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Teaching your child to speak the language of ‘Public school’.

Monday 6^th January 2014

As a loving, caring mother myself, I aspire to ensure my children get the best out of their education. I aim to do this by teaching them how to speak the language of POWER. Now before you think I’m crazy, allow me to explain. The public schools in this country have a high level of success due to the way in which their pupils speak. I wish I could send my children to Public school; however, my financial situation could ruin that idea. So, imagine this… we teach our children to speak as if they have just rolled out of Public school.

I know, I know – you live in East London and if your child speaks like a posh totty then they will most definitely get battered. Well they don’t need to speak like pompous, cocky so-and-so’s. Instead they need to learn the techniques. So, that means no slang. Public school students choose to use ‘How do you do?’ and ‘utterly brilliant’ rather than the ‘alright’ and ‘that’s mint’.  It is fair to say some children who were brought up and attended school in East London, for example, may have a different language. The slang used in their everyday conversations boggles many adults – and teachers - alike. But does their choice of language really determine their intelligence? If you really want your child to be accepted into top universities – yes. SO LOWE THE SLANG, BLUDS. Because if you choose to use the ‘bluds, innits, bruvs’ etc., then you are automatically assumed to be thick.

Studies show ‘that 11 members of the elite Russell Group turned more places over to privately-educated pupils in 2011/12’. Then David Lyscom continued to say: ‘public schools invested heavily in teaching the skills needed for university entrance’. So pull up your big girls socks because this is exactly what you’re going to do. These ‘skills’ they speak so fondly of consist of the children omitting the abbreviations, the colloquialisms (slang to you and me) and correct use of negatives – I don’t have no idea what that means. You may want to teach your child to stop with the phrasal verbs.  I’m not saying they should speak like they have something stuck up their bum, but at least they should know how to speak Standard English.

Many children who attend state comprehensive schools are undeniably creative in their spontaneous speech. They use adjectives with negative meaning as words with a positive meaning. For example, ‘that’s sick!’, ‘that’s bad man!’ suggests to older generations that they are describing something revolting – but they’re not! These phrases are used to describe something amazing. Now to me this sounds like they are highly intelligent! Not only are they using simple Standard English but they are using it in a way that no other generation have before – to describe something with a totally different meaning than you would initially think.

But this may be just the public’s opinion. So, unfortunately you still need to work hard to teach your child standardisation.

Linguistic Specialist Jenny Cheshire states that males are more like to use non-grammatical features. In case you don’t know, this means words such as ‘ain’t’ and we ‘was’. Sorry to all the Mothers of boys – you got your work cut out! You know that Universities, Colleges, places of work will not employ a man who says ‘he ain’t got no idea’ so you need to make sure that he ain’t using this grammar no more!

I know you’re stressing out now thinking that you need to send your little mite to Etiquette lessons…

But no need to thank me, I am here to save the day! Researching very basic etiquette phrases that you can slot into every day conversations, could allow your children to pick up on them and start using them too! Here you go:

Please and Thank you          yeah I know, blatantly obvious!

You’re welcome                    kicking ourselves now, aren’t we?

May I                                       This one is crucial, you should encourage them to use this phrase rather than the ‘can I’ that most children have been brought up to use.

I beg your pardon                 This phrase sounds more mature and sophisticated than ‘pardon me’. Your child should never use ‘what’ when asking someone to repeat themselves.

Not only should you encourage your children to adapt these phrases into their language but

you should also discourage the more colloquial (slang) ones. For example:

Yep, yeah, and nope             What’s the need for these? It’s just as easy to say ‘yes and ‘no’ plus you sound much more formal

No Problem                           Based on my research, many professionals, such as University Admission tutors, warn you to steer away from this phrase as it has an abrupt meaning to it. They say you should replace it with you’re welcome.

So there you go! No need to panic, with my fabulous advice, your children should be off to college and University studying for their P.H.D in no time!

Investigation Conclusion and Evaluation

Evaluation

I think that my investigation went pretty well throughout. However, at the beginning I found finding suitable video clips with enough evidence for my investigation quite difficult. Many TV programs that I viewed focused mainly on the students and their conversations rather than the teacher’s language which is what I predominantly needed for my investigation. To improve, I think I could have collected more data with more relevance to my investigation. My methodology could have been improved by being more specific about how long I listened to the clips for and put in the exact time I started listening to the clips. 

Conclusion

Throughout my investigation I found that the unemployed people within ‘Skint’ frequently used grammatical errors. I also found out that their idiolect is a big factor for their grammar as it affects the way they pronounce certain lexis. The graph also shows that the unemployed people use more hedges and fillers as they are less confident with spontaneous speech. However the teachers conjugate lexis such as ‘gonna’ due to the context of them teaching to teenagers. Therefore, they are more likely to adapt to the language of teenagers to create a rapport with them. The teacher uses a lot of connectives as well as the unemployed person but for different reasons. The teacher uses them because of the context of his spontaneous speech. On the other hand, the unemployed people use them to give them time to think about what to say next. My investigation showed that one unemployed person used a wide range of empty adjectives. Therefore, this showed me that there is a contrast in Lakoff’s (1975) theory where she states that women use more empty adjectives than men. The teachers in the Educating Essex transcript show that they use a high level of low frequency lexis. This ties in with the semantics of maths as it is a maths class and therefore the teacher uses a lot of complex lexis to communicate his point. Overall, it shows that the unemployed people use simple syntax when speaking which suggests a low level of education. This may be the reason why they are unable to get a job as they are in a lower social class than the teachers in Educating Essex.

Investigation analysis

Lexis;

Skint;

This clip interviews different people about their daily life being unemployed. Vernon, an unemployed middle-aged man, uses simple words throughout his dialogue. An example would be ‘it’s not nice’. By using the simple adjective ‘nice’ it shows the use of an empty adjective. This contrasts with Lakoff’s (1975) theory that women use more empty adjectives than men. It was in an informal context; therefore this may be why he uses an empty adjective. During the interaction between the interviewer and Vernon, the interviewer shows that they are the powerful participant. For example, he uses the discourse marker of subject change, ‘how much in all do you think you owe’. This shows that they are the most powerful participant because they are controlling the conversation as they want information from the person being interviewed. However, due to the context of this interaction that the interviewer has been hired to asked questions needed for the program. Therefore, this may be why the interviewer shows more power. Also, the interviewer may potentially be in a higher social class than Vernon, and therefore he has access to more complex syntax because of the environment he was brought up in. Julie, an unemployed mother in Birmingham, uses the wrong lexical choice. This is shown when she says ‘definitely get me money’s worth’. She has used the reflexive pronoun when she says ‘me’ instead of the personal possessive pronoun ‘my’. This could suggest that she is uneducated and unable to realise when she has used the wrong pronoun. During the transcript, they use subject specific lexis of the pawn shop. For example, ‘buy backs’, ‘they are stored’ and ‘go on the shop floor’. The context of the interaction shows that Mary is talking to the camera man, therefore this may suggest that she is emphasising the lexis in case the camera man has no knowledge of the shop. This gives evidence that as the unemployed people gain a job, their language changes because of the environment they are in and therefore starts to become more formal and use correct lexis.

Educating Essex;

An underperforming school in Essex is being filmed in a ‘fly on the wall’ style. In the Maths class the teacher used low frequency lexis such as ‘area of a circle’, ‘circumference of a circle formula’. This shows that the teacher has a high level of education. However, he may use more simple lexis depending on the context. He is teaching a year 11 class in a school therefore he will have to use lexis that they will understand rather than what students at degree level may understand. This shows the difference between people with a profession and the unemployed people because the unemployed people do not have a choice of what lexis they can use whereas people with a profession can adapt their language to the context. During the interaction the teacher uses imperatives when speaking to the students. An example would be ‘you’re gonna do’. This shows that the teacher communicates exactly what he wants the class to do. This is also evidence that the teacher is the most powerful participant in the interaction. Relating to power theory, the teacher has instrumental power as he is a teacher and therefore holds the responsibility over the students.  Also, the teacher is male and therefore relating to power theory that males are more powerful than females and therefore has a different lexical choice compared to a female teacher. At certain points in the transcript the teacher uses the lexis ‘guys’. This may suggest that he is trying to change his lexical choice in order to ‘fit in’ with the students. This may be because he wants to build a stronger relationship with the

Students.

 Grammar

Skint;

Throughout the transcript, two unemployed people use a lot of conjunctions. For example, ‘and’ ‘yeah and it come’, ‘and the money come’. This shows that they have to use compound syntax in order to communicate their point because they do not have complex lexis to use in replacement for ‘and’. This may suggest that they have a low level of education because they only use simple lexis. Also, during the interaction they overlap each other when saying ‘and the money come’. This suggests that they do not take part in adjacency pairs. However, because they are taking part in spontaneous speech, and feel under pressure to continue speaking to the camera man, these conjunctions may act as a filler to allow them time to think about what else they can say.

The unemployed family make grammatical errors during their spontaneous speech. An example would be ‘and the money come’. This is an error because they use the present tense verb ‘come’. This is the wrong tense usage and therefore should have been the past tense ‘came’. This shows that they have a low level of education and do not use complex utterances. Also, it could suggest that they also have an idiolect and that the people around them have influenced them to speak in this way. Within the family, the Father is the most powerful participant. This is shown when he says ‘as it was I was owed some money’, by using the pronoun ‘I’ it shows that he does not include his wife in the statement and therefore shows his power over her. Another way of showing that they have a low level of education is when they pronounce certain words. For example ‘appy birfday’ and ‘sayin’. On each of these words, the letter ‘h’ and ‘g’ have been dropped. This may also show their idiolect as it is the way they pronounce the words rather than their misunderstanding of the language. However, Trudgill (1974) states that men use more non-standard English whereas women were the opposite; this transcript shows evidence for this. The language used shows the informality of the context. For example, Julie uses the tag question ‘um five or six quid isn’t it’. This shows that she does not feel the need to use formal language in the situation and therefore does not hesitate to ask the camera man. This could also relate to Lakoff’s (1975) gender theory that women tend to use more tag questions during an interaction than men do. This is because women would rather create a rapport with the recipient whereas men prefer to speak in a competitive way. This relates to Deborah Tannen’s (1990) theory of gender.

Educating Essex;

Throughout the interaction between the students and the teacher, the teacher uses colloquial language. For example, ‘gonna’. This suggests that the teacher may want to feel more comfortable if he uses the same jargon as his students. Therefore, this could suggest that the students feel more comfortable around him and can confide in him. The teacher also uses lexis to clarify his point such as ‘yeah’. This lexical choice always follows an imperative which therefore could suggest that the teacher wants to manipulate the student into agreeing with him. During the transcript the teachers use correct grammar. For example ‘you need to’ shows that he is using the verb ‘need’ followed by the preposition ‘to’ rather than saying ‘needa’ like the unemployed people would say. Therefore, this shows that he has a high level of linguistic understanding and may even be in a high social class as he knows to use correct grammar rather than colloquialism. The teacher uses connectives at the beginning of sentences such as ‘but make some notes’. This may be because of the context of a classroom environment and a student has interrupted him. Therefore, he must continue what he was saying in order to get his point across to the class. The teacher uses an interrogative when speaking to a student. For example, ‘can you do some work’. This shows that he is the powerful participant because it is a demand rather than a question. This is also shown by not following the interrogative with ‘please’ which shows it is a demand. Declaratives are also used when the teacher says ‘I want you’. This shows that the students do not have a choice whether they should do it or not as the powerful speaker has declared that this is what they should do

Investigation

An investigation into the language of a person with a profession, in this case a teacher, and the language of an unemployed person and if it is affected by their social class.

Introduction

An investigation into the language used by a teacher in a classroom environment and the structure of the interaction and compare it to that of a person without a profession and are unemployed. I will analyse the language by investigating the lexis and grammar used within spontaneous speech. I expect to find that the teacher will use more low frequency lexis specific to the lesson in which they are teaching and the complexity of this language, dependant on the level in which it is being taught. I also expect to find that the unemployed people have an idiolect which is more apparent and therefore would use certain words or phrases that are individual to the area in which they were brought up in. The people who are unemployed are more likely to mispronounce words such as the ‘g’ from ‘ing’ words because their language is more informal. Throughout the text I will comment on the different lexis and grammar use of each of the individuals I am investigating and I aim to compare these to each other to conclude the differences between the two. To find my hypothesis, I chose to use two TV shows called Educating Essex and Skint because they are modern TV shows and use modern language. Throughout the analysis, I am going to use theories relating to Lakoff (1975), Tannen (1990) and instrumental and influential power.

My hypothesis; the teacher uses Standard English throughout and they tend to use less hedges or fillers. I expect to find that the teachers use more low frequency lexis and are more formal in discourse whereas the unemployed people use more colloquial language and tend to mispronounce certain words.

Methodology

The data I have collected are 2 different clips from YouTube. These clips are taken from 2 different TV shows that were aired this year; therefore the language is modern, making it more reliable. I chose the TV programs called, Skint (2011) broadcasted on channel 4 and Educating Essex (2011) also aired on channel 4. I chose 2 shows that were broadcasted on the same channel to ensure that it is more reliable in the sense that they are not more advertising focused than any other channel. Therefore, I can analyse the one channel. In total, it took me about 2 hours to collect appropriate clips that would give me enough to analyse. I transcribed the clips which were each 5 minutes long. I started transcribing the clips after the introduction and starting credits. During both clips, I decided not to include the narration over the clips as I felt it wasn’t relevant to my language investigation.

                                                                   

Compulsory Education

Compulsory Education came into effect in 1870 after funding rose to £800,000.

The 3R's

The 3R's in England (Reading, Writing, Arithmetic) came into effect after being mentioned in a toast by Sir William Curtis in 1825.

Standardisation of English Language

The standardisation of the English Language came into effect in the start to mid 19th century. This is when 'rules' came in saying that some grammatical features are more 'correct' than others. However, many argue that Standardisation is always changing.

Weight gain advert

Revolver advert

Instructions for re-filling a pen from around 1830

Newspaper Article from February 1976

Napoleon Bonaparte Speech from 1814

"Soldiers of my Old Guard: I bid you farewell. For twenty years I have constantly accompanied you on the road to honor and glory. In these latter times, as in the days of our prosperity, you have invariably been models of courage and fidelity. With men such as you our cause could not be lost; but the war would have been interminable; it would have been civil war, and that would have entailed deeper misfortunes on France.
I have sacrificed all of my interests to those of the country.
I go, but you, my friends, will continue to serve France. Her happiness was my only thought. It will still be the object of my wishes. Do not regret my fate; if I have consented to survive, it is to serve your glory. I intend to write the history of the great achievements we have performed together. Adieu, my friends. Would I could press you all to my heart."

Napoleon Bonaparte - April 20, 1814


http://www.historyplace.com/speeches/napoleon.htm

Old Recipe

Decoding Antique Recipes

Have you ever looked at an old recipe and wondered what the heck "Oleo" was? Or how to make sour milk? Here is a quick guide to some old-fashioned terms you might find on old recipes. Some of these may seem obvious, while others are real stumpers. Some of these you may not have seen because, hey, my ancestors just might have been oddballs.

Oleo = Margarine. It used to be called "oleomargarine" many moons ago.

T (Tbsp) vs. t (tsp) = Shorthand for Tablespoon and teaspoon. It used to be that people would use a capital T for Tablespoon and a lower-case t for teaspoon.

Spry/Lard = Spry was a brand name for Lard. Lard can generally be substituted with vegetable shortening very successfully in most recipes, but there are some recipes when lard really is better (a pie crust for mincemeat, for example). Nowadays many recipes that used to call for lard use butter.

Suet = Beef fat. The only recipe I have seen this in (and used it in myself) is a 100-year-old Irish mince pie recipe. It is also used a lot in traditional British puddings.

Soda = Baking Soda. That one's pretty obvious.

Sour Milk = Milk that has been soured with vinegar. To make sour milk, put 1 Tablespoon of white vinegar into a cup measure, then fill it with milk up to the cup mark. Stir well and let sit for five minutes. Not to be confused with clabbered milk, which is milk curdled with lemon juice. Sour milk can usually be substituted for buttermilk in most recipes.

"Coffee Cream" = No, they don't mean French Vanilla Coffee Creamer! I've seen this in a couple of recipes from the 1940s that list coffee cream where they apparently mean half and half or light cream.

Icing Sugar = Powdered, or "Confectioner's" Sugar

Carnation Milk or Pet Milk = Evaporated Milk. Many home cooks used to write out their recipes using brand names. Carnation is still around, of course, but they make many different milk products these days. In some cases, seeing a brand name in recipes gets confusing because the brand is no longer around or they were a strictly regional brand.

Treacle = Although they are not technically the same thing, if you see "treacle" in an old recipe, it basically means Molasses.

Salad Oil = Vegetable Oil.

Scant vs. Heaping = Pretty self-explanatory - "Scant" means slightly less than what is called for (a scant Tablespoon is just a little less than a full measured Tablespoon) and "Heaping" or "Rounded" means a little more.

"Mix like cake" = When you are making something that is not cake but will be mixing it in the way cakes are usually mixed: Cream butter with sugar, add eggs, then liquid, then gradually add flour.

"Moderate" Oven, "Hot" Oven, etc. = A moderate oven means 350 degrees. It is the "middle" temperature and the most commonly used in baking. A hot oven would be 400-425. A "Slow" oven would be 300-325 and a "cool" oven would be 200. 

http://bakeoutsidethebox.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/decoding-antique-recipes.html

News article about ban of apostrophes in street signs

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/devon-council-bans-apostrophes-in-street-signs-8536871.html?origin=internalSearch

Language Change

We have borrowed many words from other languages such as French and Latin. The French words originated from Anglo Saxons working in fields that the French have owned. The words being borrowed are called 'loan words'. Some examples include; anchor, angel, candle and cap.
English language has been borrowing words from French for nine centuries.
English has not 'reached' back to its ancestors and their original words but then borrow a French word and then the earlier word formed from Latin. Also, the English language has borrowed the same word twice centuries apart.
English language has borrowed so many words from the French language that the French have come up with the word 'franlgais'.
Function words can also be borrowed form the French Language such as pronouns and prepositions.
There is no such thing as a 'pure language' as every language has borrowed words from another and always have.

Language rules are meant to be broken

For linguists, the statement "language change is inevitable" is uncontroversial. Yet we're constantly told that teenagers (and, it seems, celebrity chefs) are destroying the English language. If we believe the warnings, then soon all younger generations will communicate as if they're composing an SMS or Facebook update and dictionaries will be full of inane abbreviations and words foreign to older generations.

Most languages have "standard" varieties, which are used for formal occasions, such as academia and the law. These words often have a history going back many years, and originate in Latin, French or German, for example. When communicating with friends and family, online or in other informal situations, "vernacular" or "colloquial" language is more appropriate.

Informal language is the most subject to change and to show variations in use. This is evident in changes to spelling, abbreviations such as "LOL", "CBF" and "FML", and for many users, an almost total disregard for rules of grammar. An understanding of the taboo nature of certain words can be seen in the substitution of "the c word" with the inoffensive "kent". The word "random" has taken on a new meaning of "weird" or "unexpected", as well as being used as a noun to describe someone who is not part of the person's social group — and unwanted.

These spelling and semantic changes are seen by linguists as interesting innovations; by the general (adult) population perhaps as signs of poor literacy, laziness or mental deficiency. But to disregard the creativity inherent in these changes is to forget that many teenagers actively engage with language, but on their own terms. Many adults do not understand them because they're not meant to; they're saying "you're not part of my group". We are unlikely to see new meanings of "kent" or "random" in a dictionary (besides the Urban one), except to bring attention to colloquial usage, which is in a constant state of flux anyway.

In terms of the negatives, of concern to many people is the misspelling and misuse of homonyms such as "they're", "there" and "their", and "to", "too" and "two". It's also common to find a sentence peppered with "u", "dat", "dere" or "y" and to show a complete lack of punctuation, even between sentences. Whether this is done out of laziness, ignorance or economy is unclear, and would only be known if the person was forced to write formally. But if one never has to write an essay for uni, create a cover sheet for a job, or give a speech to hordes of business people, then an almost total use of informal language would not present many problems, except to (critical) others. The difficulties arise if one requires the use of formal language but is unable to wield it. Even for those of us who do write formally, subjunctives ("if I were"), split infinitives ("to boldly go") and prepositions at the ends of sentences, are not things we are generally concerned about (boom boom).

Is education to blame? I know academics who write "gonna", "wanna" and "CBF", and mechanics who use the subjunctive in speech. Go figure. We should not be overly concerned because most humans know the appropriate times for certain kinds of speech or writing, dictated by the context we are in and our audience. All "living" languages are constantly changing depending on the needs of the people using them. Nostalgically clinging to words is pointless. Conversely, formal varieties of language are slow to adopt changes and words or rules tend to fall into disuse, rather than be picked up (who nowadays uses "repugn", "peregrinate" or "jactation"?).

Not everyone will attain the vocabulary of Sir Humphrey Appleby or the linguistic style of Wordsworth, and while the use of highly vernacular language by others may be frustrating or grating, attempts to force people to speak or write in certain ways are usually met with resistance or resentment.

We cannot discount individual differences in language use — you use "LOL" but I use "haha" — and people will always have differing opinions on how others should speak or write, though some may think the sky is falling and we're all destined to utter monosyllabic grunts.

The only way to ensure that all children speak, write and understand formal language would be through a massive overhaul of the education system and a prohibition on other language styles. But as this would do little to prevent informal language from being used anyway, it seems some people need to, like, get over it, and stuff.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/society-and-culture/language-rules-are-meant-to-be-broken-20101202-18hry.html#ixzz2pzPJJ8QT

Bad Grammar or Language Change?

What is happening to the English language. NBC Nightly News recently aired a criticism of English speakers, accusing us of misusing the grammar of the language. This is a criticism we have heard from editors, publishers, and readers for at least 300 years. But is it fair? Are we battering English grammar or is English grammar simply changing, as all languages do, over time? Linguists have been struggling with this question for ages.

Take, for example, the plural number in English. English traditionally distinguishes one or more objects by a distinct form, the plural, e.g. one table, two tables, many tables. Lately, however, a series of problems has arisen in the language that suggests this distinction is in trouble.

For example, have you heard people say things like this:

A large amount of pigeons flew by
We found less pigeons than we expected

English once distinguished nouns referring to substances that are always in the singular by using amount for singular substances and number for countable objects in the plural:

A large amount of Kool-Aid, ambition, coffee, or crawfish gumbo
A large number of pigeons, bullwhips, armadillos, or blueberry pies

The same distinction was made by less and fewer. Less was used only if the noun were uncountable: less Kool-Aid, less coffee, fewer crawfish but less crawfish gumbo.Fewer was applied to countable objects: fewer bullwhips, fewer armadillos, and fewer blueberry pies. This distinction, too, seems to be swooshing out the window these days. Is that a natural or unnatural process?

One final bit of evidence. Kay Bock, one of the nation's leading psycholinguists, has been researching the plurals of nouns and finding that we are confusing singular and plural more and more.

In English, the noun that is the subject of a sentence agrees with its verb. Roughly, if the noun has an the plural -s on it, the verb doesn't The pigs run) but if the noun doesn't have one (is singular), the verb does (The pig runs).

What Professor Bock is finding is that agreement is not always between the subject noun and the verb, as grammar dictates, but between the noun nearest the verb, whatever its function in the sentence. For example:

A rootery of pigs were running through the barnyard.
As the problem of rooting pigs grow, we have to address them.

In these sentences, the subject nouns are group and problem, so the verb should contain the -s:

A rootery of pigs was running through the barnyard.
As the problem of rooting pigs grows, we have to address it.

What Bock is finding, is that agreement is often between the verb and the nearest noun to it, which is not necessarily the subject of the sentence. She thinks language is changing but such sentences sound a lot like bad grammar.

By the way, this has nothing to do with the difference between British and US English, where the British use the plural with what linguists call 'collective nouns' (as opposed to our use of rootery above): nouns that are singular in form but refer to a plurality of objects:

The Parliament are in session
The crew are on alert
The team play well together.

The British are consistent in this usage. In the US it seems that our grasp of the sense of plurality is diminishing and, if that is the case, we could see the plural disappear from the language in a relative short linguistic period—perhaps, fewer than 200 years!

Before summing up, let me alert you of one final symptom that seems to fit the pattern of the other three. To understand it, you have to be aware of another loss in English: the number of suffixes for marking grammatical functions like number, person, tense, is dropping rapidly. Suffixes like -dom, -ery, -ess and many others are no longer being added to new words.

The result of this is that the suffixes we are left with have to serve more and more functions. For example, the suffix -s is used to mark the following:

The plural: ant-s, launching-s, door-s
The 3rd singular Present tense of verbs: He/she/it run-s, smell-s, plunge-s
Making nouns out of adjectives: linguistic-s, acrobatic-s, mathematic-s
Possessive: George's, Bush's, the anaconda's (ignore the apostrophe since you can't hear it)

This brings us to the fourth bit of evidence that at least US English-speakers are losing their grasp of the plural: plural number is often confused with nonplural uses. You have probably heard things like these:

Boscov's are having a big sale this week.
Logistics are not my forte.

These would be just speech errors if they didn't fit the pattern created by the first three bits of evidence: we are losing our grip on the plural of words.

So, how will we be able to communicate if the plural disappears? Would you believe that many languages get away without the singular-plural distinction today and have been doing so for millennia?

Oriental languages like Vietnamese and Chinese have no singular-plural distinction at all. The reason these languages do without plural number suggests that it might be redundant in English: we generally use the plural with some modifier that makes plural obvious:

Many Cadillacs	Many Cadillac
Five toads	Five toad
A few warts	A few wart

Do we really need -s when we already have many, five, few in the sentence? The Chinese and Vietnamese have built advanced civilizations on languages limited to phrases like those in the second column above. English could be getting more like Chinese!

If the plural is abandoning English, it is too early to be sure. However, if the process has begun, there is no stopping it, so tormenting your kids with constant grammatical corrections will not work. Only time will tell and, as we all know, time takes its time.

—Dr. Goodword is Robert Beard, PhD Linguistics, and President, The Lexiteria

4 changes to English so subtle we hardly notice they're happening.

E

veryone knows that language changes. It's easy to pick out words that have only been recently introduced (bromance, YOLO, derp) or sentence constructions that have gone out of style (How do you do? Have you a moment?), but we are constantly in the middle of language change that may not be noticeable for decades or even centuries. Some of the biggest and most lasting changes to language happen slowly and imperceptibly. The Great Vowel Shift, for example, was a series of pronunciation changes occurring over 350 years, and not really noticed for over 100 years after that. It resulted in an intelligibility gap between Modern and Middle English and created the annoying misalignment between English pronunciation and spelling. But it was impossible to see while it was going on.

These days, however, it is possible to spot subtle linguistic changes by analyzing large digital collections of text or transcribed speech, some of which cover long periods of time. Linguists can run the numbers on these large corpora to determine the direction of language use trends and whether they are statistically significant. Here are 4 rather subtle changes happening in English, as determined by looking at the numbers.

1. SHIFT FROM "THEY STARTED TO WALK" TO "THEY STARTED WALKING"There are a number of verbs that can take a complement with another verb in either the "-ing" form or the "to" form: "They liked painting/to paint;" "We tried leaving/to leave;" "He didn't bother calling/to call." Both of these constructions are still used, and they have both been used for a long time. But there has been a steady shift over time from the "to" to the "-ing" complement. "Start" and "begin" saw a big increase in the "-ing" complement until leveling out in the 1940s, whiles emotion verbs like "like," "love," "hate," and "fear" saw their proportion of "-ing" complements start to rise in the 1950s and 60s. Not all verbs have participated in the shift: "stand," "intend," and "cease" went the "to" way.

2. GETTING MORE PROGRESSIVEEnglish has been getting more progressive over time — that is, the progressive form of the verb has steadily increased in use. (The progressive form is the –ing form that indicates something is continuous or ongoing: "They are speaking" vs. "They speak.") This change started hundreds of years ago, but in each subsequent era, the form has grown into parts of the grammar it hadn't had much to do with in previous eras. For example, at least in British English, its use in the passive ("It is being held" rather than "It is held") and with modal verbs like "should," "would," and "might" ("I should be going" rather than "I should go") has grown dramatically. There is also an increase of "be" in the progressive form with adjectives ("I'm being serious" vs. "I'm serious").

3. GOING TO, HAVE TO, NEED TO, WANT TOIt's pretty noticeable that words like "shall" and "ought" are on the way out, but "will," "should," and "can" are doing just fine. There are other members of this helping verb club though, and they have been on a steep climb this century. "Going to," "have to," "need to," and "want to" cover some of the same meaning territory as the other modal verbs. They first took hold in casual speech and have enjoyed a big increase in print in recent decades.

4. RISE OF THE "GET-PASSIVE"The passive in English is usually formed with the verb "to be," yielding "they were fired" or "the tourist was robbed." But we also have the "get" passive, giving us "they got fired" and "the tourist got robbed." The get-passive goes back at least 300 years, but it has been on a rapid rise during the past 50 years. It is strongly associated with situations which are bad news for the subject — getting fired, getting robbed — but also situations that give some kind of benefit. (They got promoted. The tourist got paid.) However, the restrictions on its use may be relaxing over time and get-passives could get a whole lot bigger.

How texting is wrecking our language.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-483511/I-h8-txt-msgs-How-texting-wrecking-language.html

A good dictionary is a fine thing - I yield to no man in my love for one. If I stretch out my right arm as I type, I can pluck from my shelves the two volumes of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.

They are as close to my heart as they are to my desk because they are so much more than a useful tool.

Leafing through a good dictionary in search of a single word is a small voyage of discovery - infinitely more satisfying than looking something up on the internet.

It's partly the physical sensation - the feel and smell of good paper - and partly the minor triumph of finding the word you seek, but it's rare to open a dictionary without being diverted somewhere else.

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The eye falls on a word you've never seen before or one whose meaning you have always wanted to check, and you close the dictionary just a little bit richer for the experience.

But my lifetime love affair with the OED is at risk. The sixth edition has just been published and - I feel a small shudder as I write these words - it has fallen victim to fashion.

It has removed the hyphen from no fewer than 16,000 words.

So in future we are required to spell pigeon-hole, for instance, as pigeonhole and leap-frog as leapfrog. In other cases we have two words instead of one. Pot-belly shall henceforth be pot belly.

You may very well say: so what? Indeed, you may well have functioned perfectly well until now spelling leapfrog without a hyphen.

The spell-check (sorry: spellcheck) on my computer is happy with both. But that's not why I feel betrayed by my precious OED.

It's because of the reason for this change. It has happened because we are changing the way we communicate with each other, which means, says the OED editor Angus Stevenson, that we no longer have time to reach for the hyphen key.

Have you ever heard anything quite so daft? No time to make one tiny key-stroke (sorry: key stroke).

Has it really come to this? Are our lives really so pressured, every minute occupied in so many vital tasks, every second accounted for, that we cannot afford the millisecond (no hyphen) it takes to tap that key?

Obviously not. No, there's another reason - and it's far more sinister and deeply troubling.

It is the relentless onward march of the texters, the SMS (Short Message Service) vandals who are doing to our language what Genghis Khan did to his neighbours eight hundred years ago.

They are destroying it: pillaging our punctuation; savaging our sentences; raping our vocabulary. And they must be stopped.

This, I grant you, is a tall order. The texters have many more arrows in their quiver than we who defend the old way.

Ridicule is one of them. "What! You don't text? What century are you living in then, granddad? Need me to sharpen your quill pen for you?"

You know the sort of thing; those of us who have survived for years without a mobile phone have to put up with it all the time. My old friend Amanda Platell, who graces these pages on Saturdays, has an answerphone message that says the caller may leave a message but she'd prefer a text. One feels so inadequate.

(Or should that have been ansafone? Of course it should. There are fewer letters in that hideous word and think how much time I could have saved typing it.)

The texters also have economy on their side. It costs almost nothing to send a text message compared with a voice message. That's perfectly true. I must also concede that some voice messages can be profoundly irritating.

My own outgoing message asks callers to be very brief - ideally just name and number - but that doesn't stop some callers burbling on for ten minutes and always, always ending by saying: "Ooh - sorry I went on so long!"

But can that be any more irritating than those absurd little smiley faces with which texters litter their messages? It is 25 years since the emoticon (that's the posh word) was born.

It started with the smiley face and the gloomy face and now there are 16 pages of them in the texters' A-Z.

It has now reached the stage where my computer will not allow me to type the colon, dash and bracket without automatically turning it into a picture of a smiling face. Aargh!

Even worse are the grotesque abbreviations. It is interesting, in a masochistic sort of way, to look at how text language has changed over the years.

It began with some fairly obvious and relatively inoffensive abbreviations: 'tks' for 'thanks'; 'u' for 'you'; 4 for 'for'.

But as it has developed its users have sought out increasingly obscure ways of expressing themselves which, when you think about it, entirely defeats the purpose.

If the recipient of the message has to spend ten minutes trying to translate it, those precious minutes are being wasted. And isn't the whole point to 'save' time?

Then there's the problem of ambiguity. With my vast knowledge of text language I had assumed LOL meant 'lots of love', but now I discover it means 'laugh out loud'. Or at least it did the last time I asked.

But how would you know? Instead of aiding communication it can be a barrier. I can work out BTW (by the way) but I was baffled by IMHO U R GR8. It means: "In my humble opinion you are great." But, once again, how would you know?

Let me anticipate the reaction to this modest little rant against the text revolution and the OED for being influenced by it. Its defenders will say language changes.

It is constantly evolving and anyone who tries to get in the way is a fuddy-duddy who deserves to be run down.

I agree. One of the joys of the English language and one of the reasons it has been so successful in spreading across the globe is that it is infinitely adaptable.

If we see an Americanism we like, we snaffle it - and so we should. But texting and 'netspeak' are effectively different languages.

The danger - for young people especially - is that they will come to dominate. Our written language may end up as a series of ridiculous emoticons and everchanging abbreviations.

It is too late to save the hand-written letter. E-mailing has seen to that and I must confess that I would find it difficult to live without it. That does not mean I like it.

I resent the fact that I spend so much of my working day (and, even more regrettably, weekends) checking for e-mails - most of which are junk.

I am also cross with myself for the way I have adapted my own style. In the early days I treated e-mails as though they were letters. I tried to construct proper, grammatical sentences and used punctuation that would have brought a smile to the lips of that guardian of our language, Lynne Truss.

Now I find myself slipping into sloppy habits, abandoning capital letters and using rows of dots.

But at least I have not succumbed to 'text-speak' and I wish the OED had not hoisted the white flag either. I recall a piece of doggerel which sums up my fears nicely: Mary had a mobile.

She texted day and night. But when it came to her exams She'd forgotten how to write.

To the editor of the OED I will simply say: For many years you've been GR8. Don't spoil it now. Tks.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-483511/I-h8-txt-msgs-How-texting-wrecking-language.html#ixzz2pzJsotGl
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