Re[2]: [tied] Re: Pronunciation of "r" - again?

At 8:18:46 PM on Sunday, October 9, 2005, Andrew Jarrette
wrote:

[...]

> david_russell_watson <liberty@...> wrote:

>> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Andrew Jarrette
>> <anjarrette@...> wrote:

> Only English among Indo-European languages has examples
> like these - where originally rhyming words have diverged,
> with no apparent reason.

MHG bruoder, muoter > NHG Bruder, Mutter

There are several partial changes like this in the passage
from MHG to NHG, though I'd have to do some digging to track
them down; it's not something that I keep at the top of my
head.

>>> Plus spellings like "ough" with its myriad pronunciations.

>> But as I wrote before, a spelling system is not a >
>> language. The only justification you have in citing >
>> English spelling is the manner in which it, having >
>> fossilized, is a reminder of past sound changes in >
>> English, not as a linguistically atypical feature itself
>> > of the English _language_.

> But English spelling is atypical among Indo-European
> languages. No other Indo-European language has a spelling
> system that is as inconsistent and exception-rich as does
> English.

But as David has now pointed out twice, this has nothing to
do with the English LANGUAGE. The writing system is a
separate matter altogether.

>> Properly, you should cite only those sound changes which
>> > you consider atypical, not the spelling system that
>> merely _happens_ to reflect and remind us of some of
>> those changes.

> But I am recounting all aspects of English that make it
> nonconforming among Indo-European languages.

This isn't one of them, since -- once again -- it isn't an
aspect of the English LANGUAGE.

[...]

>>> Moreover the fact that it's called "English" though at
>>> least 60% of its vocabulary is French or Latin, if not
>>> more, though I am aware that languages such as Albanian
>>> and Farsi also have a high foreign content.

How much of the French lexicon do you think is Frankish in
origin? And what on earth has the name of the language to
do with anything linguistic?!

Brian