THE RANT THREAD!

[DanieMarie]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

The problem with English is that it's a very fluid language. Even though there are rules, the language changes so much. What is correct doesn't necessarily sound correct to the ear, and it may not read very well either. When you do editing for a living you're constantly having to make judgement calls.

[MoonRaven]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

The problem with English is that it's a very fluid language. Even though there are rules, the language changes so much. What is correct doesn't necessarily sound correct to the ear, and it may not read very well either. When you do editing for a living you're constantly having to make judgement calls.

Add to this there are exactly how many versions of English and they don't all use the same rules. *sigh*

[DanieMarie]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

So true, and sometimes there's no specification as to which version is wanted. If you write for an American or British publication, it's pretty clear, but if it's German and they want content in English, you just have to pick a mood and stick with it. I sometimes find it tricky, because as a Canadian, I'm familiar with rules of different versions, and I tend to hate things about each one. Like, I think "colour" should be spelled with the "U" (British), but that "which" should always be preceded by a comma (American). I think "rubbish" is a silly word, but "holiday" is better than "vacation". It's not always up to me though.

[anunitu]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

English is said to be the hardest language to learn if you are not born speaking it. Way to many exceptions and weird rules,and I was born speaking English.

[Agel]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

English is hard to learn even if you are born speaking it. Mainly because 'proper' English is nothing like conversational English.
Kinda like when taking Spanish or French in high school. You'll learn the mechanics but trying to talk with your Hispanic neighbor will still have problems.

[Jembru]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

English is said to be the hardest language to learn if you are not born speaking it. Way to many exceptions and weird rules,and I was born speaking English.

It depends on the first language of the person. I think DannieMarie will be able to confirm, but I was told by Germans that English is pretty simple if you're German. It's like German but with much simpler rules, such no noun gender, very few irregular plurals, little difference between accusative and dative forms (I can only think of 'who vs whom', and 'whom' is gradually being lost) and our definite and indefinite articles don't inflect for case, nor do our adjectives, and we only have one word for 'you'. We have a tone of irregular verbs, but I noticed ours are usually irregular in German too. So it's laughably simple to a German.

[Heka]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

German and English are the most similar I think.


But Indonesian is easiest. No tense!

[Jembru]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

NO tense? Really? That is amazing. I thought Japanese was generous with only two! Mind you, I recently found out that Japanese is more relaxed about tense than we are. Does Indonesian have plurals? What about irregular verbs? Are adjectives inflected?
Can I rewind 8 years and develop and interest in Indonesian instead?

Sorry. Erm, maybe we need to take this to the any other languages thread...

[DanieMarie]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

It depends on the first language of the person. I think DannieMarie will be able to confirm, but I was told by Germans that English is pretty simple if you're German. It's like German but with much simpler rules, such no noun gender, very few irregular plurals, little difference between accusative and dative forms (I can only think of 'who vs whom', and 'whom' is gradually being lost) and our definite and indefinite articles don't inflect for case, nor do our adjectives, and we only have one word for 'you'. We have a tone of irregular verbs, but I noticed ours are usually irregular in German too. So it's laughably simple to a German.

Yep. I don't think it's that much of a problem for most of Europe. I've heard it's an easier language to learn from a variety of people from different countries. The consensus is that even though there are a lot of irregularities, you pretty much just learn things as you hear them and don't have to learn any conjugations or anything like that.

[Jembru]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

I don't know where this myth that English is so difficult came from. I guess English speakers? It is of course difficult for people unfamiliar with Germanic languages, just as (apparently) the top three hardest languages for English speakers are all East Asian (although as Mandarin and Cantonese were thrown together as 'Chinese', I'd rather call it a top 4), but I think they would struggle even more with some of the concepts found in German or other European languages that cling closer to archaic grammar rules.

My rant is coincidentally related to Chinese. I don't know which form of Chinese it is, but one of the Japanese channels I watch, is actually Chinese, so the adverts and subtitles are in Chinese. I only watch it when there's sod all on on the regular Japanese channels, because it tends to show old movies and stuff. I was really, really getting into this samurai romance thing and it's bloody frozen, again... It's been happening so much over the summer (yet I've noticed when JP watches the live airing of Yugioh on Sunday mornings, it never freezes on him, grrr).

Fine, I'll just drink wine and watch old yogscast videos then shall I? I didn't want to know if he'll come back to her anyway, hope he died in battle and she choked on an onigiri.....

[ThorsSon]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

Oh, serious, SERIOUS backing. No patronizing whatsoever. They went and said something profound about their study of language and yet know nothing about how to use it properly. I'm a linguist. And because of knowing the rules of language, I know how to break the rules... that I find useful to bend way out of shape.

My take on it was, really, we need to sell tickets; "Come see the linguist with absolutely no grasp of the language! Bring the kids! Call your neighbors!"





It fits right up there with tight-rope walkers that have no sense of balance, at all. Or ballet dancers without a trace of grace. Bicycle racers that can't maintain the coordination to pedal the damn thing let alone steer it, too.

I knew that was what you meant. But it occurred to me that nuances of certain definitions of the two words could cause the sentence to have very different meanings. And I just kept thinking about it. It amused me quite a lot, actually... but, then, I kinda suspected that you meant for it to be a little ambiguous... given your penchant for bending the language. I figured there was a bit of a joke in it, for the linguists.

I'm sure he meant the person to whom you were referring! In any case, I have a cool new description for myself. I'm a non-lexical linguist to a T.

I know to whom he was referring, I just wasn't sure he wasn't playing word games.

It is Chain, after all... he's clever like that.

Anyway, I wasn't offended, or anything at all like that... Perhaps the fact that this IS the rant thread caused my post to be read in the wrong tone. Twas intended to be humorous.

[Medusa]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

It's hot and muggy.

Also. I wanted to strangle my boss today. He yelled at me so many times. I know he was expecting to crack me. Ain't gonna happen. You can't break a broken egg!

[Heka]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

NO tense? Really? That is amazing. I thought Japanese was generous with only two! Mind you, I recently found out that Japanese is more relaxed about tense than we are. Does Indonesian have plurals? What about irregular verbs? Are adjectives inflected?
Can I rewind 8 years and develop and interest in Indonesian instead?

Sorry. Erm, maybe we need to take this to the any other languages thread...

Indonesian plurals just repeat the word, eg pohon-pohon is trees. One pohon, one tree

Verbs all surround two prefixes, with few exceptions. When you get REALLY into Indo, the suffixes get a bit tricky. But I just use the slangy version - only the base word!

And i don't know what you mean by inflected adjectives.

And OF COURSE you can get interested in Indonesian!



And now RANT. My students are all going to fail their exams next week. YAY!

[MoonRaven]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

I don't know where this myth that English is so difficult came from. I guess English speakers? It is of course difficult for people unfamiliar with Germanic languages, just as (apparently) the top three hardest languages for English speakers are all East Asian (although as Mandarin and Cantonese were thrown together as 'Chinese', I'd rather call it a top 4), but I think they would struggle even more with some of the concepts found in German or other European languages that cling closer to archaic grammar rules.

To answer that let me quote two poems one of my English teachers threw at the class once upon a time. (I have no idea what the title or book it was from, it's just a photocopy of a page. So if I am violating anyones copyright I apologise.)

Basic English lesson 1

If "gh" stands for "P" as in hiccough.
If "ough" stands for "O" as in dough.
If "phtp" stands for "T" as in phthisis.
If "eigh" stands for "A" as in neighbour.
If "tte" stands for "T" as in gazette.
If "eau" stands for "O" as in beau-
The the right way to spell potato is:
Ghoughphtheightteeau!


Basic English, lesson 2

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
On hiccough, thorough, laugh and through?
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps?

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead, - it's said like bed, not bead -
For goodness sake don't call it 'deed'!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.

A moth is not a moth in mother
Not both in bother, broth in brother.
And here is not a match for there
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there's dose and rose and lose -
Just look them up - and goose and choose,
And cork and work and card and ward,
And font and front and word and sword,
And do and go and thwart and cart -
come, come, I've hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive.
I'd mastered it when I was five!


I leave it to others to decide whether or not they think English is hard to learn or not, but saying it's an easy language... Well let me phrase it this way, I'm fairly certain the Chinese don't think neither Mandarin nor Cantonese are that hard to learn either.

[Jembru]

Re: THE RANT THREAD!

To answer that let me quote two poems one of my English teachers threw at the class once upon a time. (I have no idea what the title or book it was from, it's just a photocopy of a page. So if I am violating anyones copyright I apologise.)

Basic English lesson 1

If "gh" stands for "P" as in hiccough.
If "ough" stands for "O" as in dough.
If "phtp" stands for "T" as in phthisis.
If "eigh" stands for "A" as in neighbour.
If "tte" stands for "T" as in gazette.
If "eau" stands for "O" as in beau-
The the right way to spell potato is:
Ghoughphtheightteeau!


Basic English, lesson 2

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
On hiccough, thorough, laugh and through?
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps?

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead, - it's said like bed, not bead -
For goodness sake don't call it 'deed'!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.

A moth is not a moth in mother
Not both in bother, broth in brother.
And here is not a match for there
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there's dose and rose and lose -
Just look them up - and goose and choose,
And cork and work and card and ward,
And font and front and word and sword,
And do and go and thwart and cart -
come, come, I've hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive.
I'd mastered it when I was five!


I leave it to others to decide whether or not they think English is hard to learn or not, but saying it's an easy language... Well let me phrase it this way, I'm fairly certain the Chinese don't think neither Mandarin nor Cantonese are that hard to learn either.

I've seen the second poem before! They're so much fun to use as a warm up in EFL lessons ^^. Yeah, English tends to be difficult when it comes to writing, but I was talking about learning the spoken language. I mean, sure, we have some tricky spellings, but try learning over 2500 kanji! I recognise around 400, but that's not to say I always know how to read the words I see them in. It's not even as straight forward as remembering that, say, 行 means 'go', because the sound it represents changes depending on the word. So 行く (the verb, 'to go', read 'iku', but sometimes 'yuku' in some dialects and sometimes in songs)、流行 ('fad' or 'trend', read 'hayari')、旅行 ('a trip', read ryokou)　行 (line of a song or poem, read 'gyou'), so as you can see, we have to learn to recognise 2500 of these buggers and then learn how it sounds in different compounds (there's no rule to this, you just have to know). So yeah, I think Japanese wins hands down on a few silent letters and sound changes in English! At least our writing is largely phonetic. 　

I don't know about the Chinese, but I know the Japanese also complain that learning to write kanji is a drag! I've only taught English as a second language, so it's harder to compare, but students certainly seemed to progress faster in English, than I have in Japanese. Maybe that's just me though, because I've met people who speak much better than I can (and to be honest, I've met people who've been studying longer, and even taken proper academic courses, who struggle even more than me, so...dunno).