English is Our Second Language: Why Learning to Speak and Write English Properly is Damn Near Impossible
by A lament over the current state of the English language and how it will come to ruin not by those who speak it as a Foreign language, but by those who use it as a Mother Tongue….
But for those of you who consider yourselves to be “native” speakers or writers of English as your “mother tongue”; for those of you who eschew the influx of people who do not speak English as their first language; and for you who are so lazy and uninformed that you cannot master this simple exercise in “your” own “first language” and yet continue to complain about “fureners”; for you lot I have this special curse: “May you forever be consigned to a hell of your own devising where there are no flames, no lake of fire, no eternal torments-except that you will not be able to speak or write the language and that you won’t be able to find anyone who will take the time to teach it to you properly!”
I will give you a hint, there will be no more grammar as you might recognize it; syntax will be a matter of efficiency, not custom; while many words will sound like their antecedents in English, Spanish or Arabic there will be no alphabet, only pictograms-like Chinese! Not Chinese-Chinese will probably be a language reserved for the upper classes. No, for working stiffs like you the polyglot language of the future will consist only of words, lights and symbols pertaining to the assignment and completion of tasks. A single word will mean both “well” and “good” because that is the most efficient; “success” and “failure”, “reward” and “punishment” will cease to exist as words, because “failure” will not be an option and the only reward will be your continued existence. Finally, the alternative to continued existence will be an “oblivion” for which you will need to invent many idiomatic euphemisms…. In whatever language is available to you….
1 Wheelock, Frederick M., Rev. Richard A LaFlour, Wheelock’s Latin: The Classic Introductory Latin Course Based on Ancient Authors. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, Inc: 2006.
2 The New Century Dictionary, Vols. One and Two. H.G. Emery and K.G. Brewster, Eds., Catherine B. Avery, Revision Editor. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc: 1952,
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Post CommentDee
On March 22, 2009 at 11:12 am
Incredibly interesting!
Leon
On March 22, 2009 at 6:48 pm
I enjoyed this article very much. I hope that my use of English is appropriate and in keeping with the letter and spirit of the author hoping for a “Mother Tongue” that is both stable and dynamic.
Woe unto those with whom I work for theirs is the language of descent into that Hades of incomprehensibility.