From: Óskar Guðlaugsson
Message: 208
Date: 2000-12-04
> > > (btw "hail" in English can't be all that bad. At lest I grew upHmm, I admit that I misread that. Sorry :)
> > > singing "hail, hail rock 'n roll", and that was Chuck Berry, and
> > > no one thought any "German" thoughts)
> >
> > No, English isn't all bad at all. In fact it's no worse than any
> other
> > language.
>
> Actually, I was talking about "the word hail in English"
> > > I'd like to add that in my opinion German has a much bettervowel
> > system thana
> > > English, because the English vowels are really distorted, and
> hardly
> > > correspond to the signs used to describe them. In German, the
> vowel
> > signs
> > I'm sure you know that, scientifically, there's no such thing as
> > "better" vowel system.Now you're being very slippery, mate. I'm so immersed in phonetics,
>
> I was talking about how well the "signs" (=letters)
> used to describe the sounds fit the sound.
> For historic reasons, English has kept a very old spelling
> that is centuries behind the way words are actually
> pronounced.
> It makes sense to describe diphtongs by TWO letters,Why are you bringing this up? Do the people from all over the English
> because that is what they are. Yet "I", which is
> pronounced like "ai" (a diphtong) is represented
> by only one sign or letter. Things like that..
> > Linguistics state that: "All languagesthey
> > enable their speakers to communicate any and all concepts that
> > have need or want to communicate" (my words); a language is fixedto
> > the environment and society behind it. An African tribal languageoptimal
> may
> > not have a word for 'transistor', but it will have a single short
> word
> > for a social concept too complex for the high and mighty European
> > languages to explain except in a paragraph. Norwegian is the
> > language for Norwegians, Vietnamese is better for Vietnamese thanI need to rephrase what I said to you:
> > "superior" French, Americans are best off speaking English
> > (even if no other people spoke English).
>
> Don't know if it makes sense to speak about "optimal"
> languages. Of course you simply can't switch
> languages, because it takes time to reorient oneself.
> And you'd have to be born again to know what it's like
> to have a different mothers language. But presumably some
> languages are better suited in certain environments.
> Such as the eskimo language for Greenland.
> But whether English or Russian is the best language for
> technology, might actually be undecided. Maybe Russian
> gives better chess players?
> Sure, we could write it as ®, º, ¿ , õ , ô , ð , ¤ , etc..I'll wait for other list members to complain about this problem. If
> many possibilities.
>
> For me at least "ö" is a "reserved sign" -- it already
> means something else (u-umlaut)
>
> I have seen that the Viking Society uses it in its
> books, but for Scandinavians, Germans etc, this is
> unnatural.
> I have heard Americans using German words, likeNot much comment on this really. Occasional use of German words in
> "eigenvalue", "zeitgeist", "gestalt", etc..
> I thought "eingebuergert" was a word describing very well
> what I was trying to say. I cannot see why you'd
> see it as "arrogant". In reality it only reflects
> the existence of other languages than English, where
> the appropriate word is not always on the tip of the tongue.
> "Eingebuergert", expressed my thought much more
> accurately than for example "customary". In an international
> forum you have to expect an occasional non-English word.
> Non-native English speakers aren't as good at English as
> those who were borne with it.
> The comment was written under the slash /Germans header.That's a point though, I'll give you that :)
> >I (and I believe Haukur too) do not:) :)
> > want any cross-Atlantic bias in this group (especially when we're
> > in-between, hehe :)
>
> What gave you that idea?
> I think it becomes more clear if German is used
> as reference. At least for me it is more clear that way.
> Those who know some German have a very great advantage
> when studying Old Norse. The reason is that the grammatical
> system is similar.
> > Come to the voice chat, we'll demonstrate :)You don't need the microphone :) You can still hear us speaking, so
>
> Sorry, I don't have the microphone.
> Although think it is an excellent idea,
> English, German and Norwegian all have the "j".Er...Keth, you're being funny. Of course I know that, I'm not 4 years
> Examples are jazz, just, john, jumbo, jack (English)
> jawohl, juni, justiz, jener, jagd (German)
> joda, jøss, jul, juss, jass, jumper (Norwegian)
> The English "j" differs. We say it is more like a "dzj".
> I have however no idea at all whether Old Norse had "j".
> And you say Icelandic does not have it?
> In Norwegian is a separate sound.
> Latin probably did not have it originally.It didn't, no probability involved. I told you that the character "j"
> Iulius, Iuno, etc