The Brits & English speakers are linguistically disabled

Guest   Sun Jul 23, 2006 1:21 pm GMT
Steve   Sun Jul 23, 2006 1:53 pm GMT
Fine. However, that has absolutely nothing to do with the topic.
In vino veritas   Sun Jul 23, 2006 7:06 pm GMT
Rise in liver deaths shows drinking is English disease
By Sam Lister, Health Correspondent

"EXCESSIVE drinking is killing people in Britain faster than anywhere else in Europe as the country’s alcohol consumption continues to soar, according to research"

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,8122-1972500,00.html

Wow, so it's really true, The Brits are the drunks of Europe. Maybe that is why the Brits don't learn and can't learn languages, because they always drink and are drunk most of their spare time.

In vino veritas!
Guest   Sun Jul 23, 2006 7:50 pm GMT
Wow. just like the Roman Empire disappeared in a haze of alcohol and debauchery!
In vino veritas   Sun Jul 23, 2006 9:47 pm GMT
"Wow. just like the Roman Empire disappeared in a haze of alcohol and debauchery! "

WOW! AND ENGLISH IS STILL 60% LATIN ! HA HA HA !
Guest   Sun Jul 23, 2006 9:58 pm GMT
and italy is 60% corrupt :D
greg   Sun Jul 23, 2006 11:28 pm GMT
Steve : « Euro seems, too, to forget that it is the trend for languages to simplify grammatically as a matter of evolution. »

Ah bon ? Et pourquoi ?
Steve   Sun Jul 23, 2006 11:33 pm GMT
Why does Euro forget? or why is it that way?
I don't know, that just seems to be the general trend, does it not?
I haven't seen any languages of late introducing new cases.
Kirk   Mon Jul 24, 2006 1:03 am GMT
<<I don't know, that just seems to be the general trend, does it not?
I haven't seen any languages of late introducing new cases.>>

I assure you that if you've come to the conclusion that languages don't sprout new cases anymore you've only been looking at a small set of languages (likely Indo-European ones at that).

<<Euro seems, too, to forget that it is the trend for languages to simplify grammatically as a matter of evolution.>>

As a linguistic universal, languages do not get "simpler." Now, certain aspects of languages may become simpler (such as tense or case markings) or disappear altogether but language is tricky in that at the same time those things are happening other aspects are getting more complicated. English lost most case markings but as it moved toward analysis (in the linguistic typological sense) it gained incredibly complex and rigid rules regarding syntax which had not been around to the same extent before. Classical Chinese and Vietnamese lost a lot of their final consonants but as a direct result gained complex tone distinctions which are arguably much more complicated than what they had before. Even creoles, which display some of the lowest degrees of irregular grammatical forms initially, eventually acquire grammatical irregularities (sometimes randomly, sometimes thru sound changes) as time goes on. In fact, it's likely that a good degree of modern languages today have creole origins but no one can tell by this point as too much time has passed and too much complex "needless linguistic gunk" (as linguist John McWhorter humorously calls it) has been acquired over time to be able to tell.

If languages truly were always moving towards simpler states we'd at least expect languages to get easier to learn over time but that's certainly not the case.
Guest   Mon Jul 24, 2006 1:47 am GMT
>and italy is 60% corrupt :D <

AND THE UK is 90% DRUNK ! LOL
Kirk   Mon Jul 24, 2006 1:57 am GMT
Anyway, just a few examples of languages which have acquired more cases over time and have more in their current state than they did before:

--Finnish
--Hungarian
--Russian. The genitives have split into two cases, genitive possessive and partitive from older one, as have prepositions which apparently can be locative or referative now.
--Lithuanian. Has gotten new cases from joining the older genitive with postpositions.
Steve   Mon Jul 24, 2006 2:32 pm GMT
I realise that languages become more complex in certain ways. However, having had the pleasure of learning Norwegian and attempting to learn Icelandic, I can assure you that some languages most certainly do become simpler as time passes. Although that might be because the Norse grammar had some sort of parallel development with that of my own native language.

Perhaps the case of Latin and Italian is a better example?

Anyway, despite the fact that I may be completely wrong (which wouldn't surprise me as I make no claim to a wide knowledge of linguistics), you have basically just disproved Euro's point that English grammar is simpler than, say German, and thus the reason that "English speakers are linguistically disabled".

I believe the point of this thread was to try and prove that English speakers were intellectually incapable of learning one of the languages around them and one argument used was the difficulty of other grammars for English speakers. Since the majority of these are Indo-European. Perhaps my point holds to some degree?
Steve   Mon Jul 24, 2006 2:37 pm GMT
I meant, that the Norse language became simpler to learn, not just simpler.

Out of genuine interest:

Finnish is agglutinative is it not? Do those actually qualify as cases?

Also, is Russian a direct descendent of Old Church Slavonic? How many cases did OCS have?
Guest of Russian origin   Mon Jul 24, 2006 3:28 pm GMT
to Kirk and Steve.
Can you explain to me, plz, what's the meaning of the word "case" in your two mentioned examples:

1. Kirk: "Russian. The genitives have split into two cases, genitive possessive and partitive from older one, as have prepositions which apparently can be locative or referative now."

2. Steve: "Also, is Russian a direct descendent of Old Church Slavonic? How many cases did OCS have?"

Probably I'll be able to answer your questions.
Deborah   Tue Jul 25, 2006 1:34 am GMT
Guest of Russian origin, "case" means "подеж" (I'm not sure that's the correct spelling), as in "родительный подеж".