On 4 April 2011 06:17, Ron Johnson <ron.l.john...@cox.net> wrote: > On 04/03/2011 02:54 PM, David Jardine wrote: > >> On Sun, Apr 03, 2011 at 03:08:55PM -0400, Doug wrote: >> >>> >>> This is grossly off topic, but since it's here, i _must_ answer: >>> >>> Thank God there is no "English Academy." >>> >> >> As a native English speaker I entirely agree, but I can understand the >> frustrations of others who are effectively forced to use our language as >> a lingua franca and cannot find a single, stable definition of it. >> >> > Kinda like Spanish... > > > In France, their Academy >>> has the force and power >>> of law. It is _illegal_ to name anything public in English. If you >>> have a store and call it by an English >>> name you will be forced to change it to something French. The only >>> exception I have heard of >>> is "Le Drugstore." I don't know how they get away with it. >>> >> >> What populist propaganda have you been reading? How do they say >> "Disneyland" in French? >> >> > Terre de Disney? > Terre de Souris?
I don't think they have, 'Disneyland'. > > > >> If English, either British or American, had such an academy, we >>> would still be speaking the >>> language of Henry VIII! And we would never have had the opportunity >>> to get rid of the French >>> spelling of things like "centre." >>> >> >> ... or "table" ? Come on! A nationalistic dictionary compiler (anti- >> British >> > > Webster completed his /American Dictionary/ while at U. Cambridge. Would an > anti-Brit really go to England to do his work? To study the enemy and sow dissension. > > > rather than anti-French) caught the mood of the times and you all >> lapped it up. >> > > That can only happen when there's no canon. spelling is in flux. You don't even use capital letters at the beginning of sentences any more. > > > I don't know if England had its own xenophobic equivalents, >> but I think the English would be less likely to accept changes of spelling >> decreed from above. >> >> > Above? Webster didn't get his dictionary mandated by the government. > > Anyway, two words: Samuel Johnson. He just cleaned up the mess that the French, Germans and Romans had made of the language. > > > The French may hate everything English, but those of us who speak >>> any variety of English >>> appreciate its variety, and we wouldn't have it any other way. >>> >> >> But is it _our_ language any more? >> >> > Not after you beggared yourself after the two World Wars. > That wouldn't have mattered if you lot hadn't stolen America from us. Regards, Weaver. -- Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. — Lucius Annæus Seneca. Terrorism, the new religion.
