<div style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">===========================================<br>L O W L A N D S - L - 28 May 2009 - Volume 02<br style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"><span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">Encoding: Unicode (UTF-08)</span><br style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">
<span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">Language Codes: <a href="http://lowlands-l.net/codes.php">lowlands-l.net/codes.php</a></span><br>===========================================<br></div><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">From: </span><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="gI"><span class="gD" style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Mike Morgan</span> <span class="go"><<a href="mailto:mwmosaka@gmail.com">mwmosaka@gmail.com</a>></span></span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Subject: </span><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="gI">LL-L "Grammar" 2009.05.28 (01) [EN]<br><br></span><div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="gmail_quote">
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Hi again all,</font></div>
<div> </div>
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Heather replied to my comments:</font></div><div class="im">
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">> I'm not sure where Michael found his 80 odd examples from. I have just googled for 'a half</font></div>
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">> ate sandwich' and no examples appeared.</font></div>
<div> </div>
</div><div>You get more without the extra indefinite article, but even
'A half ate sandwich' turns up 12 on my google search... a re-search
turned up the same approximate number: 80 plus for the phrase w/o "A"
... </div>
<div> </div>
<div>BUT, maybe google search is like lots of linguistic informatants:
they tell you waht you want to hear and so answers will vary from user
to user... (And to everyone except mom when she's mad at me, I am just
Mike)</div><div class="im">
<div> </div>
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">> perhaps these people were speaking sloppily and made mistakes! People do , you know!</font></div>
<div> </div>
</div><div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Yes, and one man's messy desk is another's way of doing business!</font></div><div class="im">
<div> </div>
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">> archaisms often linger longest in 'new' versions of a language ( american Fall / gotten)</font></div>
<div> </div>
</div><div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">And maybe just as often in 'old' versions?</font></div><div class="im">
<div> </div>
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span>> </span>appear not very current - in America, they certainly aren't here in the UK. </font></div>
<div> </div>
</div><div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">We
must however remember that the internet, for all its informality, is
STILL a written medium, and that MOST the people using it were educated
in what was "proper" in writing. SO chances that deviations from
written standard are UNDER-estimated by google seraches, not over...</font></div>
<div> </div>
<div><font style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">So
I am not saying that a number like "80 plus" PROVES popularity or
NOT... and CERTAINLY not that it shows "correctness". For example, if I
type in the single word "whom" I get 147 MILLION hits on google ... and
unless you go through them somehow it is hard to say how many of them
are just saying simply that the rule we learned in school is DEAD! (and
so to a descriptivist dead WRONG)</font></div>
<div> </div>
<div>We often make definitive statements, here and elsewhere, and I am
certaily not innocent of that "crime". But, in truth, the statement
that I feel MOST certain of is of the "*I* wouldn't /can't say that"
type ... and even there, sometimes, I realise later I was wrong! </div>
<div> </div></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">PS I tend to be as excited by an asterisk in front of an
"ungrammatical" sentence as I am by the asterisk in front of a
reconstructed proto-Dene-Basque word...</div>
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">mike || U C > || мика || माईक || マイク || ሚካኤል</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++</span><div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
+++++<br> (( Michael W Morgan, PhD ))<br> to be Assistant Professor in Linguistics<br>Ethiopian Sign Language & Deaf Studies Program<br>
Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia)<br>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<br>וואָס לענגער אַ בלינדער לעבט, אַלץ מער זעט ער.<br>The longer a blind man lives, the more he sees.<br><br>----------<br><br>From: <span class="gI"><span class="gD" style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Mike Morgan</span> <span class="go"><<a href="mailto:mwmosaka@gmail.com">mwmosaka@gmail.com</a>></span></span><br>
Subject: <span class="gI">LL-L "Grammar" 2009.05.27 (06) [EN]</span><br><br></div><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Dear Cheryl &
Kevin</span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Subject: LL-L "Grammar"
</div><div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="im">
<div> </div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">You
wrote:</font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">> What about:</font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">> His eyes were sunken.</font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">> Or…</font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">> The
ship was sunken when they found it. Vs. </font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">> The ship was sunk off the coast of Florida 400 years ago.
Vs.</font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">> The ship sank off the coast of Florida 400 years
ago.</font></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
</div><div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">No, it doesn't work like that. Allow me to rephrase... I'm sure it
doesn't work like that.</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">Here goes:</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">The galleon was sunk off the coast of Florida 400 years
ago.</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">The sunken galleon yielded a cargo of doubloons.</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">& as follows:</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">'The sailor was drunk' aot 'the drunken sailor'</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">'Her hair was of gold' aot 'her golden hair'</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">'His suit was of fine wool' aot 'his fine woolen
suit'</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">The system has broken down of course, English being the international
working argot that it always was, hostage to any passing linguistic eddy.
Consider 'open' - but 'ope' is dialect, 'broken' & 'broke'. 'Happen' yes,
but no 'hap', though you get 'hapless'. </font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">However, in Afrikaans we still have a strong degree of consistancy in
something similar:</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">'Die deur is oop' aot 'die ope deur' (The open door).</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">'die omie is rustig' aot ' 'die rustige omie' (the extremely laid-back
[restful] dear uncle).</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">'die draad is kort' aot 'die korte draad' (the short
thread).</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">The rule in Afrikaans is that the adjective or adverb immediately
preceding the relevant noun or verb becomes part of a word-pair, & the
relationship is indicated by the '-e' suffix.</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3">Having gone that far, once in less formal conversation a complete
sentence has introduced the subject, the noun or verb can be dropped, & the
verb stands in .for the whole pair.</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3" color="#000000">For example:</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3" color="#000000">'die dierbare kind' is followed later by reference only to
'die dierbare' (the darling one).</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3" color="#000000">'die slimme skepsel' to 'die slimme' (the sly creature
[a devius fellow]).</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3" color="#000000">'Die skone jagt' (the trim-lined jacht) to 'die skone' (the
trim one).</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3"><font color="#000000">This last example is to my mind a survival of
the Dutch substratum in American English. What else is a 'schooner' but a
trim-lined yacht?</font> </font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"></span> </div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3" color="#000000">All Yrs,</font></span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><font size="3" color="#000000">Mark</font></span></div><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
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