BS:threat to English language from Americanisms

Subject: RE: BS:threat to English language from Americanisms
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 16 Jul 11 - 11:27 AM

I once had the same problem with a communal dictionary, though this one wasn't on Word, might have been Wordstar. One of our number took it personally if he was flagged for a spelling error, and as we were supporting ICL GEORGE 3 systems, the dictionary was rapidly filling up with four-letter words starting with X, not to mention London post-codes. About the only words that didn't get put in it were the surnames of our Greek, Polish, Czech etc colleagues.

As for De Gaule, I don't think he did much riding in England, though I seem to remember him mounted on a much larger equine on ceremonial occasions. The French were involved in the Liberation, not to mention Scots, Poles, Antipodeans etc.

Subject: RE: BS:threat to English language from Americanisms
From: Big Mick
Date: 16 Jul 11 - 10:44 AM

This is similar to the argument over the language that the Irish folks speak. In common usage, it is called Gaelic. But there is a whole family of gaelic languages divided into two subdivisions. The only one properly called Gaelic in English is Scots Gaelic which derived from the dialect of the Irish language of Ulster, as I understand it. The proper term for the Irish language is Gaeilge. Translated into English (as it refers to the language) that would be "Irish". It is also sometimes referred to as Irish Gaelic. The English language as spoken by the Irish is called Hiberno-English. From that I think it reasonable to suggest that the various dialects of the language spoken in the US and Canada could be referred to properly as American-English, remembering that all the peoples of this part of the world live in the Americas.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS:threat to English language from Americanisms
From: kendall
Date: 16 Jul 11 - 10:17 AM

I speak American English in a Maine dialect. Does that satisfy the UK pedants?

Didn't Charles De Gaul once say that France should come up with a French word for television? He also had a problem with English creeping into the French language.
I'll bet he didn't mind hearing English spoken while he sat on has ass in England while England, America and Canada freed his country from the Germans.

Subject: RE: BS:threat to English language from Americanisms
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 16 Jul 11 - 09:31 AM

"crushingly positive?"

Subject: RE: BS:threat to English language from Americanisms
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 16 Jul 11 - 09:11 AM

I use MSWord. If I type "singalong" it flags it as an error, and it suggests "sing along" and "sing-along" as alternatives. It accepts "sing-a-long" if I type it that way, but I think it would do the same with any sequence of 3 valid words connected by hyphens, e.g. "one-two-three" or "one-too-three."

By the way, I once worked in an office where the computer consultant who set up our local network had installed MSWord so that the CUSTOM.DIC file resided on the server, so everyone in the company shared the same dictionary. I can see how that might be useful if you have a careful, literate person managing the file and everyone else keeps their hands off, but that's not what happened.

One day I noticed my spell checker was failing to flag common typing errors, so I investigated, and found that CUSTOM.DIC was full of dozens, if not hundreds, of misspelled words. It looked as if someone in the office (a bad speller or bad typist, no doubt) had been clicking "Add to Dictionary" every time their spell checker found a misspelled word!

I never found out who it was. I cleaned up the dictionary, and checked it periodically after that, and it stayed clean. Evidently the culprit had learned the proper way to use a spell-checker.

The next time we upgraded to a newer version of Word, it was installed in a more conventional way, so that each employee had his own CUSTOM.DIC file on his own C: drive.

I have heard lots of complaints about spell-checkers, but every time I have checked out someone's complaint on my own computer, I find it works just fine.

By the way, I once learned that you can create a file called (if I remember correctly) SUPPRESS.DIC and fill it full of words that you don't like (like "sing-a-long") and MSWord will thereafter always flag those words as errors. That can be very useful, especially if you have to edit documents that other people wrote. I did it once as an experiment and it worked, but that was a couple of computer generations ago, and I don't remember the details.

Subject: RE: BS:threat to English language from Americanisms
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Jul 11 - 01:24 AM

In fact, 'wrong' & 'illiterate' right back 2U ~ BIG'EAD!!!

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 11:57 PM

Sorry, Steve, but you are deluded, and are being absurdly prescriptive, if you think the matter that simple. Here, e.g., is the wiki entry on the topic:

===The traditional style of pluralizing single letters with the addition of 's (for example, B's come after A's) was extended to some of the earliest initialisms, which tended to be written with periods to indicate the omission of letters; some writers still pluralize initialisms in this way. Some style guides continue to require such apostrophes—perhaps partly to make it clear that the lower case s is only for pluralization and would not appear in the singular form of the word, for some acronyms and abbreviations do include lowercase letters.
However, it has become common among many writers to inflect initialisms as ordinary words, using simple s, without an apostrophe, for the plural. In this case, compact discs becomes CDs. The logic here is that the apostrophe should be restricted to possessives: for example, the CD's label (the label of the compact disc).[31]
Multiple options arise when initialisms are spelled with periods and are pluralized: for example, whether compact discs may become C.D.'s, C.D.s, CD's, or CDs. Possessive plurals that also include apostrophes for mere pluralization and periods appear especially complex: for example, the C.D.'s' labels (the labels of the compact discs). This is yet another reason to use apostrophes only for possessives and not for plurals. In some instances, however, an apostrophe may increase clarity: for example, if the final letter of an abbreviation is S, as in SOS's, or when pluralizing an abbreviation that has periods.[32][33] (In The New York Times, the plural possessive of G.I., which the newspaper prints with periods in reference to United States Army soldiers, is G.I.'s, with no apostrophe after the s.)=== [emphases mine]

You see: not so simple as you appear, delusionally, to believe; and certainly no reason for you to adopt such a crushingly positive tone.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 10:04 PM

Q, was "OK" necessary?

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 09:56 PM

Some portmanteau words:

anecdotage (yes, as I get older)
blog
brunch
chortle (Lewis Carroll)
chunnel
guestimate
e words, such as email
insinuendo
internet
infomercial
humongous
refudiate
slithy (Lewis Carroll)

I suppose one could ask- is the word necessary? (That would eliminate irregardless)

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 09:09 PM

As I posted previously, dictionaries don't include new words that are too little used to warrant inclusion. There is a good possibility that 'refudiate', number one in the Oxford Press top ten list for 2010, will be accepted by major dictionaries; none accept it now because the word has yet to 'prove' itself.
"Litigating circumstances"? That made me smile, because 'my son the lawyer' talks about them. But I agree, the words ain't interchangable.

Irregardless has been a subject of controversy for almost 100 years. A much used word, it is included in The Oxford English Dictionary, but its double negative nature is noted and the definition "regardless' is given.
Like refudiate, it is a 'portmanteau' word, probably a combination of irrespective and regardless.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 08:57 PM

Are you quite sure that "the dictionaries" have admitted "refudiate" as a new word? And if they have, is anyone using it?

I heard a Republican use "refudiate" on TV months before SP did. Because he wasn't famous, nobody cared or noticed.

Since then, the only person I've heard use the word is SP herself. So it doesn't seem like much of a threat to English, which already has an enormous vocabulary for people to choose from. If they want to say "refudiate," no one can stop them. If they want to write it seriously, an editor can change it.

People don't use every word they see in the dictionary anyway, so the presence of "refudiate" wouldn't frighten me.

It's pretty silly, but hardly more so than "OK."

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Genie
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 06:52 PM

GUEST,Lighter "...

And 95% (say) of what's ever been published is the well-edited work of unusually talented writers - even including tabloid journalists.

The average user of English anywhere on earth would be unable to write a publishable tabloid article without more training in every aspect of writing than he or she would likely get in a first-year university composition course, plus much dedicated practice and revision and a decent editor. ..."

Ah, yes, there have always been and will always be "average users" of a language who will butcher it (especially written English, which has such unpredictable spelling). What annoys me is how many "unusually talented" writers, journalists, commentators, news anchors, etc., have picked up bad grammar (e.g., "just between you and I" or "if you have a problem, come talk to myself") or spelling (confusing "its" and "it's" or describing a decade as "the 50's" instead of "the '50s"" or writing "sing-a-long" or printing a sign that says "tomato's $1.49/lb.).   I can generally count on The New York Times or Newsweek to use proper English grammar and spelling and punctuation, but the talking heads (including anchors) on CNN, the networks, even some NPR shows, plus entertainment magazines, not so much.

As for Sarah Palin not being the first to mangle "refute" and "repudiate" and come up with "refudiate," that's not surprising. I once had a supervisor, an RN, who constantly talked about "litigating circumstances" and I've known lots of people who say "irregardless." But the dictionaries didn't change the spelling of "tomato" to "tomatoe" just because Dan Quayle read that misspelling during a spelling bee, nor do they add "litigating" as a synonym for "mitigating" or legitimize "irregardless" just because a bunch of people make those mistakes.   
(I'm glad to know that the online dictionary I use doesn't recognize "refudiate.")

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Genie
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 06:33 PM

MtheGM,
"It seems that the one place where an apostrophe is needed in English for a plural is when its absence would make the word or abbreviation be misread. E.g., "There are four i's are there in "Mississippi," or "CD'S FOR SALE." But that's not the case with numbers, e.g., dates or when an acronym is in capitals and the s is in lower case.

The real problem with using an apostrophe for things like "during the '50s" is that people tend to put it in where it's not needed, between the number and the "s," and leave it out where it IS needed, in place of the century indicator.   If you say "in the 90's" or "in the 90s," are you talking about the "gay (eighteen) nineties" or the nineteen nineties (or some other century)?

Spell checkers can't be trusted for a lot of reasons, one being that they sometimes contain outright errors.   When I used to use MS Word, I found that every time I typed "singalong" or "sing-along" -- either of which is correct -- Word's Spell Checker changed it to "sing-a-long," which doesn't make any sense unless maybe you mean "sing a long song."

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 03:05 PM

Oh . . . it's a typo. Sorry, how silly of me, I should have realised.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 02:26 PM

ming = mind in the post?
Pong = unpleasant odor, in a British series I watched (Lovejoy).

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 02:21 PM

That's a use of "ming" that I hadn't come across before - here it usually means "pong".

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 02:03 PM

"CDs" can't be an imperative (or even an indicative) as it's not a verb (yet). What the genitive plural of CD is, is another matter entirely. Is "Cd's'" a possibility?

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 02:01 PM

Re Ya', post by Catspaw:
Nuthin' wrong if it refers to y'all (yo'all).

But gramatically-
yo'- singular
yo'all- two, or a few.
all yo'all- a group.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 01:57 PM

>I have heard tell that people in other countries of the Americas rather ming The States commandeering America for itself.

We've all heard this, but do they exist?

Americans don't squirm when Latin Americans routinely call them "North Americans." And since no Latin Americans are native speakers of Latin, I'd suppose that name should be disagreeable to them in any language.

Besides, millions of "Latin Americans" have grown up speaking American Indian and other non-Spanish, non-Portuguese languages. Shouldn't they be mad? Isn't this another serious impediment to international understanding? And even if you're going to ignore these people, why obscure the proud Portuguese and Spanish cultures behind that of the ill-behaved ancient Romans?

And shouldn't Canadians be angry for *not* being considered "norteamericanos"?

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 01:05 PM

I would say that "CDs" is not an alternative - it's imperative. There is no more reason to insert that apostrophe than there is to stick one in "a pound of apple's." It doesn't help to clarify anything and is merely potentially confusing. "CD's" as a plural is simply illiterate. Wrong, in other words.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: autolycus
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 12:31 PM

So is there anything wrong with

"I should say, in fact, that both CD's and CDs could be correct, as it used to be the rule that the apostrophe should be used for plural's of abbreviation's; but usage has rendered this optional of late, it is my impression."

?


It may be a problem to find a better term than 'Americans'. There's no such problem finding replacements for America.

As I said in my earlier stint, you have the choice of U.S.,U.S.A., The States, The United States [often said by Yanks], Stateside - to name only 5.

I have heard tell that people in other countries of the Americas rather ming The States commandeering America for itself.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: meself
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 12:12 PM

Speaking as a Canadian: no "actual, otherwise normal Canadians" 'get "pissed off" when Americans are referred to as "Americans"'. What else are you going to call them, after all? Any Canadian who professes outrage at such is certainly not "normal", and may not be "actual".

Some of us get slightly disgruntled when USA is referred to as "America" - on the other hand, in the past decade or so, many Canadians themselves have begun to refer to "the States" as "America". So there you go.

-------------------------

It's my understanding that adding "'s" used to be the approved way of indicating plural abbreviations, but that the "rule" has changed within the last thirty years or so.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 11:41 AM

That doesn't mean it can 'never be correct', Steve. All you have done is demonstrate why you would prefer to use the alternative to avoid ambiguity, which is quite a different thing.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 10:52 AM

"CD's" can never be correct as a plural because, among other things, it means something else: "I played the CD's fourth track." Inserting that apostrophe can't even be explained away as somehow making the meaning clearer, because it just doesn't. In fact, it does the opposite. "CDs" is perfectly clear as it is.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: catspaw49
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 09:34 AM

I don't think anyone actually cares but the joke/barb still runs along in good humor here in the USA. In Canada, it runs along in good humour...........


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 09:16 AM

Probably covered elsewhere, but...

Do we know any actual, otherwise normal Canadians who get "pissed off" when Americans are referred to as "Americans"?

Now, if we started to refer to Canadians specifically as "Americans," as though Canada were the 51st state, I could understand their annoyance. But we don't. Or if we started calling Canadians "Brits." But we don't do that either.

Americans (from the United States of America) are "Americans" and Canadians (from Canada) are "Canadians." They live in North America with the Mexicans (from the United Mexican States).

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 05:26 AM

... or NAAFI's

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 04:53 AM

I should say, in fact, that both CD's and CDs could be correct, as it used to be the rule that the apostrophe should be used for plurals of abbreviations; but usage has rendered this optional of late, it is my impression.

Thus, service canteens operated by the Navy, Army and Air Force Institute might be either NAAFI'S or NAAFIs.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: autolycus
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 03:58 AM

"late 1960's, I have read mystery stories to unwind. Probably by now I've read several hundred.

"I could read a Peter Wimsey novel set in '30's"


1960s and '30s.

No greengrocer apostrophes necessary - just simple plurals, like books, hands, apples.


One interesting, annoting example of the power of the American PC.

On a typing course I wrote 'fulfil', which is correct English. The computer it say 'fulfill', which is correct Ammerican English.

Anybody who thinks the computer must not be argued with would think 'Oh ok, 'fulfill' '

They would then be marked down on an English typing test for misspelling.


By the way, the charity shop lady alluded to some Windows programme telling her to write CD's. As yousaid, it might have been her covering up.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Gurney
Date: 15 Jul 11 - 02:42 AM

As Autolycus pointed out, kids are uncertain what the emergency number is, (even more awkward here as ours is 111) but I don't understand why all 3-figure numbers don't go to emergency services.
It isn't as if it is going to be anyone's ordinary phone, is it!
Maybe on a very small island.

'Spaw, in a thread headed as this one is, why did you put the apostrophes in "Ya' gotta' figure....."?;-)

Oh, I see! It is a wild punctuation movement. I: must, join!~

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: catspaw49
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 04:02 PM

I would be all for referring to the languages (dialects included) which we use here in United States as American except I hate to piss off the Canucks.

I tend to think Micca had it right. English may have mugged other languages or as Topsie said, "mated with them," but here in the States we took English and ripped out the entrails and ate them for lunch then pissed on the rest before scooping the leftovers into a bucket, shitting on it, and then setting it on fire. That pretty well sums up the "American" language..........and we kinda' like it......sorta'..........

Ya' gotta' figure it was inevitable. This is probably the most ethnically diverse place in the world. Plus all that diversity happened in a very short time period. Additionally, as the country was settled and the Pacific reached, transportation grew rapidly. So instead of cities with huge ethnic populations living cheek by jowl we developed into an entire country that did the same as booms developed to the west and then flowed back to the east and the south and the Northwest and southwest and...........you get the idea. Even in the small eastern Ohio town where I was born, we had at least 12 (that I can easily count) groups living closely together.

It was only natural that all the other influences should change the English to "American." Hell, we don't even know where most of our words originated but we use them anyway. Sadly for many back in the UK, it seems their language is being taken over by nasty Americans. If you feel the need to hold the line for for "real" English, then y'all just go on out there and "git 'er done!" (;<))


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 02:09 PM

As I opined in an earlier thread, American English is the 'standard' since the collapse of the British Empire and its ubiquity in world media and as a means of communication among peoples of diverse languages. Other branches (Australian, UK English, etc. have their innings since media work both ways).

Yonder (not dialect), much used by writers from Chaucer onward but now out of fashion in both U.S. and England, doesn't need the modifier 'over', I must agree; however, it is used in song, folk and faux, yonside (i. e., America) if not in speech.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 11:21 AM

of course there some dialect words thare spoken still in england and arealso spoken in america, over yonder[east anglian, notably north essex]is apparantly still used in Virginia, according to virginia tam, Plus the hullo gretting, WHOOOP

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 11:00 AM

Hold everything, I've got a statistic to contribute!

Since the late 1960's, I have read mystery stories to unwind. Probably by now I've read several hundred.

I could read a Peter Wimsey novel set in '30's or an Agatha Christie and rarely encounter a novel word. If they were different (jumper, for example) I could figure them out from context.

Last week I read a novel Cynthia Harrod-Eagles, an author born, bred and dwelling in London. Her novel, 'Body Line,' is set in present-day London and points south. I marked the englishisms in it for a possible 'translations from the British' thread. There are 19 of them. Every few pages I hit another one!

So I don't think the English are undergoing "sloppy loss of our own distinctive phraseology through sheer idleness." If anything, distinctive phraseology is increasing.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 07:37 AM

Snail , will fly
I am going to listen on listen again then I will make a judgement, anyone who prejudges anything is showing prejudice and is an idiot or buffoon whoever they are.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Ripov
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 07:28 AM

I don't care what language they speak in America, but I wish they wouldn't call it English.
Kids nowadays don't realise that when we (the more mature we, that is) write something like "Nite-club" we're just taking the p... out of the yanks.
Of course, if language hadn't evolved then all those etymologists would be out of work.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 06:29 AM

I set mine to US English and CDs didn't even warrant a wiggly red line underneath. Maybe she was fibbing to try to cover her mistake.

Children thinking the emergency number is 911 is more worrying.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 06:18 AM

I don't know what software the lady in the chaity shop was using. Everything I use lets me type 'CDs' quite happily.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: autolycus
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 05:55 AM

Matthew Engel is British-born [Northampton] not American.

He accepted that language changes. He said some Americanisms are an improvement. He said he no doubt committed some of the errors whereof he spoke.

two baasic points he made were that Britain was losing its own sense of self and

"But what I hate is the sloppy loss of our own distinctive phraseology through sheer idleness, lack of self-awareness and our attitude of cultural cringe. We encourage the diversity offered by Welsh and Gaelic - even Cornish is making a comeback. But we are letting British English wither."

He said indications of the 'threat' were british children thinking that you should say 'X,Y and Zee', 'take a raincheck', 'three strikes and you're out' and 'you got mail'; trucks rather than lorries, that in an emergency, you ring 911 instead of 999.

He especially fingered the American-driven internet which keeps correcting English spelling to American; Disney; and telly.


I had an experience like that the other day.

In a charity shop, they has the familiar "CD's 50 p"-type notice. I pointed out that the apostrophe was redundant, CDs being a simple plural like books. The lady told me if you type CDs and suchlike into the computer, it "corrects" it to CD's.

That's a threat to more than the language.




Following WillFly's logic, nobody can be corrected because we're all entitled to be prejudiced.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Allan Conn
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 05:03 AM

"the British version of English that has changed while Americans have retained the old forms: "gotten" for example."

Mind there isn't really a single "British version" of the language. The form of standard English spoken in Scotland is Scottish Standard English as oppposed to the various dialects of Scots - and words often thought of as Americanisms are common in SSE. For example 'gotten' and 'pinkie' etc.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Will Fly
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 04:17 AM

Dear Gurney down here, from Will Fly up there :-)

Technically speaking, you're quite right. The English that we speak today has around 30% of its vocabulary derived from Norman French.

The point that I was making was that, in spite of being the ruling class in England, the Normans did not convert England into a French-speaking nation. The point of change - which I facetiously referred to as 'giving in' - was when a particular monarch (and I'm damned if I can remember which one at the moment) decided that official records, etc. would be maintained in English.

English - not French. And, yes, the mutated English of the time.

Cheers,

Will - now down here with you.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Gurney
Date: 14 Jul 11 - 03:57 AM

Will Fly, right up there , you said that even the Normans 'Gave in and spoke English.'
You raise the pedant in me. No, they didn't. The peasants spoke Saxon, the aristocrats spoke Norman French, and over time both languages were combined (largely) and became 'English.'

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 10:06 PM

As I said on the "sloppy usage" thread, history proves that English grammar, pronunciation, spelling, punctuation, and diction has always been awful - by any standard.

If most of us don't think so, however, it's because 99.9999% of actual utterances by actual people was never preserved.

And 95% (say) of what's ever been published is the well-edited work of unusually talented writers - even including tabloid journalists.

The average user of English anywhere on earth would be unable to write a publishable tabloid article without more training in every aspect of writing than he or she would likely get in a first-year university composition course, plus much dedicated practice and revision and a decent editor.

"Good English" is prized partly because it's always been so very rare. And "great literature" is a different and far smaller category entirely.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 09:03 PM

The Oxford University Press blog says 'refudiate' is a verb "used loosely to mean 'reject'."
The New Oxford American Dictionary has named it the 2010 'Word of the Year'. The link below is to an article listing the top ten words of 2010.
There are no plans, however, to add it to the OED, Webster's or NOAD, or any standard dictionary. The Oxford University Press (OUP)says it must first become popular enough (unfriend, woty of 2009 has become popular enough and will be added to the OED).

OUPBlog-
http://blog.oup.com/2010/11/refudiate

OUP says Palin is not the first to use it, but don't say who that was.
(double-dip will certainly be added.)

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Genie
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 08:06 PM

I don't think the introduction of new words into the language is a negative thing, especially when the new words apply to new technology, etc., or even when they start out as slang (e.g. "ginormous"). But when "the dictionary" (probably Merriam-Webster for the US) immediately accepts a mangling of the English language by Sarah Palin -- "refudiate" -- as a new word, I think that's outrageous, especially since this new "word" doesn't add anything to the lexicon beyond what "refute" and "repudiate" already mean. (This isn't like "telecom" being short for "telephone communication" or "blog" being short for the new word "weblog" or "Frankenfood" being coined as a term for genetically modified vegetables.)


I think the other thing that's fast threatening to destroy our language, at least where spelling and grammar and punctuation are concerned, is the rapidity of communication, especially on the internet, with people being exposed virtually overnight to all sorts of mispronunciation, misspelling, bad or absent punctuation, and horrible grammar. Texting and "tweeting" contribute a lot to this. So we end up with 'sentences' like:

"u need 2 loose sum wait so him and me will go on a diat for awhile cuz its the best way for you and I to doo it."

What's appalling to me is how quickly news anchors and other people with big TV and radio microphones pick up the bad grammar, etc., when they hear or see it in some informal setting.      I even hear a lot of this from English teachers sometimes.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 07:52 PM

Now that *would* be annoying.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 07:33 PM

As long as it doesn't turn out to be JK bloody Rowling.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 07:19 PM

For fifteen hundred years the English language had shown itself to be impervious to threats.

The Beowulf poet spoke Old English. Chaucer spoke Middle English. Shakespeare spoke Early Modern English. Tennyson and Wolfe and Woolf spoke Later Modern English.

Even if you make the unwarranted assumption that the quality of English-language literature has declined since Beowulf or Shakespeare or Virginia Woolf, that would be a defect of individual talent, not of the English language.

English would be truly threatened only if people no longer find it advantageous to use it. That's what happened, for example, to Cornish and Manx and any number of Third-World languages.

We may be irritated - justifiably - by sloppy and ignorant and intenionally deceptive usages, but if they don't sink out of sight on their own (as some do), they become fully assimilated and less noticeable to later generations - who then rail about their own pet peeves.

My prophecy: despite everything, some enduring masterpieces will be written in English in the 21st Century. And the 22nd...

They may not be to our taste, but Hardy, Hemingway, and Heller would not have been to Samuel Johnson's taste either.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Songwronger
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 07:08 PM

Seems even Shakespeare corrupted the language.

Words Shakespeare Invented

In all of his work - the plays, the sonnets and the narrative poems - Shakespeare uses 17,677 words: Of those, 1,700 were first used by Shakespeare.

This list of words that we use in our daily speech were all brought into usage by Shakespeare:

•accommodation
•aerial
•amazement
•apostrophe
•assassination
•auspicious
•baseless
•bloody
•bump
•castigate
•changeful
•clangor
•control (noun)
•countless
•courtship
•critic
•critical
•dexterously
•dishearten
•dislocate
•dwindle
•eventful
•exposure
•fitful
•frugal
•generous
•gloomy
•gnarled
•hurry
•impartial
•inauspicious
•indistinguishable
•invulnerable
•lapse
•laughable
•lonely
•majestic
•misplaced
•monumental
•multitudinous
•obscene
•palmy
•perusal
•pious
•premeditated
•radiance
•reliance
•road
•sanctimonious
•seamy
•sportive
•submerge
•suspicious

That wack dude had some 'nads to tweak the lingo like that.

Subject: RE: BS: the threat to the english language from
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 06:05 PM

Ast any on yer geeten a record thingy of yon wirelss prog? I were powfagged n missed it.

No threat from yon daft cloutyeds o'er watter if you ask me though.

:D tG