yeah, baby.
anonymous
September 16 2004, 11:25:01 UTC
The notion that language can be controlled by committee is indeed a little disturbing. Cliche to evoke the Orweliian creation of newspeak, but invoke it i will. There is, as someone far more intelligient than i once said "more metaphor in manchester than in marvell". possibly. i may have just made that up. but it holds true. the base slang and vernacular of dialect is where language is forced to confront the disparity between thought and expression. pearls tend to emerge. or maybe i am talking absolute shite. on another note. it is perhaps a little harsh to describe the whole of edinburgh as a pit of hell. cretinous, yappy anglicised middle class scum unfortunately do hold sway in a significant part of the town. leith, however, remains relatively untouched by these fools. persevere, indeed.
form and content
anonymous
September 16 2004, 13:52:11 UTC
no catfight was intended. i much prefer to go toe to toe. simply an opportunity to fly the tattered and maligned leith flag. nevermind. without rules, chaos, well, probably you are right enough. i think the notion of grammar committees making new rules that serve only profit is the right way of reading your example: my attempt to conflate that scenario with a little [ignorant] speech about vernacular language was intended to highlight a point that you have made- that language structures predate dictionaries and committees. the idea that certain kinds of language is appropriate for certain topics and not others is interesting: is it, for example, that RPSE is in fact the best way to discuss Dante, or is that discussions of Dante have been confined to those amongst whom the RPSE [west midlands] dialect is spoken [the monied, the powerful, the privileged]? but hey, i'm just a stroppy socialist with no sense of humour, so i would not pay too much attention to these vague wonderings.
Re: form and contentredneonredSeptember 16 2004, 14:26:12 UTC
you're right. that was a silly thing to say caught in the heat of the moment without really thinking properly about everything said, as always. i don't, of course, mean that everyone should know lots of big words to be able to communicate properly. i do think there has to be some standard. whatever accent one has or regional dialect one was brought up with, one is able to understand a fundamental set of rules and a basic vocabulary, rules and words which shouldn't belong to the upper classes. yes, it has been something the upper classes used to keep power over less privileged classes but it does not belong to them, only something they've put a flag in, like india. please excuse that last sentance if you've not seen eddie izzard. english is a language spoken all over the world, its a way of communicating, obviously, again, dumb american comment. people in other countries to not learn cockney slang. they learn basic english. basic english can of course be added to with wonderful words like nowt, owt, butchers and balti, but the basics
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on another note. it is perhaps a little harsh to describe the whole of edinburgh as a pit of hell. cretinous, yappy anglicised middle class scum unfortunately do hold sway in a significant part of the town. leith, however, remains relatively untouched by these fools. persevere, indeed.
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without rules, chaos, well, probably you are right enough. i think the notion of grammar committees making new rules that serve only profit is the right way of reading your example: my attempt to conflate that scenario with a little [ignorant] speech about vernacular language was intended to highlight a point that you have made- that language structures predate dictionaries and committees. the idea that certain kinds of language is appropriate for certain topics and not others is interesting: is it, for example, that RPSE is in fact the best way to discuss Dante, or is that discussions of Dante have been confined to those amongst whom the RPSE [west midlands] dialect is spoken [the monied, the powerful, the privileged]? but hey, i'm just a stroppy socialist with no sense of humour, so i would not pay too much attention to these vague wonderings.
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