English is Crazy

4 Replies to “English is Crazy”

1. I watched the video clip on your follow-up post. Thanks for sharing that. But as I wrote in my comment on that post, it doesn’t seem to address the craziness of the way words in English are spelled in English. Loose and choose look like they should rhyme, but they don’t. And why isn’t chose pronounced like lose? Why do lose and choose sound alike? These are examples of what is crazy about this language of ours.

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   1. It’s a complicated story, but as I understand it, a lot of these things are due to how English absorbed words from so many different other languages. It just sopped them up from along the road, so to speak. There wasn’t even a common spelling (of a sort) enforced by the first dictionaries that started coming out in the late 1600s-early 1700s. I’m afraid we just have to accept that English is weird, and somehow learn to love it. Otherwise, it’ll haunt you. 🙂

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2. Yeah. Who invented this f**ked up language, anyway?

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   1. That’s actually a very interesting question. I remember a TV show on PBS years ago, and there are clips from it on YouTube. I’ll post one.
      Basically, English was invented in the markets of early England where Viking settlers, Saxons, Celts would come together to trade, and they had different languages. So, they had to invent a new one. So, English has its roots in commerce, was very adaptable as a result, and spread by England via colonization.

      Here’s one segment: http://youtu.be/7UG6vHXArlk

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