"John Hurt"
"Um...What is the shortest verse in the bible?"
Wednesday, 5 May 2010
r u bovvered?
I've mentioned before that I like to keep my standard and knowledge of English language....up.
Fail.
I'm the first to admit that my English isn't flawless. Indeed I like to bastardise English for my own amusement, but that's part of the game. I'm a better speaker than a writer. Since computers now proof read whatever I write, my spelling is simultaneously better and worse. Anyway, my point is that I'm not flawless, but I do have an interest in self improvement and I'm not at all interested in "you criticised this, but then you did that, and that's wrong". I do care, and I don't care, and you're probably wrong, and I can probably justify it, and if I can't it was a mistake, not sheer laziness or stupidity.
I'm aghast at modern English. SMS shorthand - which bothers me a lot, but which I consider to be justifiable in context - has started creeping into forum submissions and will find their way into serious literature in time. It's easy for me to assume that things like forum submissions are typed on a full keyboard, but I suppose it's entirely feasible that people are submitting them from mobile devices, and can therefore justify the shorthand. But still it's there. Forum submissions tend to be more verbose than SMS messages, and that's the way it will go. SMS shorthand will slowly ooze its way into English due to...not really acceptance, but apathy. Like when kids feel it's ok to play music on buses and we all sit back hating them and biting our lips. Don't tell me...you're the one who doesn't bite their lip, right? Good for you. Or wait!...you're the one playing the music because it's your constitutional right...right? You're young or at least immature, your mind will change and you will grow to hate those that you once were. And I'm right as well, so don't even say it.
..no really, shush.
Ubiquity and apathy will ensure that SMS shorthand becomes part of the English language. Most years, or indeed even more regularly, I'm appalled to hear of yet another 2000 words being inducted into the Oxford English dictionary. 'Words' like "D'Oh!" really, surely, don't need to be in the dictionary. There are others whose inclusion has confounded me, and I can't think of a single one right now. The English dictionary does need to be kept up to date, I acknowledge and applaud that. There are technological and medical based words which are genuinely new and which need to be in there. When 'brb' and 'lol' get in there (for all I know they already are), we've got problems. When 'r' = 'are' and 'u' = 'you' and '2' = 'to', 'too', and/or 'two', I'll start throwing stuff. I'm pretty certain it will happen and I'm pretty sure I'll regret throwing what I throw. Someone in Oxford (that's half a joke...I don't know if the OED is actually based in Oxford) will insist that we have to keep dictionary updates relevant for the kids to encourage reading and knowledge. Don't.
Don't dumb anything down to make it more interesting for kids. Kids have kid's stuff, and grown ups have grown up stuff. As part of human development, we move up to grown up stuff and feel like we've taken a step forward. If a kid is not interested in a dictionary - bummer...it happens.
Now, having said all that, here's the bit for the kids:
English is constantly changing. That is its beauty and its power. It's a forgiving language. You can say pretty much any sentence with words missing or in the wrong order and with dialect and accent, and what comes out will be recognisable...eventually, if not at first. It accommodates new words easily. It becomes a bit sadder with shorthand and laziness and stupidity...but even the stupids can use it. You can substitute 'r' and 'u' and it still makes sense...it's wrong, but it's 'getable' (in OED 2011 please). There's a lot made of how America and the Americans have ruined English. I myself have mocked American English in the past and I hear it mocked a lot still. What the mockers seem not to grasp is that time and separation changes English. What the English lampoon for being American bastardisation of the language is often down to evolution. American English is what?...300 years old? And I'm not talking from the perspective of that being young in relative terms, which it is, but it being old. It's about 10 generations old. Think of this in terms of your (deep breath) great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother. Lock her away, cryogenically frozen for 300 years and thaw her out now and see what she makes of modern English. She would kind of get it, but it would be so very different to what she remembered. Explain to her what an aeroplane is. Watch her face!..and while you're at it, ask her about cryogenics...she's way ahead of her time! A lot of Americanisms are old English, some obsolete in English English, but it's not necessarily broken English. Consider amongst many others: pants (trousers), trunk (boot), hose (tights), side walk (pavement), fender (guitar (no!...bumper (or quarter panel))). It's not wrong, it's older and different by separation. English English evolved, and American English did too, of course...just differently by separation. And it's ok as well. Brace yourself. Count to 5.....everything is still ok, right? It's ok.
Here's a thing...we (I) look upon Shakespeare as old fashioned. You may call it classic. I'd be lynched if I said I thought it was rubbish, but it's old and difficult to read. At least I tried. He would be dismayed at my modern English.
Here's another thing...Chaucer would surely have been aghast at Shakespeare's juvenile slang ridden scratchings.
I don't like what English is becoming. Mockery and derision will be my weapons, but I can't really win. It'll keep me amused though.
While I'm at it, what is up with the modern London accent? It's horrible! Is it African or what? Jamaican? It's not cockney any more, that's for sure.
m i bovvud? fkn right i m.
Fail.
I'm the first to admit that my English isn't flawless. Indeed I like to bastardise English for my own amusement, but that's part of the game. I'm a better speaker than a writer. Since computers now proof read whatever I write, my spelling is simultaneously better and worse. Anyway, my point is that I'm not flawless, but I do have an interest in self improvement and I'm not at all interested in "you criticised this, but then you did that, and that's wrong". I do care, and I don't care, and you're probably wrong, and I can probably justify it, and if I can't it was a mistake, not sheer laziness or stupidity.
I'm aghast at modern English. SMS shorthand - which bothers me a lot, but which I consider to be justifiable in context - has started creeping into forum submissions and will find their way into serious literature in time. It's easy for me to assume that things like forum submissions are typed on a full keyboard, but I suppose it's entirely feasible that people are submitting them from mobile devices, and can therefore justify the shorthand. But still it's there. Forum submissions tend to be more verbose than SMS messages, and that's the way it will go. SMS shorthand will slowly ooze its way into English due to...not really acceptance, but apathy. Like when kids feel it's ok to play music on buses and we all sit back hating them and biting our lips. Don't tell me...you're the one who doesn't bite their lip, right? Good for you. Or wait!...you're the one playing the music because it's your constitutional right...right? You're young or at least immature, your mind will change and you will grow to hate those that you once were. And I'm right as well, so don't even say it.
..no really, shush.
Ubiquity and apathy will ensure that SMS shorthand becomes part of the English language. Most years, or indeed even more regularly, I'm appalled to hear of yet another 2000 words being inducted into the Oxford English dictionary. 'Words' like "D'Oh!" really, surely, don't need to be in the dictionary. There are others whose inclusion has confounded me, and I can't think of a single one right now. The English dictionary does need to be kept up to date, I acknowledge and applaud that. There are technological and medical based words which are genuinely new and which need to be in there. When 'brb' and 'lol' get in there (for all I know they already are), we've got problems. When 'r' = 'are' and 'u' = 'you' and '2' = 'to', 'too', and/or 'two', I'll start throwing stuff. I'm pretty certain it will happen and I'm pretty sure I'll regret throwing what I throw. Someone in Oxford (that's half a joke...I don't know if the OED is actually based in Oxford) will insist that we have to keep dictionary updates relevant for the kids to encourage reading and knowledge. Don't.
Don't dumb anything down to make it more interesting for kids. Kids have kid's stuff, and grown ups have grown up stuff. As part of human development, we move up to grown up stuff and feel like we've taken a step forward. If a kid is not interested in a dictionary - bummer...it happens.
Now, having said all that, here's the bit for the kids:
English is constantly changing. That is its beauty and its power. It's a forgiving language. You can say pretty much any sentence with words missing or in the wrong order and with dialect and accent, and what comes out will be recognisable...eventually, if not at first. It accommodates new words easily. It becomes a bit sadder with shorthand and laziness and stupidity...but even the stupids can use it. You can substitute 'r' and 'u' and it still makes sense...it's wrong, but it's 'getable' (in OED 2011 please). There's a lot made of how America and the Americans have ruined English. I myself have mocked American English in the past and I hear it mocked a lot still. What the mockers seem not to grasp is that time and separation changes English. What the English lampoon for being American bastardisation of the language is often down to evolution. American English is what?...300 years old? And I'm not talking from the perspective of that being young in relative terms, which it is, but it being old. It's about 10 generations old. Think of this in terms of your (deep breath) great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother. Lock her away, cryogenically frozen for 300 years and thaw her out now and see what she makes of modern English. She would kind of get it, but it would be so very different to what she remembered. Explain to her what an aeroplane is. Watch her face!..and while you're at it, ask her about cryogenics...she's way ahead of her time! A lot of Americanisms are old English, some obsolete in English English, but it's not necessarily broken English. Consider amongst many others: pants (trousers), trunk (boot), hose (tights), side walk (pavement), fender (guitar (no!...bumper (or quarter panel))). It's not wrong, it's older and different by separation. English English evolved, and American English did too, of course...just differently by separation. And it's ok as well. Brace yourself. Count to 5.....everything is still ok, right? It's ok.
Here's a thing...we (I) look upon Shakespeare as old fashioned. You may call it classic. I'd be lynched if I said I thought it was rubbish, but it's old and difficult to read. At least I tried. He would be dismayed at my modern English.
Here's another thing...Chaucer would surely have been aghast at Shakespeare's juvenile slang ridden scratchings.
I don't like what English is becoming. Mockery and derision will be my weapons, but I can't really win. It'll keep me amused though.
While I'm at it, what is up with the modern London accent? It's horrible! Is it African or what? Jamaican? It's not cockney any more, that's for sure.
m i bovvud? fkn right i m.
Monday, 3 May 2010
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