Yes! So right! -- FCS Discussion Forum

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Subject: Yes! So right!

Author:
Ed Harris (Back in Shropshire)

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Date Posted: 12:29:21 11/09/04 Tue
In reply to: Random Jock 's message, "Ed why aren't you speaking English?" on 17:21:50 11/08/04 Mon

You're right! English is the archetypical mongrel language! That's why I love it... You see, French is Teutonic and Latinate. German is Teutonic and Slavic. Gaelic is Celtic, Gallic, Latinised and vaguely Semitic even. But English is all of its influences at the same time. That's why the English vocabulary has about eight times more words than its nearest rival. We can say 'king-like' [German], 'royal' [French] and 'regal' [Latin], all of which mean something different. But the Germans can only say 'koeniglich', the French 'royale', and the Italians and Spanish 'reale'.

Just as mixed-race people tend to be more clever (and, dare I say it, better looking), I think that linguistic miscegenation produces better languages. And I defy you to come up with a better example of a mixed and messed-up language than English!

It doesn't even stop at Europe... we can say 'I don't give a dam' (a 'dam' being a small Indian coin minted by the Mughals and worth about a farthing), 'I'm going to run amok' (from Malasian, or is it Burmese, for 'beserk' [which itself is Nordic]), and 'I'll clobber you with my knobkerrie' (the latter being a Zulu word for 'stick'). I love my language, and your calling it a mongrel tongue just reinforces that affeection.

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Author:
Ed Harris (Back in Shropshire)
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Date Posted: 15:06:07 11/09/04 Tue

But you're not right when you say that this mongrel language is not English. 'English' is the name which we use to denote modern demotic Latinised-Normanised Anglo-Saxon. It is not the name for Olde Englyshe or for Anglo-Saxon or for Saxon or for Nordic-Saxon. Wulde thas thow wille meg su sprike Anglishe-Sachsen, jeg kunne fal den, butte jeg will nyt. Jeg see for nye Anglishe, thow pictishe tribusmann!

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