English losing its flavor & fragrance due to Internet &a

>>Uriel Tue Nov 17, 2009 2:49 am GMT
We still use the same words, Shuimo. English isn't losing anything I can think of. <<

You fail to get the point miles away, Uriel!By that line of thinking of yours, then we should say English is gaining! and gaining tons of weight due to the rapid increase of new words each day and each hour!
Here the issue is a QUALITATIVE one!


>>Uriel Tue Nov 17, 2009 5:38 am GMT
In older forms of English people simply took longer to say things, by a more circuitous route. Does that make it better? I don't think so. It's a stylistic change, nothing more. To us it tends to sound grander and more formal because we have streamlined normal everyday speech to a greater degree, but back then, that simply WAS normal speech. So really it's our perception that has changed, since our frame of reference is now different. But efficiency is not necessarily debasement. It's simply trimming the fat.

Uriel Wed Nov 18, 2009 12:50 am GMT
Doesn't seem contradictory to me. BECAUSE we have trimmed the fat, old-fashioned English now sounds very flowery and fancy and overly formal. However, back when that style of speech was in vogue, it would not have seemed flowery or fancy to its speakers -- just normal. It's because of the alteration in speech habits over the years that modern-day speakers perceive that older style as being formal, etc. -- WE would now only use that style if we were trying to be formal or grandiose. <<

Plz don't drag the length of chunks of language to equal to language QUALITY!
Length of yr output has almost nothing to do with flavor and fragrance!
You can put things very briefly and concisely, yet no less eloquently and beautifully than otherwise putting things in longer lengthier ways!

A very short letter, be it snail mail or e-mail, can be very pleasurable and interesting!
Then a lengthy article can also be very dry and dull!

Such reading experience difference, you call it difference of stylistic change??

By no means!

Then again, you seem to equal flowery or fancy languge with fragrance and flavor of language! What a big delusion you have there!

Think again about what is really the fragrance and flavor of a language!LOL

<Doesn't seem contradictory to me.>

First you point out the fallacy of assessing "older forms of English" by modern criteria:

<back then, that simply WAS normal speech. So really it's our perception that has changed, since our frame of reference is now different>

Then you assess "older forms of English" by modern criteria:

<efficiency...It's simply trimming the fat>

Which is a contradiction.

The more words, the larger the vocabulary, the more precise you can be, thus more efficient -- as long as all interested parties understand those words.