Destructing Language

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:00 am

Do you know anybody who does evil things to the spoken language--whatever language you happen to speak?

Let us consider, for example, my wife. She is a logical mathhead. She has told me that she hated long division back in junior high school, many years ago, and used algorithms to arrive at her results. In short, she is an alien.

Her treatment of English underscores this conclusion. A while back she remembered the title of a Rolling Stone album as "Get Your Cha-Chas Out." Last night, she told me about a moment at work and stated, "It made my hair cringe." These are only two instances of what amount to an unintentional but wholesale assault upon the very foundations of what was once a noble language with many fine accomplishments.

And for those who are wondering, I refer to English, you saps.

So, anyway, do you know anybody who perform similar feats of linguistic pillage, rape and torture? If so, please post.

[ 05-10-2001: Message edited by: fable ]

Darkpoet · Post by **Darkpoet** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:04 am

You ain't got no right, to be making fun of us peoples.

Gruntboy · Post by **Gruntboy** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:08 am

My Dad calls Chicago "Chick-a-goo" and my mam calls baguettes "barge-ettes" - does that count? But then again we're working class so if you take the p*ss I'll pound your brains out

Craig · Post by **Craig** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:08 am

Another post 'bout me!!!!

Weasel · Post by **Weasel** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:10 am

You dang darn tootin i be ripping the coon tails out of git.

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:10 am

@Gruntboy, nah. All nations "naturalize" foreign words that become part of the culture. Look at Cairo (KAY-row), Ohio.

Gruntboy · Post by **Gruntboy** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:12 am

I went out with a girl once who's mother was a Russian translater for the UN. Upon heraing the way I talked and upon my utterance of the word "us" (as in "Help us out" - referring to *me* and me alone" - its like the Royal *We* for poor people), she said:

"I heard a grammatical incongruity..."

Indeed.

I ask you, which is more destructive of language?

[ 05-10-2001: Message edited by: Gruntboy ]

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 10, 2001 9:13 am

@Craig, it is not about you. We don't know what your speech patterns are like. This is only about the way people creatively mangle their native language while speaking it.

Mangling it while writing is another, higher art, some of it, pretty damn funny. I think the master of that was Robert Benchley. I oughta post of his work.

Brink · Post by **Brink** » Thu May 10, 2001 2:37 pm

I converse in broken English daily

C Elegans · Post by **C Elegans** » Thu May 10, 2001 6:59 pm

Some typically Swedish mistakes when speaking English, I'll try to explain them.

One of friends at his first visit to Britain, trying to compliment his hostess:

"This food is delicious, you're a great ****."

(Swedish for cook is pronouced like ****)

Same guy realising his mistake, trying to make up for it:

"What a lovely dress, with all those pricks on!"

(Swedish for dot is "prick".)

"No thank you, I'm full, I'll jump over the cheese"

(Swedish has the same word for jump and skip.)

Another male friend, working as au pair in London as a teenager, just having fed the baby:

"Should I rape the child?"

(Swedish for "burp" is "rap")

Manveru · Post by **Manveru** » Thu May 10, 2001 11:26 pm

To be honest my English sucks - sometimes I really have the problems with replies, especially problems with my grammar.

However I'm going to add some Polish common mistakes :

many Poles say : "Thank you straight ahead from the bridge" (originally something like that is in Polish) not "thanks in advance"

or they say "pilot" not "remote control" (In Polish "pilot" means "exactly "remote control")

or they use "actually" in meaning "current" (I think the most common Polish mistake "aktualnie" means "current" in Polish) as well as "eventually" in meaning "possibly" (Polish "ewentualnie" means "possibly")

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Thu May 10, 2001 11:33 pm

There is nothing queer about a couple of gay fellows smoking a fag

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 10, 2001 11:40 pm

Heh. The word "fag" derives from the older German word for wood, "[removed]," and I understand that homosexuals used to be given the bonfire treatment in earlier times--hence, the slang.

Funny thing is, when I was program director of a public radio station a number of years ago, many of my announcers were foreign students. (This was at a university.) One of them was from the Indian subcontinent, and he had good diction but a pronounced accent. I'll never forget his announcing a work by Hummel, saying it was a quintet for a variety of instruments, including a "[removed]." The album listed the instruments in German, and the modern use for the German wood, a stick of wood, is a bassoon.

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Fri May 11, 2001 4:15 am

Well in my sentence it dosen't mean anything else than a cigaret

fable · Post by **fable** » Fri May 11, 2001 9:24 am

Joe di Maggio, of baseball fame, on a repetition of a particular play:

"It's deja vu all over again!"

Gwalchmai · Post by **Gwalchmai** » Fri May 11, 2001 2:24 pm

@fable: Was that Joe or Yogi Berra?

OK, aside from being mildly annoyed at people who pronounce supposedly "sub-pose-a-bly", there is a recent trend that baffles me. I have always thought of the verb to grow as a passive or secondary verb as in "I watched the flower grow." "The flower grew tall." But now people use the verb in a very active voice with regards to business. My bosses are quite fond of saying "We want to grow the company." I would've said "We want to help the company to grow" or "We want expand the company." (Or the truth of the matter is "We want more money for the Senior Management.") To me, you can't grow a company, but its what everyone is saying. Just bothers me... Sort of like "conversating"...

fable · Post by **fable** » Fri May 11, 2001 4:07 pm

@Gwalchmai, correct: it was Berra. You can see how much time I spend on our national sport.

What about the the sudden appearance of the dangling "with?" Instead of "Do you want to come with us?" we now have, "Do you want to come with?"

ThorinOakensfield · Post by **ThorinOakensfield** » Fri May 11, 2001 6:17 pm

crAIG yOu CAn'T SPeLl CoRRECTly.
You know what i hate, when people pronounce simple names wrong such as Moscow.
Here in the U.s its like
Moss Cow

The Outsider · Post by **The Outsider** » Sat May 12, 2001 5:45 pm

Oy, could I have fun kvetching in here!

There is a standard belief in North America. It runs as follows:

1. Any verb can be used as a noun.
2. Any noun can be verbed.

A professor of mine ranted extensively about the improper (verbish)* use of the word "impact"; I told him to blame it on dentists.
Also a topic of conversation between us was the ubiquitous presence of the word "excellence" in business jargon. It's a word that is slotted in like styrofoam packaging: wherever there's a gap.

I'd like to say that the Americans are the worst abusers of language, but I lived in England for a while. In the Stevenage area, the dialect is around three levels below ****ney. Any "th" becomes "f", and as many consonants as possible are omitted.

* I am aware that "verbish" is a rather cruel thing to do to the word "verb". Part of the problem with the destruction of language is that it's so flaming easy to slip into a casual, non-canonical method of expression, and to let that become the dominant voice; the orthodox enunciation etc. is then displaced.

I'll let someone else rant now.

Vehemence · Post by **Vehemence** » Sun May 13, 2001 12:12 am

Language is a tool used to express yourself.

Do you have a problem with freedom of expression???

Didn't think so.