The Myth of the Death of the English Language
What with slang, and the so-called 'dumbing-down' of literacy, many (grammarians/english majors) have bemoaned the 'Death' of the English Language. That people are speaking and writing more casually, and important grammar rules that have been around for hundreds of years are being ignored.
This, however, is all a myth. The English Language is about as dead as Reagan's legacy. More people are speaking English than every before, in more countries than ever before. It has become the language of business, science, trade, international affairs, etc, replacing French in those catorgies. As America is a global super power, it seems unlikely that English will suddenly 'die'.
As far as the increased casuality with which it is spoken and written, this is simply because more English speakers are literate before. One can hardly say that that is a bad thing. 'dumbing-down' literacy? That started with the publishing of the Gutenburg Bible (when the Bible was first written in a language other than Latin, thus preventing the church from saying 'oh well the bible says this', whithout anyone being able to refute them, and i'm not saying they did this a lot, i'm just saying that the new translation was very freeing for the middle class literate of the time, but i'd better stop because this is a run-on sentance in a parenthesis!).
And many of the grammatically rules we have should be thrown out. For instance, 'are' is a plural form of the verb 'to be', and yet we use it with the singular pronoun 'you'. This makes absolutely no sense at all, and yet people who say 'you is' are attacked as ignorant. It was a big mistake in the first place attaching Latin grammar rules to a Germanic language. The only reason this was done was because Latin was considered a 'pure' language, but one wonders whether the Aristocracy did this just to prevent the lower classes from ever being able to speak proper English. Of course, the upper class English of the time were French, so this is really getting confusing.
English has never been a static language. That is why it has survived so long. It has changed over the centuries and shown an amazing ability to outlast and adapt. Other languages just as ancient have bitten the dust long ago or descended into obscurity, but English has grown and triumphed. It is not dead.
This, however, is all a myth. The English Language is about as dead as Reagan's legacy. More people are speaking English than every before, in more countries than ever before. It has become the language of business, science, trade, international affairs, etc, replacing French in those catorgies. As America is a global super power, it seems unlikely that English will suddenly 'die'.
As far as the increased casuality with which it is spoken and written, this is simply because more English speakers are literate before. One can hardly say that that is a bad thing. 'dumbing-down' literacy? That started with the publishing of the Gutenburg Bible (when the Bible was first written in a language other than Latin, thus preventing the church from saying 'oh well the bible says this', whithout anyone being able to refute them, and i'm not saying they did this a lot, i'm just saying that the new translation was very freeing for the middle class literate of the time, but i'd better stop because this is a run-on sentance in a parenthesis!).
And many of the grammatically rules we have should be thrown out. For instance, 'are' is a plural form of the verb 'to be', and yet we use it with the singular pronoun 'you'. This makes absolutely no sense at all, and yet people who say 'you is' are attacked as ignorant. It was a big mistake in the first place attaching Latin grammar rules to a Germanic language. The only reason this was done was because Latin was considered a 'pure' language, but one wonders whether the Aristocracy did this just to prevent the lower classes from ever being able to speak proper English. Of course, the upper class English of the time were French, so this is really getting confusing.
English has never been a static language. That is why it has survived so long. It has changed over the centuries and shown an amazing ability to outlast and adapt. Other languages just as ancient have bitten the dust long ago or descended into obscurity, but English has grown and triumphed. It is not dead.
posted by Placeholder at 10:43 PM
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