunnon or Lunnainn for the Scots, and Londain for the Irish. In Finland it's called Lontoo and on Corsica they call it Londra and so do the Romanians. In Czech it's Londýn and in Polish it is Londyn.

 

It seems a minority of the Europeans agree with the English on the spelling of the name of their capital: Germans, Swedish, Norwegians and Danish seem to agree ... but I have to admit that I didn't check all languages (official and unofficial).

 

In Old English it was spelled Lunden, and while that looks quite different, we must note that the pronunciation has hardly changed, although that may be a surprise to the Americans.

 

So, while that is in no way an answer to the question, it shows at least that it is quite common to totally ruin the names of capitals and countries in other languages. And no, I'm not even a native speaker, and feel free to shoot me down on anything I just wrote.

[JohnB]

Seriously, English is a massively 'mongrel' language, evolved from and still evolving to incorporate language elements from all over the world. There must be something in this flexibility that makes it a good candidate as a global language. Are there other languages with such diverse roots?

 

The best description I've ever read is this: "English is not a language that borrows from other languages. English follows other languages down dark alleys, hits them over the head and riffles their pockets for loose grammar".

 

I have no idea who said it, but it is so true.