Actually, this is no problem at all, in fact you have to have your
cake before you eat it.
The trick is to eat your cake and have it too.
Almost everyone gets this old saying backwards.
On 5/2/07, Robert Dober <robert.dober@gmail.com> wrote:
You mean you want to have your cake *and* eat it ;)?
--
Rick DeNatale
My blog on Ruby
http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/
As the English language is the greatest victim of trivialization by
foreign speakers and writers I appreciate enormously to get these
things right.
It is a great irony that countries like France, where I happen to
live, are very worried about the influence of English - and they are
right because I do not feel that English verbs scale very nicely into
latin languages but this is beyond my point.
The true "victim" of English's globalization is English itself. But
that is how languages have evolved for millennia now and there is
nothing we can do about it. (Imagine the shock Sallust, Cicero or
Caesar would have had when hearing the vulgo from of Latin that gave
birth to latin languages).
But I do not like it nonetheless.
Cheers
Robert
On 5/3/07, Rick DeNatale <rick.denatale@gmail.com> wrote:
On 5/2/07, Robert Dober <robert.dober@gmail.com> wrote:
> You mean you want to have your cake *and* eat it ;)?
Actually, this is no problem at all, in fact you have to have your
cake before you eat it.The trick is to eat your cake and have it too.
Almost everyone gets this old saying backwards.
--
You see things; and you say Why?
But I dream things that never were; and I say Why not?
-- George Bernard Shaw
This is OT.
But I'll bite.
Utter nonsense. Languages are never victims. No human language is canonical. It isn't possible. English is one of the few languages whose grammar books are not dictated by committee, but updated to reflect modern usage. English, like all human languages is flexible and fuzzy. Now the number of speakers of English as a second language outnumber native English speakers. This simply means that English now has more dialects than ever and where they all overlap is where you will find the language. Language and culture are often difficult to separate and thus societies attempt to preserve something that is intangible. Language and culture are organic and depend on each connection between individuals to identify what is and is not functioning symbolic code for communication of ideas. Language is its own disruptive technology. It contradicts, counteracts and alters itself. Often words do or eventually will have exactly opposite or wholly different meanings from their origins.
English has no foreign speakers. English has no single country or nation. It has always historically been a mix-in. There is not and never has been such a concept as a pure language.
Thus, nobody is trivializing any language. Native speakers of any given language will often and naturally take it for granted.
Sallust, Cicero and Caesar would hardly have been shocked by Latin pidgins and creoles. Those existed in their time. It was always an effect of expansion of communication and interaction, all provided primarily by advancing and spreading technology (roads, writing, commerce) and a little dash of imperialism to boot.
On May 4, 2007, at 7:27 PM, Robert Dober wrote:
On 5/3/07, Rick DeNatale <rick.denatale@gmail.com> wrote:
On 5/2/07, Robert Dober <robert.dober@gmail.com> wrote:
> You mean you want to have your cake *and* eat it ;)?
Actually, this is no problem at all, in fact you have to have your
cake before you eat it.The trick is to eat your cake and have it too.
Almost everyone gets this old saying backwards.
As the English language is the greatest victim of trivialization by
foreign speakers and writers I appreciate enormously to get these
things right.
It is a great irony that countries like France, where I happen to
live, are very worried about the influence of English - and they are
right because I do not feel that English verbs scale very nicely into
latin languages but this is beyond my point.The true "victim" of English's globalization is English itself. But
that is how languages have evolved for millennia now and there is
nothing we can do about it. (Imagine the shock Sallust, Cicero or
Caesar would have had when hearing the vulgo from of Latin that gave
birth to latin languages).