Thread: Another Language Virus

I like pointing out that a foul mouth is a sign of a weak mind, or at least a poor vocabulary--d&mm^t!

I have found it interesting that the longer the time since retirement that I am away from the factory working environment the more civilized my language has become. Now if I cuss, it has a direct connection to the item that deserved it rather than a generalized place keeper.
~Richard

Reading, and the love of reading, is the greatest gift we can give ourselves and our children.

Much of the rest, proper English, manners, constructive and critical thought can be opened up like a great, timeless world, different places, times, customs, planets, civilizations, all can be discovered inside a book.

Language is a living thing. Always has been. Words come and go. Slang is funny like that, some expressions end up as accepted vocabulary, while others just fade away. I have a English to Finnish slang dictionary from 1974 that contains a whole bunch of expressions that are in regular use e.g. 'cop-out', but also things I have never heard of in studying English for more than half of my life e.g. 'foozle'. A fun little book, that.

And text speak is a great example of the principle of least effort in linguistics (or less effort, anyway), as is spoken Finnish (when compared to written Finnish). However, for text speak it mostly is a reduction of characters loosely based around phonetic spelling. Contracted auxiliaries also can be explained according to the same principle, although are funny in their own right, as they seem (to me) to be rather natural in speech and accordingly modified in written language, rather than the other way around. But maybe that is due me thinking of language in essence as a verbal tool rather than a written one.

That being said, I do think that people are getting lazier in their writing, mainly due to spell checkers diminishing the need for accurate spelling. All of my Dutch teachers in secondary school made us write essays by hand and would deduct points for spelling mistakes. Remarkably enough, some of them got complaints from parents for being too strict in this.

About the connection between language and etiquette: Naturally they are connected, they are both part of human interaction. I do believe language is more of a profound communicative tool than etiquette, and etiquette more of an additional tool for getting along. However, I prefer to judge people on the insight of their utterances rather than how they say it or if they were chewing while they did so. That being said, I hate it when people chew with their mouths open, let alone talk while eating.

Originally Posted by Utopian

I like pointing out that a foul mouth is a sign of a weak mind, or at least a poor vocabulary--d&mm^t!

I don't use profanity constantly, but definitely quite regularly. Even though I'm not a big George Carlin fan, he did have a point when he said "They're just words, too." True, they are marked words and throwing them around constantly for no apparent reason is just silly, but they definitely have their uses. For instance, they can emphasise the speaker's point, underline their emotion, be used for comical effect and take the edge off in certain social situations.

I always found constantly correcting other people's grammar in a conversation without adding any insight to the conversation to be a sign of a weak mind (not a stab at you Ron, just a general pet peeve). Just as I really dislike talking to people who pretty much exclusively talk a) about their own achievements/merits and b) in snippets of trivia or facts ('Well, technically...') without the faintest intention of turning it into an original thought that may even apply to the situation or could be put into a larger perspective.

tl;dr Absolute syntactical awfulness aside, I worry much more about what people say than about how they say it. Language changes. People don't, really.

Originally Posted by Pithor

Language is a living thing. Always has been. Words come and go. Slang is funny like that, some expressions end up as accepted vocabulary, while others just fade away. I have a English to Finnish slang dictionary from 1974 that contains a whole bunch of expressions that are in regular use e.g. 'cop-out', but also things I have never heard of in studying English for more than half of my life e.g. 'foozle'. A fun little book, that.

Apologies for editing out so many excellent points. I just want to start the campaign to re-introduce foozle to the world and return it to its proper place in English usage. What a great word!

I'm going to have to look up foozle.

Apparently foozle is a bungled play in a game, especially in golf. I have never played golf. Maybe foozle is still in use.

It's the split infinitives that get me. "To boldly go..." really? REALLY?? WTF!!!!????!!

Excuse me, I need to go sit down and have a cup of tea and get my blood pressure back to normal.

James.

Yes, we can!

Originally Posted by Jimbo

Excuse me, I need to boldly go sit down and to at least have a cup of tea and to strenuously, yet ultimately successfully get my blood pressure back to normal.

James.

You are welcome

A foozler and his golf betting money are soon parted!