English revolution sweeping the world
Jukka Aho
2015, researchers say."
<http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?story=591193>
--
znark
Jukka Aho
As no-one has commented on this yet, I will do it myself:
Given the high number of people who now speak, and according to that
article, _will_ speak English as their second language in the future,
would this surge of new speakers finally call for establishing some sort
of "standardized", international form of English?
(Note that I do _not_ mean a "standardized" form of English for those
who speak English as their _native language_ but rather for those who do
not even _live_ in an English-speaking country, and still need to learn
English for communicating with other people [many of those being people
who do not necessarily speak English as their first language, either.])
This kind of standardization would, of course, require founding an
internationally recognized authoritative linguistic entity - akin to the
French Academy - that would look after this "international" version of
English. Since various English-speaking countries (and the
English-speakers in those countries) have agreed not to agree about
things like spelling or pronunciation, this kind of organization would
have to work independently of any similar national bodies.
Naturally all this would be a massive undertaking, and not easily
achievable. However, keeping in mind what the above-linked article
suggests, the number of people who would possibly be using the services
of such an organization in the future is quite massive, too. (The idea
of having a standardized, international, normative form of English is
probably very old and already discussed to death, so I am not saying
there would be anything particularly new to it as such, but the
above-linked article gives it some new _statistical_ backing, which at
least I find personally interesting.)
--
znark
Django Cat
wrote:
>Jukka Aho wrote:
>
>> "Half the world's population will be speaking or learning English by
>> 2015, researchers say."
>>
>> <http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?
>> story=591193>
>
>As no-one has commented on this yet, I will do it myself:
>
>Given the high number of people who now speak, and according to that
>article, _will_ speak English as their second language in the future,
>would this surge of new speakers finally call for establishing some sort
>of "standardized", international form of English?
>
No.
Jukka Aho
>>> "Half the world's population will be speaking or learning English by
>>> 2015, researchers say."
>>>
>>> <http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?
>>> story=591193>
>> As no-one has commented on this yet, I will do it myself:
>>
>> Given the high number of people who now speak, and according to that
>> article, _will_ speak English as their second language in the future,
>> would this surge of new speakers finally call for establishing some
>> sort of "standardized", international form of English?
> No.
Why not? As of now, those who want to learn to speak English as their
second language - as a communication tool, not necessarily as anything
they would use for emotionally or culturally bonding themselves to any
particular English-speaking country - will have to learn several
variations of it, none of which is _the_ English language (for them.)
Native speakers can always use the form of English they grew up with. I,
as a non-native speaker, do not have that luxury. I can never be too
sure about whether I should stick to the American spelling and
vocabulary or the British one (I would include other countries and their
native forms of English on the list as well but these two are the ones I
am most familiar with.) I often alternate between the two as well as I
can, depending on the audience, but on international forums such as this
newsgroup it is hard to make your mind about it. I don't have any
clearly-defined preference for one form over the other, but it would be
much easier if there _was_ a neutral ground, standardized, international
form of the English language I could relate to without necessarily
having to choose any single country and their native form of English.
--
znark
Torkel Franzen
> I can never be too
> sure about whether I should stick to the American spelling and
> vocabulary or the British one (I would include other countries and their
> native forms of English on the list as well but these two are the ones I
> am most familiar with.)
It doesn't matter in the least whether you use a consistent spelling,
pronunciation, or vocabulary in using English "as a communication
tool, not necessarily ... for emotionally or culturally bonding
[yourself] to any particular English-speaking country." If you want
guidelines, just use whatever version of spelling and pronunciation
you were taught in school.
Harvey Van Sickle
> Jukka Aho wrote:
>
>> "Half the world's population will be speaking or learning English
>> by 2015, researchers say."
>>
>> <http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?
>> story=591193>
>
> As no-one has commented on this yet, I will do it myself:
>
> Given the high number of people who now speak, and according to
> that article, _will_ speak English as their second language in the
> future, would this surge of new speakers finally call for
> establishing some sort of "standardized", international form of
> English?
-snip-
> This kind of standardization would, of course, require founding an
> internationally recognized authoritative linguistic entity - akin
> to the French Academy - that would look after this "international"
> version of English.
I don't see the "of course" aspect of this at all.
A de facto standardised form of English -- used by and between second-
language speakers and writers -- could not only develop on its own but
probably *will* develop on its own. I suspect if a "standardising
body" does eventually appear it will simply grow out of some existing
UN or EU standards agency, and would not involve a dedicated linguistic
entity.
--
Cheers, Harvey
Ottawa/Toronto/Edmonton for 30 years;
Southern England for the past 22 years.
(for e-mail, change harvey.news to harvey.van)
Jukka Aho
> If you want guidelines, just use whatever version of spelling
> and pronunciation you were taught in school.
Well, that doesn't work for long, does it? Language changes over time
and new words and usages keep creeping in. My old schoolbooks stay the
same. If I did what you suggest, I would _have_ to start following the
practices of only a single country. I am not sure if I would like to
impersonate, say, an English chap all the time (not that there would be
anything wrong about being one :). I'd rather speak and write English
that does not directly connect me to any particular English-speaking
country. In some sense I probably already do, but you know what I mean.
--
znark
Torkel Franzen
> Well, that doesn't work for long, does it? Language changes over time
> and new words and usages keep creeping in.
Sure, but that doesn't affect spelling and pronunciation. If you
want constant information about what vocabulary to use, there isn't
any to be had, no matter what variety of English we are talking about.
> I'd rather speak and write English
> that does not directly connect me to any particular English-speaking
> country. In some sense I probably already do, but you know what I mean.
It makes no difference whether you use a pronunciation based on
"standard American English" or a pronunciation based on "standard
British English", unless you are particularly good at imitating sounds
and wish to avoid being taken for a Brit or an American. If you were
to adopt a skillful imitation of "standard Indian English", that might
draw some attention.
Donna Richoux
I can see how you might puzzle over this. However, I suspect none of the
rest of us keep track of whether you are mixing American and British
style choices. We're used to both, here. The reader's perspective is
different; the writer has to make active choices, but the reader just
passively accepts, up to the point of not understanding something.
(What we've noticed over the years is how awfully good Finnish English
is. I'm sure you know this already.)
>I don't have any
> clearly-defined preference for one form over the other, but it would be
> much easier if there _was_ a neutral ground, standardized, international
> form of the English language I could relate to without necessarily
> having to choose any single country and their native form of English.
So if some unspecified people working for some unspecified reason,
funded from unspecified sources, put a whale of a lot of time and energy
into forming an international organization that is supposed to resolve
thousands of conflicting uses and to somehow ensure that their
recommended replacements would be used around the globe -- this would
make your *own* life easier? Because you wouldn't have to worry about
whether you looked foolish, mixing styles?
Oakily-doakily. I'll put it on the wish list, somewhere below finishing
metric conversion and getting everyone to drive on the same side of the
road. And way below the ending of flood, fire, famine, and pestilence.
I think it will be interesting to see in three or four decades (if I'm
around to see it) how the nature of English will change as more people
adopt it. However, my trust is in the usual mechanics of language use
and change and not in international regulatory bodies.
I suspect that by a few years from now, you'll have outgrown your own
concern about mixing British and American styles. Perhaps your
schoolteachers made an undue fuss over it, trying to get you to follow
one and forsake the other? They may have cared, and maybe there are jobs
where it truly matters, but the Internet world doesn't care.
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Jukka Aho
> this [standardized normative form of "international English"] would
> make your *own* life easier?
Not only mine, but the lives of all of us who speak and write English as
a second(or third, or whatever) language. The whole point was to relate
this all to the ever-growing number of non-native speakers, as suggested
by the article to which I linked in my original post.
> Because you wouldn't have to worry about whether you looked foolish,
> mixing styles? [...] I suspect that by a few years from now, you'll
> have outgrown your own concern about mixing British and American
> styles.
No, this is not what I meant at all. I have little or no concern about
mixing styles myself, although I try to avoid that. What I have a
problem with is associating myself closely with _one English-speaking
country and culture only_, by choosing a particular existing national
style and following it methodically (as was already suggested), instead
of being able to stay on a neutral ground where I wouldn't write in
either "British style" or "American style" but in "international style"
which would be regulated and consistently maintained by some
international organization founded for this very purpose.
It's the same old "universal language" idea again, just based on an
existing language (which, according to those news reports, is
significantly gaining in popularity as a second language.)
--
znark
Mike Lyle
As Donna said or implied, it's happening already, without the need
for regulation (we just don't do regulation; though we certainly do
argument). And in any case, formal US English and formal BrEtc
English don't differ very much: often not even an expert could tell
which was which. If you don't know our nationalities already, it
might be fun to try placing the next few neutral-topic AUE messages
you read.
Mike.
Larry G
The problem is that you need a neutral universal language to make it work.
If you replace, English with say, French, you'll see what I mean.
Imagine an "Académie française internationale" that regulates the use of
"German French" or "South African French" and imagine the reaction of French
or Canadian people, and maybe you'd understand, hehe, especially if the goal
is to merge the various varieties.
Besides, as Mike has pointed out, the standard varieties of written English
are much more similar than the various dialects of Dutch or German, for
example.
If the goal is to write in an international standard, go with British. It's
where the language was born, and it is spoken by several hundred
Commonwealth countries around the globe. Standard written American English
is the result of English as it was spoken in the 17th century, and reforms
by Noah Webster. And, I say this as an American BTW.
The differences are miniscule (at least in written form), so it's really not
an issue. Many people switch registers, even I do it. I prefer a double "LL"
in many words like "travelled", where the majority of Americans write it
"traveled", etc.
Even if you standardize the international varieties of English, they will
diverge, as did Latin into French, Spanish, Italian, and their dialects,
etc.
There is indeed an evolving "European English" as its speakers will often
use Latinate words that have long since died out in British or American
English in common use, but an international academy for it? I don't know.
Let's get national academies going first. ;-)
Larry
Jukka Aho
> The problem is that you need a neutral universal language to make
> it work. If you replace, English with say, French, you'll see what I
> mean.
>
> Imagine an "Académie française internationale" that regulates the use
> of "German French" or "South African French" and imagine the reaction
> of French or Canadian people, and maybe you'd understand, hehe,
> especially if the goal is to merge the various varieties.
Note that what we are talking here is a body that would regulate and
standardize the use of English _for those who learn it as a second
language in a foreign country_, not for those who speak it as the first
language in a predominantly English-speaking country.
Also note that the affected people would only be those who neither
currently live in nor have any plans for moving in to an
English-speaking country. (If someone later does, good for him, but then
he will naturally adapt to using the local variety of English spoken in
that country, and after having fallen into that category, that person is
no longer the concern of this suggested hypotethical, authoritative,
international "academy".)
Keeping this in mind, the ultimate goal wouldn't be unifying all
English-speakers. It would only be unifying the use of English language
for those who do _not_ speak it as their first language, and do _not_
live in an English-speaking country.
> Even if you standardize the international varieties of English, they
> will diverge, as did Latin into French, Spanish, Italian, and their
> dialects, etc.
But isn't this a bit different from what is suggested above? People who
live in France, Spain, Italy etc. speak French, Spanish, Italian etc. as
their _first_ language. What I have been talking about only concerns the
use of English as a _second_ language (an auxiliary language, if you
will; for handling things like international communications, tourism,
international trade etc.) in a non-English-speaking country.
* * *
On a related note (elaborating a bit on the "auxiliary language" idea by
telling a practical example), consider this:
Finland is officially a bi-lingual country, much like Canada. The
official languages here are Finnish and Swedish. Every citizen has the
right to be served in either Finnish or Swedish when dealing with the
local or national authorities - for example, the police or the tax
authority. The laws are written in both Finnish and Swedish, and if you
get elected as a member of the Parliament you may give all your speeches
in either Finnish or Swedish. All school kids must take a certain number
of classes in the "other" language as a part of their compulsory basic
education. If you want to get an academic degree, you have to pass a
language test in the other language as part of your studies.
Given all this bi-lingualism, would you think that as the result of it,
most Finnish-speaking Finns are fluent in Swedish, too?
No, they're not.
Sadly, if a Finnish-speaking kid and a Swedish-speaking kid make friends
with one another, they are likely to communicate in English!
Similarly, if a Finnish-speaking Finn takes a ferry to Stockholm over
the Gulf of Bothnia, to go shopping, will he speak Swedish there? No,
he'll speak English!
What about business co-operation between Finland and Sweden: for example
companies like TeliaSonera (a merger of two former state telco
monopolies), or Nordea (a merger of several banks in three Nordic
countries)? You guessed it! The official company language is now English
(they originally tried to get by with Swedish, but that didn't work
out.)
OK, of course there are still those who are fluent in the "other"
language as well and have had a genuine interest in learning it to the
best of their abilities (and a generation or two back it was fairly
common, too) but these days it seems most of the younger people -
especially Finnish-speaking Finns - just do not bother with that any
longer; they only learn as much Swedish as is needed for passing the
tests and then forget it all, or at least never actively use and
practice their Swedish skills again, letting them get in a very rusty
state indeed. ´
English, German, and, to a lesser extent, French, are all popular
languages amongst school kids; the compulsory classes of the "other"
language usually aren't. (School kids have to take classes in at least
three languages. Finnish and Swedish are compulsory, and you really do
not get to choose anything about them, but the most popular choice for
the third one is, by far, English.)
Do you see where I'm getting at here? I'm living in a (supposedly)
non-English-speaking country, surrounded by other (supposedly)
non-English-speaking countries, the culturally closest neighbor of ours
uses a language we should (supposedly) have learned at school, so there
should be no problem using Swedish with them - and yet some of our
mutual merged companies do all their business internally in English (at
least if there is a single non-Finnish speaker attending the meeting),
write their internal papers and memos in English, and our kids/teens
even speak English to some of their other fellow countrymen. When I get
on to do my Master's Thesis, there is a fair chance I will have to write
it for one of these companies that use English as their company
language.
I'm not worried about the fate of my own language - I think Finnish is
going strong, is large enough to survive, and for the forseeable future,
English will only stay as an auxiliary second language here. However,
English has somehow changed its status and nature: you used to take
English classes with the primary intent of being able to communicate
with the native speakers (by snail mail etc.), or of being able to
travel to (or live in) English-speaking countries. Now you take English
classes because some parts of our _own_ lives (not forgetting the
tremendous effect the WWW and the Internet in general have had) require
that, right here, even if there would be no single native English
speaker in the whole country.
> There is indeed an evolving "European English" as its speakers will
> often use Latinate words that have long since died out in British or
> American English in common use, but an international academy for it?
Sounds interesting. Would you happen to have any examples of that?
(I'll stop here for now. I may comment on some of the other parts of
your posting later.)
--
znark
Raymond S. Wise
news:321bptF...@individual.net...
[...]
> Even if you standardize the international varieties of English, they will
> diverge, as did Latin into French, Spanish, Italian, and their dialects,
> etc.
Linguist Mario Pei was of the opinion that a modern international language
would *not* form dialects, because of the existence of modern communications
devices such as radio, television, and such devices as the record player,
when he wrote, and the personal computer with access to the Internet
nowadays. I'm inclined to agree with him. For one thing, Esperanto has been
around for more than a hundred years, and I see no evidence that it has
developed regional dialects.
--
Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
E-mail: mplsray @ yahoo . com
Jim Ward
wrote:
>Given the high number of people who now speak, and according to that
>article, _will_ speak English as their second language in the future,
>would this surge of new speakers finally call for establishing some sort
>of "standardized", international form of English?
I suspect standardized English would be as popular as standardized
cooking.
Larry G
> Linguist Mario Pei was of the opinion that a modern international language
> would *not* form dialects, because of the existence of modern
communications
> devices such as radio, television, and such devices as the record player,
> when he wrote, and the personal computer with access to the Internet
> nowadays. I'm inclined to agree with him. For one thing, Esperanto has
been
> around for more than a hundred years, and I see no evidence that it has
> developed regional dialects.
Well, I will have to respectfully disagree to a point. Here is one usenet
post to the contrary with regard to Esperanto, via old-school Google Groups
on its South African service:
http://groups.google.co.za/groups?selm=3A05DE48.7CBE273B%40mail.utexas.edu&o
utput=gplain
It mentions a "riista Esperanto". There are also three variants of writing
it for diacritical purposes on a computer. Not sure if this is the same as
"riista" or not. Haven't looked into it.
There are also the various reform movements such as "Ido". Now that begs the
question as to whether this is a different language or not like between
English and Scots, or American and British English, Brazilian or European
Portuguese, or Dutch and Afrikaans, etc.
That is a gray area. I've also read reports that while the general language
remains the same among second-language speakers, among their children,
"native speakers" raised in homes where Esperanto is spoken, that certain
dialects have emerged.
However, it is true that as media advances such as the internet, TV, etc.
that this threatens dialects. For example, in the cities where Southern
American English is spoken, that accent and associated dialect is fastly
disappearing into standard American, northern/midwestern-style English.
However, the internet has also developed its own dialect of English, even
though most dispise it: R U following me, LOL? <g> ;-)
In addition, I don't see AAVE/Ebonics disappearing anytime soon or many
other varieties of English. In fact in the modern age, I think it is a very
positive time for threatened languages/dialects to have a world forum, where
they did not previously.
So, I disagree for the most part, but I do see your point as well.
Larry
Raymond S. Wise
> "Raymond S. Wise" <mplsra...@gbronline.com> wrote in message ...
> > Linguist Mario Pei was of the opinion that a modern international
language
> > would *not* form dialects, because of the existence of modern
> communications
> > devices such as radio, television, and such devices as the record
player,
> > when he wrote, and the personal computer with access to the Internet
> > nowadays. I'm inclined to agree with him. For one thing, Esperanto has
> been
> > around for more than a hundred years, and I see no evidence that it has
> > developed regional dialects.
>
> Well, I will have to respectfully disagree to a point. Here is one usenet
> post to the contrary with regard to Esperanto, via old-school Google
Groups
> on its South African service:
>
http://groups.google.co.za/groups?selm=3A05DE48.7CBE273B%40mail.utexas.edu&o
> utput=gplain
>
> It mentions a "riista Esperanto". There are also three variants of writing
> it for diacritical purposes on a computer. Not sure if this is the same as
> "riista" or not. Haven't looked into it.
I said "regional dialects." Riisma Esperanto is a variation of Esperanto in
which there is a third-person singular pronoun, "ri," which is not marked as
to sex, to be used alongside the words for "he" and "she," "li" and "shi."
Whether it makes any sense to speak of it as some sort of dialect is open to
debate, but it is certainly not a regional dialect.
>
> There are also the various reform movements such as "Ido". Now that begs
the
> question as to whether this is a different language or not like between
> English and Scots, or American and British English, Brazilian or European
> Portuguese, or Dutch and Afrikaans, etc.
Ido is not a dialect of Esperanto, not even in the sense of the word
"dialect" that permits us to say that "French is a dialect of Latin." The
differences are too great. (For similar reasons, American Sign Language is
not a dialect of French Sign Language in any sense of the word "dialect,"
even if it does derive from it, nor are creole languages dialects of any of
their ancestor languages.)
>
> That is a gray area. I've also read reports that while the general
language
> remains the same among second-language speakers, among their children,
> "native speakers" raised in homes where Esperanto is spoken, that certain
> dialects have emerged.
I'd certainly expect private vocabulary within a family, but I wouldn't call
that a dialect. Even if it were, it would be a social, not a regional,
dialect.
>
> However, it is true that as media advances such as the internet, TV, etc.
> that this threatens dialects. For example, in the cities where Southern
> American English is spoken, that accent and associated dialect is fastly
> disappearing into standard American, northern/midwestern-style English.
>
> However, the internet has also developed its own dialect of English, even
> though most dispise it: R U following me, LOL? <g> ;-)
>
> In addition, I don't see AAVE/Ebonics disappearing anytime soon or many
> other varieties of English. In fact in the modern age, I think it is a
very
> positive time for threatened languages/dialects to have a world forum,
where
> they did not previously.
Whether a language or dialect survives depends ultimately upon people having
a strong enough motive to speak it. I don't expect Hebrew or Arabic to
disappear in the face of a widely-spoken international language because of
their religious associations. I would expect AAVE to continue for quite a
while, in part because of the ignorance about AAVE on the part of those
teaching black children which leads to problems teaching the black children
a standard dialect, but I believe Black American Sign Language (a racial
dialect of American Sign Language which arose because of the segregation of
schools for the deaf in the American South) is already pretty much gone, as
is Yiddish.
Ultimately, I expect most languages are doomed. I think one important
influence leading to such a loss will be the intermarriage between people
who speak separate mother tongues but share a common second language in the
international language, which will probably be English. The parents will
usually bring their children up speaking the international language, and
will see little point in having the children learn one or more of the mother
tongues of the parents. See John McWhorter's *The Power of Babel* for more
on this question.
>
> So, I disagree for the most part, but I do see your point as well.
>
> Larry
Raymond S. Wise
news:kqenr09okn8quj5q6...@4ax.com...
Isn't that very popular indeed? Think "McDonald's."
Larry G
in
> which there is a third-person singular pronoun, "ri," which is not marked
as
> to sex, to be used alongside the words for "he" and "she," "li" and "shi."
> Whether it makes any sense to speak of it as some sort of dialect is open
to
> debate, but it is certainly not a regional dialect.
Well, with regard to Esperanto, then we cannot know yet about "regional
dialects" because sadly 100 years on, the language remains boxed in theory,
spoken by a small niche group of people. If it were to become entrenched as
a spoken theory, I have no doubt that regional varieties would develop. The
reason being is because languages evolve. Certain local words would be
adopted from local languages, etc.
>
>
> >
> > There are also the various reform movements such as "Ido". Now that begs
> the
> > question as to whether this is a different language or not like between
> > English and Scots, or American and British English, Brazilian or
European
> > Portuguese, or Dutch and Afrikaans, etc.
>
>
> Ido is not a dialect of Esperanto, not even in the sense of the word
> "dialect" that permits us to say that "French is a dialect of Latin." The
> differences are too great. (For similar reasons, American Sign Language is
> not a dialect of French Sign Language in any sense of the word "dialect,"
> even if it does derive from it, nor are creole languages dialects of any
of
> their ancestor languages.)
Yes, I know, the whole "a language is a dialect with an army" quandry. It
can be hard to define it. At one time, I would guess that it was possible to
describe French as a dialect of Latin. But as Latin died as an everyday
language, and French evolved away from it, this changed.
As for Esperanto and Ido, it is hard to define as both are planned
languages, but yes I've read reports of "regional" variations of Esperanto.
It has not diverged as a typical language, because it has not become an
established "mother tongue" language.
But, with regard to this thread, if enough people in, say, Finland, begin
speaking English in everyday use, to the point of establishing a worldwide
standard, as the original poster describes, this language would probably
have features of British English and American English, plus a few Finnish
words. Therefore, you would have "Finnish English", a dialect distinct from
the other varieties. Now, whether you call this a dialect, variety, accent,
etc. will forever be a source of endless debate, but I don't foresee the day
when dialects disappear completely due to technology. What has happened to
English? There has evolved an internet-style of English as I described.
Perhaps, this is not "regional", but if anything yet another "dialect" has
emerged.
In Britain, that country has had an influx of American television
programming. It is true that the American standard dialect has influenced
that language, but this hasn't stopped the evolution of presence of distinct
British dialect. If anything, technology has encouraged differences, rather
than bridge them.
Yet, at the same time, I recognize that technology can and indeed does have
a unifying influence. So again, I see Mr. Pei's point, but not completely.
> I'd certainly expect private vocabulary within a family, but I wouldn't
call
> that a dialect. Even if it were, it would be a social, not a regional,
> dialect.
Right, but only IMHO, because Esperanto has not reached the area English has
in that, Esperanto is not spoken by very many people as a lingua franca. If
it were allowed to evolve as a natural language, regional differences would
emerge. Technology is great, but we aren't borg yet <g>. (Trek reference).
> Whether a language or dialect survives depends ultimately upon people
having
> a strong enough motive to speak it. I don't expect Hebrew or Arabic to
> disappear in the face of a widely-spoken international language because of
> their religious associations. I would expect AAVE to continue for quite a
> while, in part because of the ignorance about AAVE on the part of those
> teaching black children which leads to problems teaching the black
children
> a standard dialect, but I believe Black American Sign Language (a racial
> dialect of American Sign Language which arose because of the segregation
of
> schools for the deaf in the American South) is already pretty much gone,
as
> is Yiddish.
>
> Ultimately, I expect most languages are doomed. I think one important
> influence leading to such a loss will be the intermarriage between people
> who speak separate mother tongues but share a common second language in
the
> international language, which will probably be English. The parents will
> usually bring their children up speaking the international language, and
> will see little point in having the children learn one or more of the
mother
> tongues of the parents. See John McWhorter's *The Power of Babel* for more
> on this question.
No doubt that technology and factors such as intermarriage have thinned down
or killed many of the world's languages and dialects. And, that is sad in
many ways. And English is a beneficiary in many ways because of its ability
to adapt, precisely because it doesn't have national academies prescribing
its specific use, and because of the great popularity of the USA in this
era. It's possible Mandarin Chinese could serve such a purpose if Chinese
culture expands several years down the road.
I think you have many interesting points. I just don't believe this is the
end of dialects. In an English-speaking world, I believe we will still have
various regional dialects, varieties, whatever you want to call them, due to
various factors - retention of local vocabulary from the previous language,
different patterns of evolution in different countries, etc.
Dialects, patterns of speech still survive. The Boston accent remains,
despite what is called "midwestern" newscaster English being the dominant
form of English on the airwaves. Sure the Boston accent is diluted, but it
still exists. Even the soda/pop/coke divisions remain in the USA. Surely
after all this time, you'd think this kind of thing would be standardized.
I remember people asking at the end of the cold war if this was the end of
history. Think about how ridiculous that question sounds now.
Indeed we are entering a new era, but I think if a language like Esperanto,
or as English spreads and becomes entrenched, new forms and patterns will
emerge.
Larry
Donna Richoux
> Donna Richoux wrote:
>
> > this [standardized normative form of "international English"] would
> > make your *own* life easier?
>
> Not only mine, but the lives of all of us who speak and write English as
> a second(or third, or whatever) language. The whole point was to relate
> this all to the ever-growing number of non-native speakers, as suggested
> by the article to which I linked in my original post.
>
> > Because you wouldn't have to worry about whether you looked foolish,
> > mixing styles? [...] I suspect that by a few years from now, you'll
> > have outgrown your own concern about mixing British and American
> > styles.
>
> No, this is not what I meant at all. I have little or no concern about
> mixing styles myself, although I try to avoid that. What I have a
> problem with is associating myself closely with _one English-speaking
> country and culture only_, by choosing a particular existing national
> style and following it methodically (as was already suggested), instead
> of being able to stay on a neutral ground where I wouldn't write in
> either "British style" or "American style" but in "international style"
> which would be regulated and consistently maintained by some
> international organization founded for this very purpose.
Something artificial, then, something that is created and maintained not
by a living population but merely by bureaucrats?
There's a English style guide put out by the European Union for its
members to consult when writing documents for publication by that body.
Have you seen it? Does it give the sort of advice you would hope to see?
http://europa.eu.int/comm/translation/writing/style_guides/english/style
_guide_en.pdf
Larry G
> If it were to become entrenched as
> a spoken theory,
*spoken language
rather. Though in a sense, Esperanto is a "spoken theory" <g> at this stage.
Larry
Larry G
> Keeping this in mind, the ultimate goal wouldn't be unifying all
> English-speakers. It would only be unifying the use of English language
> for those who do _not_ speak it as their first language, and do _not_
> live in an English-speaking country.
I understand, but I fail to see how problems wouldn't arise. To give it a
local example for you. Imagine if Finnish were adopted as a worldwide lingua
franca, like English is becoming now. Go with me here, I'm not supposing it
will. ;-)
And, imagine that Finnish, Karelian, and Estonian were all considered
dialects of the same Finnish language.
Imagine what would happen is someone suggested an international academy to
standardize this group of languages and merge them together for
second-language speakers living outside of the Nordic area.
What would be the reaction to this in Finland, Russia, and Estonia? That's
what I'm saying. Despite the fact that English is one language, there is a
lot of pride and history involved in the British and American standards.
Eventually the word of the academy would either have some influence on or
conflict with the native speakers of English.
The British would most likely accuse the hypothetical academy of conforming
to American standards, or vice-versa, or the result, if spelling reforms
were included, could be one of more conflict, not less as this international
standard vied for a place along with the British and American standards.
English spelling is so atrocious because, at least in the American variety,
it adopts a Chinese-like solution in keeping a standard orthography while
the various dialectal groups pronounce the words differently.
If I were to write Texan or Southern American English phonetically with
local words, the result would appear much more like Scots probably. If
spelling reforms took place, to who's standards would they be as different
regions would probably pronounce the words differently.
This is why feel at even if and when English becomes the international
language, that dialects will remain, and they will be hard to standardize.
There are problems that even native speakers grapple with, and despite the
fact that the differences between British and American are somewhat
miniscule, some are significant. For example, noun/number agreement.
American would say - "The company is.....", while British would form this as
"The company are......". Because British would see this collective noun as
more than one, whereas American would only count it as one.
The good news is, despite many protests you'll find to the contrary, there
are basically only two written standards - British and American English. One
is based on the Received Pronunciation of southeastern England, and though
following out of prestige is still a standard. The other for the USA, is
variously referred to as "General American/Midwestern (though not identical
to many midwestern dialects)/newscaster", etc. This is the dialect that you
hear on American newscasts, movies (for the most part), television programs,
etc. The dialectal differences are a bit greater than the media would
suggest. I assume though this is the case throughout the world, and is not
peculiar to the English-speaking world.
Most of the Brito-Commonwealth (my coinage <g>) world follows the British
standard, at least with regard to its written form. There are many, many
spoken forms. With varying degrees of American and national influences. The
United States, and presumably its former territories like the Philippines,
follow the American standard.
If you learn one or the other, you will be understood by the majority. There
are some quite stark vocabulary differences, but if you learn both forms,
you shouldn't have a problem. Other languages vary even greater, such as
Spanish. IIRC, there are around eight words meaning "bus" in varieties of
that language. So, in comparison, English is a piece of cake (easy), hehe.
> But isn't this a bit different from what is suggested above? People who
> live in France, Spain, Italy etc. speak French, Spanish, Italian etc. as
> their _first_ language.
Only with regard to time. The point being that Latin was a lingua franca in
these areas when Rome gained power. Latin diverged into its various forms as
these areas evolved and added local words from the languages previously
spoken in the area, or from invasions, or from contact with nearby
languages. In my opinion, if English takes on a native-speaker like status
in non-English areas, local dialects of the new English will emerge, or have
done so.
I must say I was surprised at this, especially at the linguistic divisions
in that country from what I've read. When I read about Finnish areas, I read
of little evidence of Swedish, and in Swedish areas like the Åland Islands,
Swedish seems to dominate. This reminds me of Canada where English (or
Chinese in the case of Vancouver) dominates much of the west of that
country, and French most of Quebec. You only have English and French meeting
on more or less equal terms in places like Ottawa and Montreal.
I find Finland to be fascinating from a linguistic point of view. I love to
visit sometime. I know this is probably a touchy subject given the history,
but what about Russian in the mixture. Is there a percentage of the
population that speaks this also, presumably, I'm guessing very old people.
> What about business co-operation between Finland and Sweden: for example
> companies like TeliaSonera (a merger of two former state telco
> monopolies), or Nordea (a merger of several banks in three Nordic
> countries)? You guessed it! The official company language is now English
> (they originally tried to get by with Swedish, but that didn't work
> out.)
I must say I'm surprised, but not really shocked, also. I participate on a
forum where the majority are Europeans, and indeed the lingua franca among
the group is English.
Even among people from Germany and Austria, the common language among them
will usually be in English, if they even suspect a non-German-speaking
person is reading the posts. Even in this "multilingual" forum. French is
used to a lesser extent, but English dominates because more people are
likely to speak English as a second-language, so English is more often
chosen.
And, even among multinationals the common language is English. I've got a
Dutch friend working in research in France. Despite the fact that the
majority speak French, I wouldn't be surprised to find the working language
for that facility also to be in English.
What surprised me about him, is that he's said he speaks Dutch so little
now, mainly to his family and friends back home, that he's forgetting it.
That's an amazing, and sad, statistic to me for the future of diversity in
languages and culture.
[...]
> > There is indeed an evolving "European English" as its speakers will
> > often use Latinate words that have long since died out in British or
> > American English in common use, but an international academy for it?
>
> Sounds interesting. Would you happen to have any examples of that?
Well on the European forums, when talking about various European/EU
agreements, the word "acquis" is used, which although a perfectly valid
English word, is far less likely to be used by American speakers, and even
by British speakers, outside of the academic community.
Another word that I would define as "European English" is "ameloriate".
Although a perfectly good English word derived from French, it is little
used outside of academic circles. The same with a word like "facile". I bet
a sizable number wouldn't even be aware that "facile" is also an English
word.
This is juxtoposed with a preference for words like "y'all" as a plural for
the word "you" as English has lost its familiar "you" forms "thee", "thou",
etc., except in poetry. And, a word like "nowadays" has come into common
parlance in the academic world.
Words like "y'all" and "nowadays" to be are distinct markers of Southern or
General American English. I'm surprised that "nowadays" has become so
common, as an example. I would use the word "currently" as a synonym, for
example. But to non-native speakers, the history and use of these words is
unknown, and as I doubt that English English students of Oxford or Cambridge
would use them, all I see developing is yet another, third standard of
English, rather than a standardizing of the two standards.
At any rate, it is a subject I find fascinating.
Larry
Larry G
> There's a English style guide put out by the European Union for its
> members to consult when writing documents for publication by that body.
> Have you seen it? Does it give the sort of advice you would hope to see?
>
> http://europa.eu.int/comm/translation/writing/style_guides/english/style
> _guide_en.pdf
IIRC, the EU style guide suggests writing in the British standard when in
doubt, as that is the language of a member state.
Larry
Torkel Franzen
> This is juxtoposed with a preference for words like "y'all" as a plural for
> the word "you" as English has lost its familiar "you" forms "thee", "thou",
> etc., except in poetry.
"Juxtaposed." I don't understand your "as". What do the familiar
forms have to do with the plural?
> Words like "y'all" and "nowadays" to be are distinct markers of Southern or
> General American English.
"Y'all" is indeed considered Southern. However, there is another
traditional American plural! "You guys." Very much a part of the
vernacular, though.
> But to non-native speakers, the history and use of these words is
> unknown, and as I doubt that English English students of Oxford or Cambridge
> would use them, all I see developing is yet another, third standard of
> English, rather than a standardizing of the two standards.
What? Why do you think students at Oxford or Cambridge don't use
"nowadays"?
As for knowledge of the history of words, native or non-native is
irrelevant. As a rule, we don't know squat about our native langauge.
Larry G
different
> regions would probably pronounce the words differently.
*whose standards
I'd better correct that with this being AUE <g>. I'm sure I made a few more
typos there.
Larry
Jukka Aho
> Something artificial, then, something that is created and maintained
> not by a living population but merely by bureaucrats?
Not necessarily. I was rather thinking something like "labor of love" by
linguists, English teachers all around the world and such. _Of course_
it would have to have connections to the "living population" [1]; in my
view it should be an amalgamation of the features and traits you
commonly encounter in the most spoken/written native styles of English;
just one that is maintained and cared for by an international body,
primarily for the purposes of those who want (or need) to learn English
as their second language in foreign countries, instead of one that
centers its activites to one English-speaking country and their
(natively) English-speaking population only.
[1] I find that "living population" expression a bit odd, though: aren't
those who speak English as their second language - auxiliary language,
if you wish - in their daily lives every bit as "alive" as those who
speak it as their first language?
> There's a English style guide put out by the European Union for its
> members to consult when writing documents for publication by that
> body. Have you seen it? Does it give the sort of advice you would
> hope to see?
>
> http://europa.eu.int/comm/translation/writing/style_guides/english/
> style_guide_en.pdf
Interesting find. Thank you, I will have to take a closer look at it.
(I'm somewhat suspicious about this sort of thing, though, since it is
not only written _by_ bureaucrats but also written _for_ bureaucrats,
not for ordinary people. It also clearly states in Chapter 1 that
British spelling and usage is the one to be followed.)
I should perhaps also clarify that I am not exactly "seeking advice" in
this thread. I am just stirring up conversation about the possible need
of a more "standardized" form of English for the growing numbers of
those who have to learn it as their second language, in countries where
there is no (natively) English-speaking population and no clear
tradition of adhering to any particular style or dialect of English. (Or
rather, where the natively English-speaking population are mostly
immigrants and a small and diverse enough group to be insignificant in
this regard, and greatly outnumbered by those who speak English as their
second language.)
--
znark
Larry G
> "Larry G" <thela...@yahoo.com> writes:
>
>
> > This is juxtoposed with a preference for words like "y'all" as a plural
for
> > the word "you" as English has lost its familiar "you" forms "thee",
"thou",
> > etc., except in poetry.
>
> "Juxtaposed." I don't understand your "as". What do the familiar
> forms have to do with the plural?
The familiar forms were singular, the polite form "you" was also the formal.
Therefore, the odd "you are" grammar when referring to one person. English
has lost "thee, thou" etc. as the familiar singular form, except in poetry.
>
> > Words like "y'all" and "nowadays" to be are distinct markers of Southern
or
> > General American English.
>
> "Y'all" is indeed considered Southern. However, there is another
> traditional American plural! "You guys." Very much a part of the
> vernacular, though.
Yes, I know. :) But what I'm saying is that for European English speakers,
those whose native language is not English, I find "y'all" to be a common
word. The poster asked what distinctive features I've heard from European
English speakers (who were not British or Irish). "y'all" is one such word.
>
> > But to non-native speakers, the history and use of these words is
> > unknown, and as I doubt that English English students of Oxford or
Cambridge
> > would use them, all I see developing is yet another, third standard of
> > English, rather than a standardizing of the two standards.
>
> What? Why do you think students at Oxford or Cambridge don't use
> "nowadays"?
Because "nowadays" has a "down home" feel. There's nothing wrong with it, I
accept it. But it seems odd in non colloquial language to me. My English
teachers would have preferred "currently" or some other adjective. Nothing
wrong with it, as there's nothing wrong with "y'all". But to me, it is not
"formal" either.
To make an example, a perfectly good word for a television remote control is
"clicker". I could ask you to hand me "the clicker", hehe, but "remote
control" would be the more formal word.
"Nowadays" is like that to me. The word has evolved like "aint" to become
more accepted, I just find its use odd, like a pet peeve. This is not to say
that "nowadays" isn't a perfectly valid word, unlike "aint", whose use has
been debated. It's just odd to me.
>
> As for knowledge of the history of words, native or non-native is
> irrelevant. As a rule, we don't know squat about our native langauge.
True. Again, the poster asked what words I'd noticed that non-native
speakers tend to use. I used examples, where such combinations would be
unlikely, though not unheard of, with regard to native speakers.
An international academy might standardize these usages into a common
English, but not without some feedback from the native speakers, I'm sure.
Larry
Larry G
formal.
*Argh, and the plural.
> Therefore, the odd "you are" grammar when referring to one person. English
> has lost "thee, thou" etc. as the familiar singular form, except in
poetry.
Maybe, I could use some help from the future academy myself. :-P
Larry
Torkel Franzen
> But what I'm saying is that for European English speakers,
> those whose native language is not English, I find "y'all" to be a common
> word.
Really? I've never heard it myself from European speakers.
> Because "nowadays" has a "down home" feel.
I don't think you're at all typical in feeling this.
However, having said the above, I certainly have no further argument
to produce!
Larry G
>
> > But what I'm saying is that for European English speakers,
> > those whose native language is not English, I find "y'all" to be a
common
> > word.
>
> Really? I've never heard it myself from European speakers.
What can I say, I have from a couple of countries.
> > Because "nowadays" has a "down home" feel.
>
> I don't think you're at all typical in feeling this.
>
> However, having said the above, I certainly have no further argument
> to produce!
All I can say, it has informality to it, and I'm surprised it has become
accepted in academic circles when there other words for it. It's akin to
calling a television set "the tele" in British parlance. Perfectly
acceptable, but odd in an otherwise formal post. I'm sure there must be some
examples in other languages that are similar.
Here's an AUE post from Bob Cunningham in July. Perhaps, he can explain it
better than me:
http://groups.google.co.za/groups?selm=hc5tf0he5rqfdvpmju4htagbgo123jgvdu%40
4ax.com&output=gplain
Larry
Mike Lyle
I see from that link that I said positive "anymore" seemed more
hayseedish than "nowadays". I still think so, but "nowadays"
nonetheless feels rather informal to me: I don't think I'd use it in
writing any more formal than a newspaper article.
I've never heard any British speaker use "you all" or "y'all" simply
as a plural "you" except jokingly. Some urban black people may be
exceptions to this, but I'm not at all sure. (Of course I don't mean
ordinary "all of you" uses such as "You all know what I mean".) I'm
surprised to learn that any European ESL speakers have adopted it.
Mike.
Donna Richoux
> Donna Richoux wrote:
>
> > Something artificial, then, something that is created and maintained
> > not by a living population but merely by bureaucrats?
>
> Not necessarily. I was rather thinking something like "labor of love" by
> linguists, English teachers all around the world and such. _Of course_
> it would have to have connections to the "living population" [1]; in my
> view it should be an amalgamation of the features and traits you
> commonly encounter in the most spoken/written native styles of English;
> just one that is maintained and cared for by an international body,
> primarily for the purposes of those who want (or need) to learn English
> as their second language in foreign countries, instead of one that
> centers its activites to one English-speaking country and their
> (natively) English-speaking population only.
>
> [1] I find that "living population" expression a bit odd, though: aren't
> those who speak English as their second language - auxiliary language,
> if you wish - in their daily lives every bit as "alive" as those who
> speak it as their first language?
I didn't mean to suggest that living populations weren't living. I said,
were these guidelines created by a living population -- arising out of
daily actual spontaneous uses -- or were they to be created on paper by
a handful of bureaucrats?
It rather relates back to the old "descriptive/prescriptive" debate. Do
you want a dictionary and grammar book that reflect how Finns actually
use English on a daily basis, or do you want something created by a few
people telling them how they *should* use English, in order to conform
with this imaginary ideal of international unity? You're asking for the
second. I see some value in the first.
>
> > There's a English style guide put out by the European Union for its
> > members to consult when writing documents for publication by that
> > body. Have you seen it? Does it give the sort of advice you would
> > hope to see?
> >
> > http://europa.eu.int/comm/translation/writing/style_guides/english/
> > style_guide_en.pdf
>
> Interesting find. Thank you, I will have to take a closer look at it.
> (I'm somewhat suspicious about this sort of thing, though, since it is
> not only written _by_ bureaucrats but also written _for_ bureaucrats,
> not for ordinary people. It also clearly states in Chapter 1 that
> British spelling and usage is the one to be followed.)
>
> I should perhaps also clarify that I am not exactly "seeking advice" in
> this thread.
I do realize that. But I think sticking to some sort of actual, specific
experiences and concerns is likely to lead to a more productive
discussion, in this largely abstract context. So I'm checking to see
there there are any particular personal angles here. And I'm genuinely
curious whether that Euro guidebook offers anything useful.
>I am just stirring up conversation about the possible need
> of a more "standardized" form of English for the growing numbers of
> those who have to learn it as their second language, in countries where
> there is no (natively) English-speaking population and no clear
> tradition of adhering to any particular style or dialect of English. (Or
> rather, where the natively English-speaking population are mostly
> immigrants and a small and diverse enough group to be insignificant in
> this regard, and greatly outnumbered by those who speak English as their
> second language.)
I suspect there is going to have to be a point where Finns and the Dutch
and others are going to have to stick their necks out and claim
responsibility for this language they are doing so much work in. Yeah,
you may have borrowed it from the Brits and the Yanks, but after some
number of decades, it is *yours*. You'd be completely entitled to
writing dictionaries and handbooks that reflect Finnish standards, and
in fact your publishers quite likely already do.
Like I tell people, Dutch has long had the familiar voice (jij, jouw)
and the formal voice (u) and now it's added a whole new voice, the
foreign voice (you). English is just the branch of their language that
they use to speak to foreigners.
The desire for global uniform standards is awfully strong among some
people. They think it will solve all unhappiness and problems. Actually,
there's a lot to be said for recognizing and tolerating diversity.
(Diversity happens naturally. Uniformity must be imposed by authority.)
Mike Lyle
> Jukka Aho <jukk...@iki.fi> wrote:
[...]
The more I see of this discussion, the less I see _in_ it. I just
don't see _why_ there should be some separate standard for English as
a "second" language. We've already agreed that formal English in the
eastern and western hemispheres is for any practical purpose the
same, apart from a few mainly trivial differences in particular
contexts; and the signs are that the similarity is increasing.
If some miracle were to produce a separate standard, then that
standard, by definition, would essentially not be English, and
couldn't survive.
I may have missed something, but I don't think Jukka has given
examples of situations in which genuine difficulty arises. Am I being
obtuse?
Mike.
mpl...@my-deja.com
This isn't a question of the "'a language is a dialect with an army'
quandry." It's a matter of "dialect" having a technical meaning in
linguistics which is not used in ordinary speech. French, Italian, and
Spanish are "dialects" of Latin because they are languages which are
derived from Latin. I was just trying to indicate in my post that Ido
is no dialect of Esperanto (and American Sign Language is no dialect of
French Sign Language) by this criterion. The extensiveness of the
changes in the first case, and the extensive difference in the
languages in the second case--at best, ASL might be said to be a creole
of FSL--remove them from the possibility of being considered dialects
in any sense of that word, including this technical sense which is
unknown to most non-linguists.
Raymond S. Wise
> "Torkel Franzen" <tor...@sm.luth.se> wrote in message ...
[...]
> > What? Why do you think students at Oxford or Cambridge don't use
> > "nowadays"?
>
> Because "nowadays" has a "down home" feel. There's nothing wrong with it,
I
> accept it. But it seems odd in non colloquial language to me. My English
> teachers would have preferred "currently" or some other adjective. Nothing
> wrong with it, as there's nothing wrong with "y'all". But to me, it is not
> "formal" either.
"Nowadays" has long been a standard term. Neither the 1895 *Century
Dictionary* nor the 1913 *Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary* mark it
with a usage label, which they certainly would have if they considered it
anything other than acceptable in formal usage.
For that matter, none of the dictionaries which are available via
www.onelook.com and which list the term give it a usage label. I'd have to
conclude that your impression that the word has a "down home" feel to it is
a curious one indeed.
The only dictionary I can find which has a usage note accompanying the term
is Noah Webster's 1828 dictionary. Under the entry for "now," at
http://65.66.134.201/cgi-bin/webster/webster.exe?search_for_texts_web1828=now
he has the term with the spelling "now a days," and says of it, "This is a
common colloquial phrase, but not elegant in writing, unless of the more
familiar kinds." If his judgment on the matter was in fact sound, we have to
conclude that the usage had become elevated by 1895, because *The Century
Dictionary* was certainly a prescriptive one, as was the 1913 Webster's.
By the way, "ain't" is the quintessential example of a nonstandard term
which has a standard spelling.
Raymond S. Wise
news:1102879217.8...@c13g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
That is not the only sense of "dialect" which is unknown to most
non-linguists. The sense of "dialect" by which the prestige speech and
writing of educated speakers constitutes a "standard dialect" is also
unknown to most people. Another sense which is unknown to most people would,
in fact, apply to the speech of a single family:
From
http://www.linguistlist.org/~ask-ling/archive-most-recent/msg10790.html
[quote, from Joseph F Foster, Associate Professor of Anthropology,
University of Cincinnati, Ohio]
All languages have dialects and there is no way of speaking a language that
is not a dialect. A dialect is simply a consistent way of speaking a given
language shared by two or more people. (A given way of speaking a language
peculiar to only one person is called an _idiolect._) The term _language_
is used by the ignorant or the antilinguists to mean a "standard dialect"
and _dialect_ is used by them to mean a "nonstandard" dialect. These people
often believe that there is some special characteristic of a standard
dialect that makes it fit to be the standard and some special characteristic
either present or lacking in nonstandard dialects that make them unfit to be
the standard. They are mistaken and can furnish no comparative evidence that
this belief is true.
[end quote]
So in that sense, the speech of a family of native speakers of Esperanto
would be a dialect of Esperanto. As I indicated before, however, it would be
a social, rather than a regional, dialect.
Donna Richoux
> "Larry G" <thela...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:3231e8F...@individual.net...
> > "Torkel Franzen" <tor...@sm.luth.se> wrote in message ...
>>
I just checked Mastertexts collection of British and American classics;
they have eighty hits for "nowadays," which is quite a few for them, and
almost none of them appear in strong dialect. In fact, about a quarter
of them must be from Oscar Wilde, whose high-class characters use it
frequently:
Lady Markby. [Genially.] Ah, nowadays people marry
as often as they can, don't they?
Lord Illingworth. Ah! she is not modern, and to be
modern is the only thing worth being nowadays.
Lady Caroline. He must be quite respectable. One has
never heard his name before in the whole course of
one's life, which speaks volumes for a man, nowadays.
Other users are Jane Austen, Walter Scott, Thomas Hardy, Arthur Conan
Doyle... Is this scholarly enough?
As Professor of Latin at Bordeaux, we find him
presenting a Latin poem to Charles V.; and indulging
that fancy of his for Latin poetry which seems to us
nowadays a childish pedantry, which was then--when
Latin was the vernacular tongue of all scholars--a
serious, if not altogether a useful, pursuit.
-- Kingsley_Charles/ Historical_Lectures_and_Essays/
Larry G
Well, I'm not going to get into a typical AUE novel over this subject. It is
my opinion, I'm not insulting those who use it. It is merely my opinion that
there are better choices out there, and other users in the past have
concurred, and I'm surprised by how widespread it is. This does NOT mean I
have any disrespect for those who use the word. I'm having flashbacks of our
George Plimpton (regarding his accent) debate some years ago, yeesh.
Getting to the original subject of the thread, this is why I feel we will
never have an academy either for the national varieties or for the
international speakers. English evolves and changes over time. This is its
strength.
Larry
Django Cat
wrote:
>Jukka Aho <jukk...@iki.fi> wrote:
>
>> Django Cat wrote:
>>
>> >>> "Half the world's population will be speaking or learning English by
>> >>> 2015, researchers say."
>> >>>
>> >>> <http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?
>> >>> story=591193>
>>
>> >> As no-one has commented on this yet, I will do it myself:
>> >>
>> >> Given the high number of people who now speak, and according to that
>> >> article, _will_ speak English as their second language in the future,
>> >> would this surge of new speakers finally call for establishing some
>> >> sort of "standardized", international form of English?
>>
>> > No.
>>
>> Why not? As of now, those who want to learn to speak English as their
>> second language - as a communication tool, not necessarily as anything
>> they would use for emotionally or culturally bonding themselves to any
>> particular English-speaking country - will have to learn several
>> variations of it, none of which is _the_ English language (for them.)
>>
>> Native speakers can always use the form of English they grew up with. I,
>> as a non-native speaker, do not have that luxury. I can never be too
>> sure about whether I should stick to the American spelling and
>> vocabulary or the British one (I would include other countries and their
>> native forms of English on the list as well but these two are the ones I
>> am most familiar with.) I often alternate between the two as well as I
>> can, depending on the audience, but on international forums such as this
>> newsgroup it is hard to make your mind about it.
>
>I can see how you might puzzle over this. However, I suspect none of the
>rest of us keep track of whether you are mixing American and British
>style choices. We're used to both, here. The reader's perspective is
>different; the writer has to make active choices, but the reader just
>passively accepts, up to the point of not understanding something.
>
>(What we've noticed over the years is how awfully good Finnish English
>is. I'm sure you know this already.)
>
Written maybe, but they've got a very flat intonation pattern in
spoken English.
DC
Larry G
I'm really not sure what you want from me, we're not going to agree
completely on this subject. Now that we've established that we can go on
from there.
Please clarify with regard to Esperanto and Ido. Ido is a planned language
and reform of the planned language of Esperanto, granted. It would be
difficult to say it is "dialect" because of its planned nature. But, without
Esperanto, there would be no Ido. Ido is DERIVED from Esperanto.
I would suppose in natural languages, this is compared to English and Scots.
Scots is different from English as Ido from Esperanto.
Is Scots a language? Its speakers would argue yes because of a basic
orthography, and a strong literary tradition. But there is also an argument
that it is a dialect of English. As I stated before, if I wrote down various
Southern American accents phonetically, these two would probably differ
radically from standard English orthography as Scots does from English.
However, it has been established that Esperanto has "dialects". Whether
these can be described as "regional" is rather moot at this stage, because
the language is spoken by a rather small group of people of like mind. There
are very few "native speakers", though a few exist, the children of
second-language speakers. Unfortunately the language is still at the theory
stage all these years later, so yes, at this time, there are no REGIONAL
dialects. But, I have read reports of different idiolects in individual
families around the globe.
Many of the markers of American English, were spelling reforms by Noah
Webster, for example "labour" is "labor" in AmE. So, what specifically makes
Ido not a dialect, and does so for American English, when yes indeed, many
of the markers that distinguish it from the British standard were indeed
planned. Is it the planned part of it? The fact that Ido is an intentional
reform? Ido is a planned variant of Esperanto, that calls itself a language.
Regarding the word "dialect", this is indeed a hot potato. When I look at
various definitions, I usually find the largest non-answers possible, it
seems. Is there some technical definition that is in linguistic material
that I'm missing. In French, "dialect" carries a lot of baggage. IMHO, there
is an effort not to confuse various French dialects with French creoles.
Luxembourgish is a language. Swabian is a dialect. It is mainly politics
that makes this distinction. So, I'm not certain what the "right" definition
would be to satisfy various linguists, as it is relative. I will say that a
dialect is not a creole, but even English appears on the surface to have
some creolization to it being a Germanic language influenced heavily by
French and Latin.
Could you cite some official source defining "dialect" that LINGUISTS would
agree on. From what I've seen, one person's dialect is another's language.
Admittedly, I'm not a linguist. And as far as technology goes, I
respectfully disagree. I don't think we've seen the end of dialects. You
have used Esperanto as an example of the contrary. My point is that we
cannot know as yet. There certainly varieties of Esperanto. Whether or not
these are "dialect" depends on your definition of the word. If they are not
regional in *some* cases, it is only because the language has not reached a
point, like English or French has reached, where it is widely spoken enough
to know for sure. It has not reached the point of almost nativeness like
English has for speakers of Dutch and Finnish, for example.
I respect that you disagree. I see your point in many ways. In many ways,
you're right. I've seen it in the disappearance of the Southern accent in
the USA. The accent and dialect of my grandmother is being consigned to
history. You have a point.
But, I still don't think that we'll ever reach the stage where dialects do
not form and develop. There may be fewer of them, but I don't see the end of
them.
Larry
Areff
> they have eighty hits for "nowadays," which is quite a few for them, and
> almost none of them appear in strong dialect.
And let's note that in many Midland US dialects a "positive anymore" is
used *in place of* StandAmE "nowadays". You can catch Tony Cooper doing
this, for example. When you notice this being done it can seem a bit
folksy.
--
Steny '08!
Mike Lyle
[...]
> I just checked Mastertexts collection of British and American
> classics; they have eighty hits for "nowadays," which is quite a
few
> for them, and almost none of them appear in strong dialect. In
fact,
> about a quarter of them must be from Oscar Wilde, whose high-class
> characters use it frequently:
>
> Lady Markby. [Genially.] Ah, nowadays people marry
> as often as they can, don't they?
>
> Lord Illingworth. Ah! she is not modern, and to be
> modern is the only thing worth being nowadays.
>
> Lady Caroline. He must be quite respectable. One has
> never heard his name before in the whole course of
> one's life, which speaks volumes for a man, nowadays.
>
> Other users are Jane Austen, Walter Scott, Thomas Hardy, Arthur
Conan
> Doyle... Is this scholarly enough?
>
> As Professor of Latin at Bordeaux, we find him
> presenting a Latin poem to Charles V.; and indulging
> that fancy of his for Latin poetry which seems to us
> nowadays a childish pedantry, which was then--when
> Latin was the vernacular tongue of all scholars--a
> serious, if not altogether a useful, pursuit.
> -- Kingsley_Charles/ Historical_Lectures_and_Essays/
Well, there are plenty of examples back to the fifteenth century or
earlier; but that raw Mastertext word-count reveals little. It
doesn't work like that. The Wilde quotations are all dialogue, for a
start, so they aren't evidence. Jane wrote in a familiar style when
it suited. I don't know about the Hardy, Scott, or Doyle examples,
but even if their examples were all in the authorial voice they
aren't remotely what you call "scholarly", any more than Kingsley
was; and I won't follow them up because what concerns us here is how
the word (or is it still a phrase?) rings today; and I for one would
rarely if ever use it or recommend its use in a wholly formal
register. Further textual work could show me to be out of step; but
that's my position.
Mike.
perchprism
"Mike Lyle" <mike_l...@REMOVETHISyahoo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:3244s7F...@individual.net...
<snip>
>...what concerns us here is how
> the word (or is it still a phrase?) rings today; and I for one would
> rarely if ever use it or recommend its use in a wholly formal
> register. Further textual work could show me to be out of step; but
> that's my position.
It's a word.
I'm with you. I'd change it to "now" or "today" or something, depending, in
copyediting anything not conversational in tone.
To my ear it has a frontier or hillbilly tang--not too bad, but there. I
think it sounds that way from being a tad olden. I use it freely in speech
but always consciously.
Another precinct heard from.
--
Perchprism
(southern New Jersey, near Philadelphia)
Maria Conlon
> Mike Lyle wrote [re "nowadays"]
> <snip>
>
>> ...what concerns us here is how
>> the word (or is it still a phrase?) rings today; and I for one would
>> rarely if ever use it or recommend its use in a wholly formal
>> register. Further textual work could show me to be out of step; but
>> that's my position.
>
> It's a word.
>
> I'm with you. I'd change it to "now" or "today" or something,
> depending, in copyediting anything not conversational in tone.
>
> To my ear it has a frontier or hillbilly tang--not too bad, but
> there. I think it sounds that way from being a tad olden. I use it
> freely in speech but always consciously.
>
> Another precinct heard from.
Here's another one:
Growing up with southern speakers around me (along with nons), I found
there were more than a few words southerners used that others didn't
seem to. "Reckon" was one; "nowadays" was another. However: "nowadays"
sounded southern to me only because of that middle "a." I heard
non-southerners say what sounded like "nowdays," and assumed that that
pronunciation was the result of a different (and correct) spelling. I
was surprised (and felt a bit guilty for not accepting my own family's
ways) when I learned that the "a" belonged in there, both in spelling
and in pronunciation.
Nowadays, I don't hesitate to use "nowadays," but I wouldn't use it in
any sort of formal or technical writing. The word just seems casual, and
as Perchprism said, a tad olden. (Nor would I use "reckon" in formal or
technical writing, except -- maybe -- in the phrases "reckon with" and
"reckon without.")
"A tad olden" fits many southernisms, of course, because of that
Appalachian, "back in them mountains," "Scotch-Irish" (and English, too)
lifestyle (to use a non-southernism) that has changed to more worldly
ways only within my own lifetime and that of my parents. (For the most
part.)
Maria Conlon, resident of southeastern Michigan; native of east
Tennessee.
(As usual, I've edited and reworded much of what I wrote here in this
post. I hope it still says what I think.)
Raymond S. Wise
It's not what I wanted from you, it's what I wanted from me. I wanted to
present a fair overview of the issue, and for that purpose it was necessary
for me to mention the above definition of "dialect," which is one I myself
have used in the past. To the extent that a dialect can be considered a
collection of related idiolects, a family way of speaking is indeed a
dialect.
>
> Please clarify with regard to Esperanto and Ido. Ido is a planned
> language and reform of the planned language of Esperanto, granted. It
> would be difficult to say it is "dialect" because of its planned
> nature. But, without Esperanto, there would be no Ido. Ido is DERIVED
> from Esperanto.
It's rather like the difference between an animal species which evolved from
a previous animal species and a creature which might be constructed by
genetic engineering from a number of species. The first would represent a
natural language, the second a creole language or an artificial language.
Both Ido and Esperanto would represent such engineering: Neither can be said
to belong to the families of the languages from which they are derived.
Something like a rabbit to which a gene has been added which makes its fur
photoluminescent is pretty much still a rabbit. A dialect which represents
this level of engineering would be Riisma Esperanto and the E-prime
artificial dialect of English. The changes are just not large enough to make
separate languages from their ancestors (but see below for Riisma
Esperanto).
>
> I would suppose in natural languages, this is compared to English and
> Scots. Scots is different from English as Ido from Esperanto.
>
> Is Scots a language? Its speakers would argue yes because of a basic
> orthography, and a strong literary tradition. But there is also an
> argument that it is a dialect of English. As I stated before, if I
> wrote down various Southern American accents phonetically, these two
> would probably differ radically from standard English orthography as
> Scots does from English.
I think linguists generally agree that Scots is not a dialect of English,
but English and Scots are both dialects of an ancestor language. Standard
Scottish English (which should not be confused with Scots, which might be
said to have its own standard dialect), on the other hand, *is* a dialect of
English, since it is derived from English, not from Scots.
>
> However, it has been established that Esperanto has "dialects".
> Whether these can be described as "regional" is rather moot at this
> stage, because the language is spoken by a rather small group of
> people of like mind. There are very few "native speakers", though a
> few exist, the children of second-language speakers. Unfortunately
> the language is still at the theory stage all these years later, so
> yes, at this time, there are no REGIONAL dialects. But, I have read
> reports of different idiolects in individual families around the
> globe.
The concern is whether an international language would break up into
separate dialects in something like the way that Latin broke up into its
daughter Romance language. I think we can safely exclude family dialects
from consideration.
It has, in fact, *not* been established that Esperanto has dialects. I
myself have argued in soc.culture.esperanto that it is possible for an
artificial dialect of Esperanto to be created. All that is required is to
make relatively small changes in the language, as Riisma Esperanto in fact
does. However, my opinion was very much a minority one. Riisma Esperanto
violates the principles of the *Fundamento de Esperanto,* and so, to most
Esperantists, it is no more Esperanto than is Ido. I would certainly agree
that Riisma is not a *standard* dialect of Esperanto.
>
> Many of the markers of American English, were spelling reforms by Noah
> Webster, for example "labour" is "labor" in AmE. So, what
> specifically makes Ido not a dialect, and does so for American
> English, when yes indeed, many of the markers that distinguish it
> from the British standard were indeed planned. Is it the planned part
> of it? The fact that Ido is an intentional reform? Ido is a planned
> variant of Esperanto, that calls itself a language.
>
> Regarding the word "dialect", this is indeed a hot potato. When I
> look at various definitions, I usually find the largest non-answers
> possible, it seems. Is there some technical definition that is in
> linguistic material that I'm missing. In French, "dialect" carries a
> lot of baggage. IMHO, there is an effort not to confuse various
> French dialects with French creoles.
>
> Luxembourgish is a language. Swabian is a dialect. It is mainly
> politics that makes this distinction. So, I'm not certain what the
> "right" definition would be to satisfy various linguists, as it is
> relative. I will say that a dialect is not a creole, but even English
> appears on the surface to have some creolization to it being a
> Germanic language influenced heavily by French and Latin.
>
> Could you cite some official source defining "dialect" that LINGUISTS
> would agree on. From what I've seen, one person's dialect is
> another's language.
I think that all linguists would agree on two points: First, "dialect" has
been used historically to refer to languages which have come from other
language, so that French is a dialect of Latin. I think you will find such a
definition in any encyclopedia of linguistics.
Second, most linguists would agree that for any dialect, or variety, of a
language, there is no inherent defect in the dialect which would prevent it
from being used as a standard variety. My point in saying this is that
linguists do recognize concepts such as standard and nonstandard varieties
of a language (just as they also recognize class varieties), but they don't
necessarily use "dialect" when speaking of such matters.
(In his book *The Power of Babel: The Natural History of Language* linguist
John McWhorter says that "There
are no languages, only dialects." This does not, however, prevent him from
using the word "language.")
>
> Admittedly, I'm not a linguist. And as far as technology goes, I
> respectfully disagree. I don't think we've seen the end of dialects.
> You have used Esperanto as an example of the contrary. My point is
> that we cannot know as yet. There certainly varieties of Esperanto.
> Whether or not these are "dialect" depends on your definition of the
> word. If they are not regional in *some* cases, it is only because
> the language has not reached a point, like English or French has
> reached, where it is widely spoken enough to know for sure. It has
> not reached the point of almost nativeness like English has for
> speakers of Dutch and Finnish, for example.
>
> I respect that you disagree. I see your point in many ways. In many
> ways, you're right. I've seen it in the disappearance of the Southern
> accent in the USA. The accent and dialect of my grandmother is being
> consigned to history. You have a point.
>
> But, I still don't think that we'll ever reach the stage where
> dialects do not form and develop. There may be fewer of them, but I
> don't see the end of them.
Donna Richoux
They aren't evidence of what?
So on the one hand, we have evidence of how Oscar Wilde thought English
aristocrats of his day spoke. On the other hand, we have evidence of how
Mike Lyle thought English aristocrats of Oscar Wilde's day spoke. Let's
see, which one weighs up more heavily...
>Jane wrote in a familiar style when it suited.
"Familiar" doesn't matter to me. She didn't write in the strong rural
and urban dialects that came into fashion later in that century, none of
this "Look'ee here, missy, tha knows" stuff. And as I said, none of the
Mastertexts hits -- well, one -- looked to be strong dialect.
When I looked into "folks," for comparison, it was much harder (though
still possible) to find non-dialectal uses of that. I remember Thackeray
was quite fond of using "folks" in a neutral fashion, but not many
others.
>I don't know about the Hardy, Scott, or Doyle examples,
> but even if their examples were all in the authorial voice they
> aren't remotely what you call "scholarly", any more than Kingsley
> was;
Right-o, everyone throws about remarks about Latin poetry being in the
vernacular tongue. Daily topic.
Here's a bit of circular reasoning to consider.
A. No proper piece of scholarly writing uses "nowadays".
B. Any piece of writing containing "nowadays" is not scholarly.
>and I won't follow them up because what concerns us here is how
> the word (or is it still a phrase?) rings today; and I for one would
> rarely if ever use it or recommend its use in a wholly formal
> register.
Well, that's always a puzzle, isn't it? If a person says "Word X sounds
peculiar" and someone else points out that Word X has long been used in
that way, then the first person says "I wasn't talking about back then,
I'm talking about now."
All right, we can switch to talking about now, although I'd rather say a
thing or two about how the 19th century is not that long ago. But here's
21st century Google hits on <"house of lords" nowadays>, because I'm
trying to think of something we know is on line, is British (so you
can't say this is an Americanism) and is formal. There are about 20,000
hits. Most of these are either testimony to or reports by the House of
Lords:
According to Professor John Strang, Director of the National
Addiction Centre, few users end up in hospital with acute
psychiatric problems, and most regular users are not nowadays
advised by their doctor to change their habits (Q 244).
Systematic misunderstandings of traditional moral principles, and
false inferences from them, are nowadays offered to justify
jettisoning a traditional ethic of medicine in the interests of
having doctors kill patients.
Nowadays IMF aid is a small proportion of the international
credits available to governments that command confidence.
Nowadays, university core funding is dominated by the Research
Assessment Exercise, at least for the research-intensive
universities.
The limitations on the power of the Lords reflect the convention
that nowadays the main legislative function of the non-elected
House is to act as a chamber of revision which does not seek to
rival the elected House of Commons.
Nowadays, the leading case is Hankey v. Clavering [1942] 2 K.B.
326.
The rulings, whether given in the Chamber or privately, are printed
nowadays in Hansard.
Initially, fault indicated moral blameworthiness. Nowadays, it
indicates that the defendant has failed to attain the requisite
standard of behaviour.
These are hardly Ma and Pa Kettle Go to Westminster.
>Further textual work could show me to be out of step; but
> that's my position.
Avoid any word you choose. I think, though, that you're missing out on a
perfectly good one that has no synonym, for no sound reason that I can
see.
Alan Jones
[...]
> All right, we can switch to talking about now, although I'd rather say a
> thing or two about how the 19th century is not that long ago. But here's
> 21st century Google hits on <"house of lords" nowadays>, because I'm
> trying to think of something we know is on line, is British (so you
> can't say this is an Americanism) and is formal. There are about 20,000
> hits. Most of these are either testimony to or reports by the House of
> Lords:
>
> According to Professor John Strang, Director of the National
> Addiction Centre, few users end up in hospital with acute
> psychiatric problems, and most regular users are not nowadays
> advised by their doctor to change their habits (Q 244).
> Avoid any word you choose. I think, though, that you're missing out on a
> perfectly good one that has no synonym, for no sound reason that I can
> see.
I agree. Though Mike Lyle's strong opinion to the contrary did momentarily
make me wobble, since I'm also British but so much older than he is (or
that's whatt I assume), on consideration I stand my what I first thought:
"Nowadays" is standard formal modern English, without any hint of dialect or
archaism.
Alan Jones
Frances Kemmish
I have to agree with Alan, even though I am, I think, a little younger
(mid-fifties). "Nowadays" is perfectly ordinary English, with no hint of
informality.
This isn't the first time I have seen posters suggest that a particular
word, or phrase, which I find unexceptionable, is "hillbilly", or
informal, or dialect. It is usually US posters who make these
pronouncements rather than transplanted Australians though.
Fran
Robin Bignall
wrote:
Actually, Mike was the person you quoted, Alan, and I think he agrees
with you.
As to yoof, my thoughts were, on seeing him at the Oxford boink, "This
can't be Mike Lyle. He's far too young and respectable." His first
words to me were "Docrobin? I thought you'd be fat", which I suppose
is a backhanded compliment, nowadays.
--
wrmst rgrds
Robin Bignall
Hertfordshire
England
Harvey Van Sickle
> Alan Jones wrote:
>> "Donna Richoux" <tr...@euronet.nl> wrote in message
>> news:1goqfuq.lggdy0n6nqtwN%tr...@euronet.nl...
-snip-
>>> Avoid any word you choose. I think, though, that you're missing
>>> out on a perfectly good one that has no synonym, for no sound
>>> reason that I can see.
>> I agree. Though Mike Lyle's strong opinion to the contrary did
>> momentarily make me wobble, since I'm also British but so much
>> older than he is (or that's whatt I assume), on consideration I
>> stand my what I first thought: "Nowadays" is standard formal
>> modern English, without any hint of dialect or archaism.
> I have to agree with Alan, even though I am, I think, a little
> younger (mid-fifties). "Nowadays" is perfectly ordinary English,
> with no hint of informality.
Add my vote on this side, too.
Until reading this thread, it had never remotely occurred to me that
"nowadays" might be considered remarkable in any way, shape or form --
as far as I'm aware it remains a solid word, still appropriate and used
in all registers.
--
Cheers, Harvey
Ottawa/Toronto/Edmonton for 30 years;
Southern England for the past 22 years.
(for e-mail, change harvey.news to harvey.van)
rrh...@acme.com
I think that some people overstate the differences between Standard
British English and Standard American English, often, I suspect, as
part of a political agenda. Other people don't understand the nature
of these overstatements and worry more than they ought to about it.
My pastor, for example, is German. I can tell that he was taught
British, rather than American, English, but I doubt that my
co-parishoners notice it. His German accent is obvious. The British
English veneer is not.
Richard R. Hershberger
perchprism
"Frances Kemmish" <fkem...@optonline.net> wrote in message
news:325s8gF...@individual.net...
An Australian I worked with once upon a time always used "I reckon" where an
American would say "I guess." Happily, his accent saved him from being
thought a hillbilly (is there even a non-disparaging term?). It's starting
to look like "nowadays" is one of those words stateside.
Larry G
Sigh, since I brought this up, I'll respond. "Nowadays" is a perfectly good
word, I use it, I'll probably use it at this very forum in the future.
<gasp> It is just my opinion that it has a "folksy", more humanly quality,
which is probably why I've seen it used to much.
It doesn't mean I regard those who use it as "hillbilly" or not "scholarly".
Please don't take it so personally. This reminds me of my previously
exchange with you, Donna, where I chose the word "pseudo" instead of "quasi"
to explain George Plimpton's mid-atlantic accent. You interpreted this as me
accusing Mr. Plimpton of being fake or "hoity-toity", which couldn't be
further from the truth. I know his accent was genuine and fascinating. I
made a blunder in my choice of words.
Similarly, I feel that "nowadays" has a somewhat folksy quality. A certain
unexplainable, Germanic feature that conveys something more familiar and
something, yes, less scholarly to the reader. Like using the word "free" vs.
"liberty".
This shouldn't be interpreted as the word having any less meaning or
prestige than another word. But, I DO recall that I probably would have been
encouraged to use another word in a more scholarly text, and remark that the
word's use has apparently changed.
This is NOT mean I am personally attacking anyone who uses it, or think that
they are any less intelligent because they do. Or that anyone who uses the
word is "stupid" when they use it. It simply has a more "folksy" quality as
others have called it. And, when I see it in a scholarly text it stands out
against the other text usually because the remainder does not attempt to
have that same quality, that's all. It's a matter of personal opinion to me,
and apparently to some others. It is not an attack.
My own grandmother also used folksy words like "yourn", probably the same
words Maria's relatives used in Tennessee. I love them. Sadly, these
dialects are disappearing. This does not mean my grandmother was "stupid".
She was well educated and taught school for many years in Southern
California. So, please don't interpret my opinion of a word like "nowadays"
as attacking those who use it.
It is a word like "olden". The word stands out probably because it is a last
survivor of words like it. Perhaps it's more a comment that perhaps we're
forming newer words in English based upon Latin or Romance languages, so
Germanic constructions almost stand out.
But at any rate, it wasn't an attack on anything. Rest assured, I won't call
you a bumpkin if you use the word. It's not what I meant. I use it too. But
I do note that its use has increased of late, and I find it surprising. My
opinion.
My only wish is that you wouldn't interpret so many of my opinions as
personal attacks on people. I find it disheartening. It is not the type of
person I am at all, and I wish I was better at expressing myself, so my
posts would come across that way to you.
Larry
Torkel Franzen
> Similarly, I feel that "nowadays" has a somewhat folksy quality.
Right, but I think you're entirely unrepresentative of users of
the language in having this feeling.
Larry G
I think you would be surprised at how many share my opinion. What I noticed
was that the word was used more often than previously, so obviously more
people share your opinion, which was in fact my point.
Larry
Mike Lyle
> Mike Lyle <mike_l...@REMOVETHISyahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> Donna Richoux wrote:
>> [...]
>>> I just checked Mastertexts collection of British and American >
>> classics; they have eighty hits for "nowadays," which is quite a
few
>> > for them, and almost none of them appear in strong dialect. In
>> fact, > about a quarter of them must be from Oscar Wilde, whose
>> high-class > characters use it frequently:
>>>
>>>
>>> Other users are Jane Austen, Walter Scott, Thomas Hardy, Arthur
>> Conan
>>> Doyle... Is this scholarly enough?
>>>
>>> As Professor of Latin at Bordeaux, we find him
>>> presenting a Latin poem to Charles V.; and indulging
>>> that fancy of his for Latin poetry which seems to us
>>> nowadays a childish pedantry, which was then--when
>>> Latin was the vernacular tongue of all scholars--a
>>> serious, if not altogether a useful, pursuit.
>>> -- Kingsley_Charles/ Historical_Lectures_and_Essays/
OK, respice finem. It's often useful to have the conclusion stated at
the beginning, so please note that I said " I for one would rarely if
ever use it or recommend its use in a wholly formal register."
"...wholly formal..." "...rarely if ever..."
>>
>> Well, there are plenty of examples back to the fifteenth century
or
>> earlier; but that raw Mastertext word-count reveals little. It
>> doesn't work like that. The Wilde quotations are all dialogue, for
a
>> start, so they aren't evidence.
>
> They aren't evidence of what?
For a belief that the word was suitable for wholly formal prose.
> So on the one hand, we have evidence of how Oscar Wilde thought
> English aristocrats of his day spoke. On the other hand, we have
> evidence of how Mike Lyle thought English aristocrats of Oscar
> Wilde's day spoke. Let's see, which one weighs up more heavily...
You'll remember that I claim the word belongs more in speech than in
formal writing. Last time I heard one, aristocrats spoke; but I'm
disturbed that you should invent a statement by me about how they
spoke in Wilde's time.
>> Jane wrote in a familiar style when it suited.
>
> "Familiar" doesn't matter to me.
Well, it matters in a discussion of the difference between familiar
and formal language.
> She didn't write in the strong rural
> and urban dialects that came into fashion later in that century,
none
> of this "Look'ee here, missy, tha knows" stuff. And as I said, none
> of the Mastertexts hits -- well, one -- looked to be strong
dialect.
I don't think strong dialect comes into it.
>
> When I looked into "folks," for comparison, it was much harder
(though
> still possible) to find non-dialectal uses of that. I remember
> Thackeray was quite fond of using "folks" in a neutral fashion, but
> not many others.
To echo your phrase, "folks" doesn't matter here.
>> I don't know about the Hardy, Scott, or Doyle examples,
>> but even if their examples were all in the authorial voice they
>> aren't remotely what you call "scholarly", any more than Kingsley
>> was;
>
> Right-o, everyone throws about remarks about Latin poetry being in
the
> vernacular tongue. Daily topic.
"Vernacular" is a quite ordinary word, and as far as I know has no
exact synonym. In the quotation it's used in an extended or even a
sloppy sense; but I think it works very well. The Victorians, of
course, used it more than we do because of the foreign territories
they administered. I assume you mention it as evidence that the
passage is quoted from a piece of formal English: but we don't need
that evidence, since it's obvious from the title and the subject.
> Here's a bit of circular reasoning to consider.
>
> A. No proper piece of scholarly writing uses "nowadays".
> B. Any piece of writing containing "nowadays" is not scholarly.
I'm not entirely convinced I said that; but if anybody had, it might
have been wrong, but it wouldn't have been a circular argument:
that's part of how connoisseurship works. (No horse has horns: if it
has horns, it isn't a horse.) I would, mind you, be astounded if you
were to insist that the four novelists you mentioned were scholarly.
Even poor Kingsley, who _was_ for a while paid to give two lectures a
year at Cambridge (perhaps on the say-so of Prince Albert, but I
can't remember), didn't exactly cover himself with glory as an
academic; and as a stylist he can be woeful.
and>
>> and I won't follow them up because what concerns us here is how
>> the word (or is it still a phrase?) rings today; and I for one
would
>> rarely if ever use it or recommend its use in a wholly formal
>> register.
>
> Well, that's always a puzzle, isn't it? If a person says "Word X
> sounds peculiar" and someone else points out that Word X has long
> been used in that way, then the first person says "I wasn't talking
> about back then, I'm talking about now."
Well, it can be the appropriate attitude: it's common in AUE
discussions. I could have followed up the leads; but it wouldn't have
changed my attitude if every example had turned out to be in
authorial prose. It was you, not I, who brought in examples as proof
of the word's suitability for formal writing, and introduced the
perhaps extraneous notion of scholarliness.
>
> All right, we can switch to talking about now, although I'd rather
> say a thing or two about how the 19th century is not that long ago.
> But here's 21st century Google hits on <"house of lords" nowadays>,
> because I'm trying to think of something we know is on line, is
> British (so you can't say this is an Americanism)
I made not the slightest such suggestion.
> and is formal.
> There are about 20,000 hits. Most of these are either testimony to
or
> reports by the House of Lords:
>
[...]
> Systematic misunderstandings of traditional moral principles,
and
> false inferences from them, are nowadays offered to justify
> jettisoning a traditional ethic of medicine in the interests
of
> having doctors kill patients.
[similar examples snipped]
> These are hardly Ma and Pa Kettle Go to Westminster.
And Westminster is hardly our most authoritative guide to prose
style: sample any recent Queen's Speech. I may have misunderstood,
but you seem to have an idea that aristocrats use more formal
language than other people; they don't, of course.
>
>> Further textual work could show me to be out of step; but
>> that's my position.
>
> Avoid any word you choose. I think, though, that you're missing out
> on a perfectly good one that has no synonym, for no sound reason
that
> I can see.
There are many alternatives. As I suggested, in this case I'm content
to be out of step; and there's no reason why you should share my
views on prose style.
Mike.
Harvey Van Sickle
> "Torkel Franzen" <tor...@sm.luth.se> wrote in message ...
>> "Larry G" <thela...@yahoo.com> writes:
>>
>>> Similarly, I feel that "nowadays" has a somewhat folksy quality.
>>
>> Right, but I think you're entirely unrepresentative of users of
>> the language in having this feeling.
>
> I think you would be surprised at how many share my opinion. What
> I noticed was that the word was used more often than previously,
There's the problem -- "previously" to what date?
As Donna has gone to great lengths to show, the word was in common use
in the 19th century, and is in common use in the late 20th century.
To what period are you applying "previous", when it was less-used?
> so obviously more people share your opinion, which was in fact my
> point.
--
Mike Lyle
>> I agree. Though Mike Lyle's strong opinion to the contrary did
>> momentarily make me wobble, since I'm also British but so much
older
>> than he is (or that's whatt I assume), on consideration I stand
my
>> what I first thought: "Nowadays" is standard formal modern
English,
>> without any hint of dialect or archaism.
>>
> Actually, Mike was the person you quoted, Alan, and I think he
agrees
> with you.
No, I'm obdurate in my view that it's rather less than formal; I
fully agree that it has no hint of dialect or archaism, though. It
just feels rather colloquial to me.
>
> As to yoof, my thoughts were, on seeing him at the Oxford boink,
"This
> can't be Mike Lyle. He's far too young and respectable." His first
> words to me were "Docrobin? I thought you'd be fat", which I
suppose
> is a backhanded compliment, nowadays.
Sorry about that, Robin! It was your rotundly jolly sense of humour
which set up the wrong mental image. I'll try to look a lot more
disreputable next time.
Mike.
Harvey Van Sickle
> Donna Richoux wrote:
>> There are about 20,000 hits. Most of these are either testimony
>> to or reports by the House of Lords:
> [...]
>> Systematic misunderstandings of traditional moral principles, and
>> false inferences from them, are nowadays offered to justify
>> jettisoning a traditional ethic of medicine in the interests of
>> having doctors kill patients.
>
> [similar examples snipped]
>
>> These are hardly Ma and Pa Kettle Go to Westminster.
>
> And Westminster is hardly our most authoritative guide to prose
> style: sample any recent Queen's Speech. I may have misunderstood,
> but you seem to have an idea that aristocrats use more formal
> language than other people; they don't, of course.
I think you *have* either misunderstood (or are misrepresenting -- I'll
give you the benefit of the doubt, though) what one could possibly
infer from Donna's use of the HofL for "use of a word in a formal
register".
Of course, the HofL aren't all arisocrats, and aristocrats don't use
"more formal language than other people".
But it would strike me as perverse to argue against the statement that
"Debates in the Lords tend to be conducted in a more formal spoken
register than is commonly encountered".
And those debates use "nowadays" in a manner which appears to be
entirely unselfconscious and idiomatic for that level of formal
register.
Donna Richoux
> My only wish is that you wouldn't interpret so many of my opinions as
> personal attacks on people.
I think your wish has been granted. I don't see anything in my two posts
on this thread that attacks you or anyone else.
As you say, you apparently are remembering some discussion from long
ago. I'm sorry anything I said so many years ago gave you pain; I'm sure
it was never my intention. I remember you from back then but I don't
associate you with opinions warranting attacks.
--
Donna Richoux
Larry G
> On 13 Dec 2004, Larry G wrote
>
> > "Torkel Franzen" <tor...@sm.luth.se> wrote in message ...
> >> "Larry G" <thela...@yahoo.com> writes:
> >>
> >>> Similarly, I feel that "nowadays" has a somewhat folksy quality.
> >>
> >> Right, but I think you're entirely unrepresentative of users of
> >> the language in having this feeling.
> >
> > I think you would be surprised at how many share my opinion. What
> > I noticed was that the word was used more often than previously,
>
> There's the problem -- "previously" to what date?
>
> As Donna has gone to great lengths to show, the word was in common use
> in the 19th century, and is in common use in the late 20th century.
>
> To what period are you applying "previous", when it was less-used?
That is hard to quantify, because I'm not referring to any period when
"nowadays" suddenly replaced more Romance vocabulary such as "currently".
I'm only referring to more scholarly material.
If I had to put a figure on scholarly material, I'd say in the last ten
years with the rise of the internet and as English has spread to more and
more countries.
Getting back to my main point, I was asked what features that I've noticed
*non-native* speakers of English using. One example was the use and increase
of "nowadays" in scholarly material, as one example.
English, as a rule, tends to use more Romance sources in scholarly material.
Germanic words are considered more "humane" and "concrete", while Romance
words are considered more "intellectual" and "abstract".
Harvey you've forced me to go digging my print Britannicas out of storage on
that one, hehe. Here's a quote from them. If you don't like the opinion of
it, you have my permission to write the University of Chicago with your
complaints <g>:
"Borrowing from French - Languages of the World article
The debt of the English language to French is large. The terms president,
representative, legislature, congress, constitution, and parliament are all
French. So, too, are duke, marquis, viscount, and baron; but king, queen,
lord, lady, earl, and knight are English. City, village, court, palace,
manor, mansion, residence, and domicile are French, but town, borough, hall,
house, bower, room, and home are English. Comparison between English and
French synomyms shows that the former are more human and contrete, the
latter more intellecutal and abstract: e.g. the terms freedom and liberty,
friendship and amity, hatred and enmity, love and affection, likelihood and
probability, truth and veracity, lying and mendacity. The superiority of
French cooking is duly recognized by the adoption of such culinary terms as
boil, broil, fry, grill, roast, souse, and toast. "Breakfast" is English,
but "dinner" and "supper" are French. "Hunt" is English, but "chase"
"quarry" "scent", and "tack" are French. Craftsmen bear names of English
origin: baker, builder, fisher (man), hedger, miller, shepherd, shoemaker,
wainwright, and weaver or webber. Names of skilled artisans, however are
French: carpenter, draper, haberdasher, joiner, mason, painter, plumber, and
tailor. Many terms relating to dress and fashion, cuisine and viniculture,
politics and diplomacy, drema and literature, art and ballet come from
French.
In the spheres of science and technology many terms come from Classical Grek
through French or directly from Greek. Pioneers of research and development
now regard Greek as a kind of inexhaustible quarry from which they can draw
linguistic material at will. "
- Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1985 edition. P. 675 - Macropedia from the
subarticle "English language" in "Languages of the World".
So when asked the question, what features of English have I seen non-native
speakers use, I used the example of latinate words such as "acquis" as
English even though I don't even see a definition in most dictionaries for
that word (I would assume the OED has it of course), while at the same time
including Germanic constructions such as "nowadays" in a scholarly text, or
Texan English phrases such as "y'all" to denote the plural "you". Though in
true Texan English "y'all" is the singular "you", while "all y'all" is the
plural <g>. This isn't limited to non-native speakers of course, or true of
all speakers.
This is because the history and baggage of such words is unknown to ESL
speakers. So these kinds of developments will occur in the English of
second-language speakers. In standard English, a more I've noticed that a
more Romance vocabulary occurs. The use of a word of Middle English origin
"nowadays" in more scholarly material, which tends to be more Latinesque, is
indeed new to me.
This isn't about people being "stupid" or not scholarly when they use a word
like this. I use it and others like it many times. But, English has
different registers. This kind of dual vocabulary I feel is why English has
become such a popular international language, because it is open to use by
its great vocabularly and freedom of syntax and morphology that lends itself
to ease of use in an international setting.
It is also why I believe that national academies prescribing use and even
international academies will not work. Each variant is different. I'm sure
the English spoken by francophones is different and has a more Romance
vocabulary and syntax, than the English spoken by Swedophones.
When Torkel told me that my take on this is "unrepresentative of the
majority of users". That may be true. And, especially so for English as
spoken in Sweden. But in my experience, I've noticed that more abstract
(words originating in Latin, French, Greek) tend to be used in more
scholarly texts, and found it interesting to see this word of Middle English
origins taking precedence over Romance words. That's my reality.
So, therefore, I'm coming from the point of view of an American English
speaker. That may be different from a native British speaker, or a native
Canadian speaker in Britain who can identify both from Western North America
and from Europe <g>, or the English as spoken by ESL speakers in Sweden,
Norway, China, or Italy. Especially as English entrenches itself as a common
international tongue.
That's why I feel an international academy, despite, its intentions will
find it hard to prescribe a standard variety, and native speakers will take
offense if they are told by second-language speakers that their own national
version of English is somehow "incorrect" despite the good intentions of
such an academy, as the language has so many spoken variations.
At any rate, that's the point I'm trying to convey. Not that anyone using a
certain term is "stupid" or somehow not scholarly, even though I've used
this term myself. I want diversity and the preservation of various dialects
and languages.
What I'm getting at is I'm surprised that a word of English origin is
gaining ground in what was once the domain of French or Latin-origin words.
Not that it isn't a perfectly good word. It's like the phrase "olden days"
or "olden times". It used to be somewhat common in English as recently as
about 20 years ago. But in more recent times, you are more likely to hear
"back in the day" or some such phrase in its place.
It doesn't mean "olden" is somehow "redneck", just that "old" is replacing
this. And, I find it sad for the language, but it's hard to change usage.
I hope I've been able to express myself more clearly here.
Larry
Laura F. Spira
(As I said at the time, I thought you'd be rounder, fatter and balder,
Mike.)
I have been pondering "nowadays"*. As ever, I am impressed by Donna's
scholarly research** but I think I share Mike's view on this. I can't
quite put my finger on the reason, but I would not use "nowadays" in
formal writing and I don't think I've come across it in academic papers
in my discipline - it would stick out like a sore thumb. I've certainly
corrected it in students' work.
*while spending the last hour or so trying to find all my old work and
home emails in a strangely emptied copy of Netscape - my initial anxiety
has given way to a curious sense of release but if anyone knows how to
find them, I'd be grateful for a hint
** in an ideal world, she and John Dean would be my research assistants
--
Laura, now using Thunderbird
(emulate St. George for email)
Larry G
Thanks Donna. No problem. I just didn't want you, or anyone else, to be
caused any pain as well if you thought that my opinion of this word was in
anyway some kind of attack either. It's forgotten. :)
Larry
Robin Bignall
<mike_l...@REMOVETHISyahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>Robin Bignall wrote:
>> On Mon, 13 Dec 2004 14:27:37 GMT, "Alan Jones"
><a...@blueyonder.co.uk>
>> wrote:
>[...]
>>> I agree. Though Mike Lyle's strong opinion to the contrary did
>>> momentarily make me wobble, since I'm also British but so much
>older
>>> than he is (or that's whatt I assume), on consideration I stand
>my
>>> what I first thought: "Nowadays" is standard formal modern
>English,
>>> without any hint of dialect or archaism.
>>>
>> Actually, Mike was the person you quoted, Alan, and I think he
>agrees
>> with you.
>
>No, I'm obdurate in my view that it's rather less than formal; I
>fully agree that it has no hint of dialect or archaism, though. It
>just feels rather colloquial to me.
>>
Phew! I had to chase the thread back a bit to see that those House of
Lords' references were posted by Donna, not you. Sorry, Mike! What's
good enough for their Lordships is good enough for me. <tugs forelock,
smiles ingratiatingly>
My eye wouldn't even hesitate for an instant on seeing it in formal
writing, possibly because it's a word I learned very early, a
favourite of my father's, one I've heard often on both sides of the
pond.
>> As to yoof, my thoughts were, on seeing him at the Oxford boink,
>"This
>> can't be Mike Lyle. He's far too young and respectable." His first
>> words to me were "Docrobin? I thought you'd be fat", which I
>suppose
>> is a backhanded compliment, nowadays.
>
>Sorry about that, Robin! It was your rotundly jolly sense of humour
>which set up the wrong mental image. I'll try to look a lot more
>disreputable next time.
>
A touch of pig muck on the wellies will be authentic enough, ta very
much.
John Dean
> Raymond S. Wise <mplsra...@gbronline.com> wrote:
>
>> "Larry G" <thela...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>> news:3231e8F...@individual.net...
>>>> "nowadays"?
>>>
>>> Because "nowadays" has a "down home" feel. There's nothing wrong
>>> with it, I accept it. But it seems odd in non colloquial language
>>> to me. My English teachers would have preferred "currently" or some
>>> other adjective. Nothing wrong with it, as there's nothing wrong
>>> with "y'all". But to me, it is not "formal" either.
>>
>>
>> "Nowadays" has long been a standard term. Neither the 1895 *Century
>> Dictionary* nor the 1913 *Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary*
>> mark it with a usage label, which they certainly would have if they
>> considered it anything other than acceptable in formal usage.
>>
>
> Doyle... Is this scholarly enough?
>
> As Professor of Latin at Bordeaux, we find him
> presenting a Latin poem to Charles V.; and indulging
> that fancy of his for Latin poetry which seems to us
> nowadays a childish pedantry, which was then--when
> Latin was the vernacular tongue of all scholars--a
> serious, if not altogether a useful, pursuit.
> -- Kingsley_Charles/ Historical_Lectures_and_Essays/
OED records it as now-a-days from 1362 onwards but notes "Now freq.
written without hyphens as one word."
I wonder why / how they missed the opportunity to write Nowadays freq.
written without hyphens as one word."
--
John Dean
Oxford
Steve Hayes
wrote:
>> I have to agree with Alan, even though I am, I think, a little
>> younger (mid-fifties). "Nowadays" is perfectly ordinary English,
>> with no hint of informality.
>
>Add my vote on this side, too.
>
>Until reading this thread, it had never remotely occurred to me that
>"nowadays" might be considered remarkable in any way, shape or form --
>as far as I'm aware it remains a solid word, still appropriate and used
>in all registers.
I use it quite frequently, and heard it used, quite normally, on Sky News at
midday today.
I wouldn't even have noticed it if it hadn't been for this thread.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/stevesig.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
Steve Hayes
wrote:
>This isn't the first time I have seen posters suggest that a particular
>word, or phrase, which I find unexceptionable, is "hillbilly", or
>informal, or dialect. It is usually US posters who make these
>pronouncements rather than transplanted Australians though.
But it works the other way too -- words that sound perfectly normal to US
speakers sound slightly quaint and old-fashioned to me -- "gotten" and
"pitcher:, for example.
And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and commonplace
words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some people in the US.
Areff
> And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and commonplace
> words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some people in the US.
And as for "nowadays", we have just two Americans, Tony Cooper and Larry
G, who regard it as quaint.
--
Steny '08!
Areff
> And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and commonplace
> words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some people in the US.
"Fortnight" doesn't seem quaint to me -- rather, it seems BrE, in a
strongly Victorian sort of way.
--
Steny '08!
R J Valentine
1.8*10^12 furlongs per fortnight: it's not just a good idea; it's the LAW!
--
R. J. Valentine <mailto:r...@smart.net>
Now how is that strongly BrE? I ask you.
dcw
>> I think you would be surprised at how many share my opinion. What
>> I noticed was that the word was used more often than previously,
>
>There's the problem -- "previously" to what date?
>
>As Donna has gone to great lengths to show, the word was in common use
>in the 19th century, and is in common use in the late 20th century.
>
>To what period are you applying "previous", when it was less-used?
It seems there's been some doubt about it for a long time. Todd's
edition (1818) of Johnson says
[This word, though common and used by the best writers,
is perhaps barbarous]
(I think the [] mean that it's Todd, not Johnson) and cites
Spencer, Shakespeare, South, Tillotson, and Garrick.
David
Mickwick
>I have been pondering "nowadays"*. As ever, I am impressed by Donna's
>scholarly research** but I think I share Mike's view on this. I can't
>quite put my finger on the reason, but I would not use "nowadays" in
>formal writing and I don't think I've come across it in academic papers
>in my discipline - it would stick out like a sore thumb. I've certainly
>corrected it in students' work.
I'm wary of using 'nowadays', not because I regard it as informal but
because I associate its use with people who bang on about how much
better things used to be when politicians were sincere and children
well-mannered and the 8.15 from Tunbridge Welles left on time and so on.
(This doesn't mean that things weren't much better; it just means that I
want to disguise my banging on.)
--
Mickwick
Dena Jo
> *while spending the last hour or so trying to find all my old work
> and home emails in a strangely emptied copy of Netscape - my
> initial anxiety has given way to a curious sense of release but if
> anyone knows how to find them
You're having email problems? Aha! Have you received any mail from me
in the last week or so?
--
Dena Jo
Email goes to denajo2 at the dot com variation of the Yahoo domain.
Plonk the bastards: http://www.schmuckwithanunderwood.com/trolls.html
Harvey Van Sickle
-snip great explanatory post-
> What I'm getting at is I'm surprised that a word of English origin
> is gaining ground in what was once the domain of French or
> Latin-origin words. Not that it isn't a perfectly good word. It's
> like the phrase "olden days" or "olden times". It used to be
> somewhat common in English as recently as about 20 years ago. But
> in more recent times, you are more likely to hear "back in the
> day" or some such phrase in its place.
>
> It doesn't mean "olden" is somehow "redneck", just that "old" is
> replacing this. And, I find it sad for the language, but it's hard
> to change usage.
>
> I hope I've been able to express myself more clearly here.
Extremely so -- I now see what you're getting at.
It still doesn't resonate with me on a personal level: as mentioned
elsethread, until reading this I'd never thought of linking "nowadays"
(which sounds entirely normal to me) with words like "olden" (which
sounds consciously archaic).
That may well be (as you noted) a function of my dual pondiality. (A
good example of that was in a pub discussion one evening when I used
the word "happenstance". That had never struck me as sounding even
remotely old-fashioned, but it stopped a couple of people in mid-
conversation that evening.)
Mike Lyle
I've deleted the earlier messages, but I think it was Perchprism who
said something not unlike my avowal that I wouldn't be inclined to
use it in elevated language.
Mike.
Mike Lyle
> On 13 Dec 2004, Mike Lyle wrote
> I think you *have* either misunderstood (or are misrepresenting --
> I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, though) what one could
> possibly infer from Donna's use of the HofL for "use of a word in a
> formal register".
>
> Of course, the HofL aren't all arisocrats, and aristocrats don't
use
> "more formal language than other people".
>
> But it would strike me as perverse to argue against the statement
that
> "Debates in the Lords tend to be conducted in a more formal spoken
> register than is commonly encountered".
I wouldn't disagree, for a moment. I did say I thought the quality of
English prose at Westminster was low, though.
>
> And those debates use "nowadays" in a manner which appears to be
> entirely unselfconscious and idiomatic for that level of formal
> register.
No, it wasn't so much the Lords bits -- some of which weren't from
Peers of the Realm anyhow -- as the earlier insistence on the
aristocratic birth of quoted Oscar Wilde characters.
Interestingly, though OT, I've gathered that thoughtful hereditaries
incline to the view that this Kingdom never had a real aristocracy
anyhow. When one thinks of Russian, German, or French history it's a
convincing idea, perhaps.
Mike.
Donna Richoux
>
> No, it wasn't so much the Lords bits -- some of which weren't from
> Peers of the Realm anyhow -- as the earlier insistence on the
> aristocratic birth of quoted Oscar Wilde characters.
Listen, my country doesn't have titles and it doesn't have aristocrats,
but if you're telling me I'm wrong to use the word "aristocratic" to
describe characters that Wilde named Lady Markby, Lord Illingworth, and
Lady Caroline, I'll be mighty surprised.
> Interestingly, though OT, I've gathered that thoughtful hereditaries
> incline to the view that this Kingdom never had a real aristocracy
> anyhow. When one thinks of Russian, German, or French history it's a
> convincing idea, perhaps.
So it sounds like you don't think the word can properly be applied to
anyone in England. No wonder you're harping on this, then.
--
Donna Richoux
An American living in the Netherlands
Areff
> Mike Lyle <mike_l...@REMOVETHISyahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
>>
>> No, it wasn't so much the Lords bits -- some of which weren't from
>> Peers of the Realm anyhow -- as the earlier insistence on the
>> aristocratic birth of quoted Oscar Wilde characters.
>
> Listen, my country doesn't have titles and it doesn't have aristocrats,
> but if you're telling me I'm wrong to use the word "aristocratic" to
> describe characters that Wilde named Lady Markby, Lord Illingworth, and
> Lady Caroline, I'll be mighty surprised.
The possession of the title didn't necessarily signify aristocratic birth
back then, did it?
--
Steny '08!
Harvey Van Sickle
But it never has: someone has to be "the first Lord Tiddlypom".
(There's a pecking order, of course: the successful brewers who became
peers were referred to as "the beerage".)
But by and large, the late 19th-century lords was populated by the
aristocratically-born rather than the newly-ennobled. (And "life
peers" as we now understand them[1] didn't exist until 1958.)
[1]There was arguable at least one life-limited peerage prior to this,
but it was a legalistic oddity.
Skitt
Well, elevated language dictates the use of such things as "at this point in
time" and the like, no?
--
Skitt (in Hayward, California)
www.geocities.com/opus731/
Mike Lyle
> Mike Lyle <mike_l...@REMOVETHISyahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
>>
>> No, it wasn't so much the Lords bits -- some of which weren't from
>> Peers of the Realm anyhow -- as the earlier insistence on the
>> aristocratic birth of quoted Oscar Wilde characters.
>
> Listen, my country doesn't have titles and it doesn't have
> aristocrats, but if you're telling me I'm wrong to use the word
> "aristocratic" to describe characters that Wilde named Lady Markby,
> Lord Illingworth, and Lady Caroline, I'll be mighty surprised.
Try reading what I wrote. It was clear that you attached significance
to the social status of the Wilde characters you mentioned. (You even
raised, curiously, the matter of whether Oscar or I were the best
judge of how aristocrats of his time spoke.) The implication was that
aristocrats' English was in some sense important to the discussion,
which I would deny, since it's much the same as anybody else's. I had
no objection to your choice of word in the context, and doubt if I
put so much as a pair of quotation marks round the word -- but if I
did, it would have been to signal that I was quoting.
>
>> Interestingly, though OT, I've gathered that thoughtful
hereditaries
>> incline to the view that this Kingdom never had a real aristocracy
>> anyhow. When one thinks of Russian, German, or French history it's
a
>> convincing idea, perhaps.
>
> So it sounds like you don't think the word can properly be applied
to
> anyone in England. No wonder you're harping on this, then.
No, you're missing the point again. I marked it "OT", since it was a
departure from the topic of the thread. I am not "harping" on the
subject: you introduced it -- misguidedly, in my opinion -- and I
responded. Harvey mentioned it again, apparently having missed part
of the dialogue, and I responded to that. That's a discussion, not
harping. The appropriateness of the word "aristocracy" to British and
Irish conditions is an interesting matter, though: as I said, I'd
heard it questioned by people who might themselves be called
"aristocrats".
Mike.
Robin Bignall
<harve...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>On 13 Dec 2004, Larry G wrote
>
>-snip great explanatory post-
>
>> What I'm getting at is I'm surprised that a word of English origin
>> is gaining ground in what was once the domain of French or
>> Latin-origin words. Not that it isn't a perfectly good word. It's
>> like the phrase "olden days" or "olden times". It used to be
>> somewhat common in English as recently as about 20 years ago. But
>> in more recent times, you are more likely to hear "back in the
>> day" or some such phrase in its place.
>>
>> It doesn't mean "olden" is somehow "redneck", just that "old" is
>> replacing this. And, I find it sad for the language, but it's hard
>> to change usage.
>>
>> I hope I've been able to express myself more clearly here.
>
>Extremely so -- I now see what you're getting at.
>
>It still doesn't resonate with me on a personal level: as mentioned
>elsethread, until reading this I'd never thought of linking "nowadays"
>(which sounds entirely normal to me) with words like "olden" (which
>sounds consciously archaic).
>
I would expect to see it only in "In the olden days..." nowadays.
Pretty much a cliché.
>That may well be (as you noted) a function of my dual pondiality. (A
>good example of that was in a pub discussion one evening when I used
>the word "happenstance". That had never struck me as sounding even
>remotely old-fashioned, but it stopped a couple of people in mid-
>conversation that evening.)
I heard and used that when I were a nipper, but COD10 says it's mainly
American.
happenstance
· n. chiefly N. Amer. coincidence.
– ORIGIN C19: blend of happen and circumstance.
Mike Lyle
Godalmighty! "Insistence on the _relevance_ of the aristocratic birth
of entirely fictitious characters in plays by Oscar Wilde _to their
use of language_ in this instance", then! I was trying to get away
from this impasse, and to be as brief as I could about it. All I was
doing was challenging Donna's poor selection of examples to
illustrate a language point she was making which I didn't agree with.
(Or was it a language point I was making that she didn't agree with?)
I could almost certainly have found better examples to attack my case
myself.
Mike.
Mike Lyle
Certainly not, and you know it! I said "elevated", not "constipated".
Mike.
Skitt
<grin>
John Dean
I thought we *were* your research assistants? Am I suing the wrong
person for unpaid bonuses?
--
John Dean
Oxford
R H Draney
>
>Are we still voting? A friend of mine who's an English teacher says
>her students use "nowadays" a lot and it drives her crazy, but to me
>it's "appropriate and used in all registers". There, that should
>settle things.
If your friend's not a citizen of aue, her vote doesn't count....r
R J Valentine
} On 13 Dec 2004, Laura F. Spira posted thus:
}
}> *while spending the last hour or so trying to find all my old work
}> and home emails in a strangely emptied copy of Netscape - my
}> initial anxiety has given way to a curious sense of release but if
}> anyone knows how to find them
}
} You're having email problems? Aha! Have you received any mail from me
} in the last week or so?
Or from me?
Roland Hutchinson
And the semantic distance between that and "quaint" would be measured in
what? Millimeters? Microns? Angstroms?
--
Roland Hutchinson Will play viola da gamba for food.
NB mail to my.spamtrap [at] verizon.net is heavily filtered to
remove spam. If your message looks like spam I may not see it.
R J Valentine
} Areff wrote:
}
}> Steve Hayes wrote:
}>> And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and
}>> commonplace words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some people in
}>> the US.
}>
}> "Fortnight" doesn't seem quaint to me -- rather, it seems BrE, in a
}> strongly Victorian sort of way.
}
} And the semantic distance between that and "quaint" would be measured in
} what? Millimeters? Microns? Angstroms?
Deciponds?
Steve Hayes
It's not the same thing.
"Nowadays" means "at this point in time and for an unspecified time before and
after".
Areff
> Areff wrote:
>
>> Steve Hayes wrote:
>>> And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and
>>> commonplace words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some people in
>>> the US.
>>
>> "Fortnight" doesn't seem quaint to me -- rather, it seems BrE, in a
>> strongly Victorian sort of way.
>
> And the semantic distance between that and "quaint" would be measured in
> what? Millimeters? Microns? Angstroms?
Strongly Victorian seems too sophisticated to be quaint.
--
Steny '08!
Steve Hayes
"Gotten" and "pitcher" sound strongly Jacobean -- is that also too
sophisticated to be quaint?
Skitt
> "Skitt" wrote:
>> Mike Lyle wrote:
>>> Areff wrote:
>>>> Steve Hayes wrote:
>>>>> And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and
>>>>> commonplace words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some
>>>>> people in the US.
>>>>
>>>> And as for "nowadays", we have just two Americans, Tony Cooper and
>>>> Larry G, who regard it as quaint.
>>>
>>> I've deleted the earlier messages, but I think it was Perchprism who
>>> said something not unlike my avowal that I wouldn't be inclined to
>>> use it in elevated language.
>>
>> Well, elevated language dictates the use of such things as "at this
>> point in time" and the like, no?
>
> It's not the same thing.
>
> "Nowadays" means "at this point in time and for an unspecified time
> before and after".
True, and I simply *must* use smileys sometimes, it appears.
Areff
> On 15 Dec 2004 07:12:25 GMT, Areff <m...@privacy.net> wrote:
>
>>Roland Hutchinson wrote:
>>> Areff wrote:
>>>
>>>> Steve Hayes wrote:
>>>>> And words like "nowadays" and "fortnight", which are everyday and
>>>>> commonplace words to me, seem to sound similarly quaint to some people in
>>>>> the US.
>>>>
>>>> "Fortnight" doesn't seem quaint to me -- rather, it seems BrE, in a
>>>> strongly Victorian sort of way.
>>>
>>> And the semantic distance between that and "quaint" would be measured in
>>> what? Millimeters? Microns? Angstroms?
>>
>>Strongly Victorian seems too sophisticated to be quaint.
>
> "Gotten" and "pitcher" sound strongly Jacobean -- is that also too
> sophisticated to be quaint?
They sound neither sophisticated nor quaint to me. Depending on the
speaker's accent, use of "got" in place of "gotten" might sound
unsophisticated.
--
Steny '08!
jerry_f...@yahoo.com
--
Jerry Friedman
Charles Riggs
I'd argue for location, not only accent. An American permanently in
Ireland correctly uses Irishspeak and British spelling too, no? When
an Irish person or a Brit has lived in the US for a while, must he
adopt US standards for his English? Apart from his accent, which
almost all will see as being both quaint and desirable, I'd think so.
By the way, does "quaint" generally have pejorative implications? One
of my new writer friends and I were arguing the point last night.
--
Charles Riggs
They are no accented letters in my email address
jerry_f...@yahoo.com
> On 13 Dec 2004, Frances Kemmish wrote
> > Alan Jones wrote:
> >> "Donna Richoux" <tr...@euronet.nl> wrote in message
> >> news:1goqfuq.lggdy0n6nqtwN%tr...@euronet.nl...
>
> -snip-
>
> >>> Avoid any word you choose. I think, though, that you're missing
> >>> out on a perfectly good one that has no synonym, for no sound
> >>> reason that I can see.
>
> >> I agree. Though Mike Lyle's strong opinion to the contrary did
> >> momentarily make me wobble, since I'm also British but so much
> >> older than he is (or that's whatt I assume), on consideration I
> >> stand my what I first thought: "Nowadays" is standard formal
> >> modern English, without any hint of dialect or archaism.
>
> > younger (mid-fifties). "Nowadays" is perfectly ordinary English,
> > with no hint of informality.
>
> Add my vote on this side, too.
>
> Until reading this thread, it had never remotely occurred to me that
> "nowadays" might be considered remarkable in any way, shape or form
--
> as far as I'm aware it remains a solid word, still appropriate and
used
> in all registers.
Are we still voting? A friend of mine who's an English teacher says
her students use "nowadays" a lot and it drives her crazy, but to me
it's "appropriate and used in all registers". There, that should
settle things.
--
Jerry Friedman
R H Draney
Sure, and tell her to help herself to the donuts in the waiting room too....
She can *have* a provisional ballot; we just don't have to count it....r
Harvey Van Sickle
Care is needed here: some people in Rightpondia get very agitated
about provisionals and ballots....