{"id":131273,"date":"2016-08-14T19:04:40","date_gmt":"2016-08-15T01:04:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/14\/when-languages-change-do-they-decline-or-just-evolve.html"},"modified":"2016-08-14T19:04:40","modified_gmt":"2016-08-15T01:04:40","slug":"when-languages-change-do-they-decline-or-just-evolve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/14\/when-languages-change-do-they-decline-or-just-evolve.html","title":{"rendered":"When languages change, do they decline or just evolve?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I come from what might be called an "English privilege" position, where most of the cross-contamination in languages that are changing over time is coming from English words creeping in.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, English itself is deeply a blend of foreign language, well beyond being a Germanic tongue heavily overlaid with Norman French. While we get into all sorts of zaniness over grammar, we've been more than happy to adopt words from every language we run into. So it's hard to feel too much sympathy for other folk being paranoid about English creeping into their tongue.<\/p>\n

As for language simplifying, well, that's another matter. It always sounds good, but Americans, at least, gave that up after Noah Webster. The closest I can think to an attempt that actually worked was the Third Reich doing away with the blackscript lettering that Germans and Austrians had used forever. Dictating to people how to spell, or what words they are allowed to use, rarely works on a macro level.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n
\n
\n<\/a>
\nThe circumflex: A battle over an accent mark<\/a><\/span>
\nA controversy brewing in France over a decision to eliminate the circumflex highlights fears about ‘English taking over’. Agnes Poirier takes a closer look.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

View on Google+<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I come from what might be called an "English privilege" position, where most of the cross-contamination in languages that are changing over time is coming from English words creeping in. On the other hand, English itself is deeply a blend of foreign language, well beyond being a Germanic tongue heavily overlaid with Norman French. While … Continue reading “When languages change, do they decline or just evolve?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-131273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10087,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/09\/07\/how_languages_c.html","url_meta":{"origin":131273,"position":0},"title":"How languages change","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 7-Sep-06 7:18am","format":false,"excerpt":"Remarkable article on Language Log about how everyday Turkish is being changed by the media. It's not any sort of intentional change, but it has to do with English-language movies...","rel":"","context":"In "Writing and Language"","block_context":{"text":"Writing and Language","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/writing-and-language"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":43323,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/07\/02\/english-in-india.html","url_meta":{"origin":131273,"position":1},"title":"English in India","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 2-Jul-14 4:54pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Fun article on how English words keep popping up in new and interesting ways amongst various groups in India. \u00a0I actually love this kind of linguistic cross-fertilization. Having a dynamic, living language that incorporates words that are useful to it from other languages is a good thing.\ufeff English explodes in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":45462,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/09\/23\/save-the-english-language-from-the-hun.html","url_meta":{"origin":131273,"position":2},"title":"Save the English Language from the Hun!","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 23-Sep-14 5:50pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The outbreak of WWI for the US started a reaction not only against speaking German in the US (either as an immigrant or as an academic study), but most other non-English languages as well -- a reaction that we live with in many ways to this day. Originally shared by\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":46228,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/11\/04\/translating-words-across-europe.html","url_meta":{"origin":131273,"position":3},"title":"Translating words across Europe","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 4-Nov-14 4:19pm","format":false,"excerpt":"This is a very spiffy little site. Enter in an English word, and see the most common translated word in a variety of European nations. Originally shared by +Yonatan Zunger: Here's an interesting site, via +Laura Gibbs: it uses Google Translate to show you the translations of any word across\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":139130,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/06\/09\/red-light-blue-light.html","url_meta":{"origin":131273,"position":4},"title":"Red light! Blue light!","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 9-Jun-19 1:21am","format":false,"excerpt":"We assume everyone groups colors the same way as we do. We assume wrongly.","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/japan-traffic-signal.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/japan-traffic-signal.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/japan-traffic-signal.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/japan-traffic-signal.png?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/japan-traffic-signal.png?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":41985,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/05\/15\/maybe-kay-should-learn-german.html","url_meta":{"origin":131273,"position":5},"title":"Maybe Kay should learn German","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 15-May-14 5:59am","format":false,"excerpt":"My daughter plans on taking Mandarin Chinese in high school next year, but looking at this map, German might be a better alternative if she plans on sticking around in Colorado.Reshared post from +Yonatan ZungerThis is a great little dive into US Census data: What's the most commonly spoken language\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131273\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}