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L O W L A N D S - L - 18 March - Volume 02<br>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: <span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(91, 16, 148);">Roger Thijs, Euro-Support, Inc.</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:roger.thijs@euro-support.be">roger.thijs@euro-support.be</a>></span><br>
Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L "Grammar" 2011.03.18 (01) [EN]</span><br>
<br>
From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com" target="_blank">sassisch@yahoo.com</a></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">><br>
> Subject: Grammar</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><br>
> Languages with simplified grammars (such as English and Afrikaans) are
more suitable as liguae francae because they do not require the foreign learner
to deal with complex morphological rules prior to acquiring a beginner’s
working knowledge.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">I see Walloons have quite
some difficulty with learning Dutch and German, though both are national
languages in Belgium.
So most of them prefer English as second language in school.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Other factors though may
play a role as the international status of English and some anti-feelings.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">And those who learnt
Dutch or German during several years are reluctant to expose themself with using
it, while the ones who studied English have no refrain, even while
talking with a strong French accent.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Regards,</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Roger</p>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">----------</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: <span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Sandy Fleming</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:fleemin@live.co.uk">fleemin@live.co.uk</a>></span><br>
Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L "Grammar" 2011.03.18 (01) [EN]</span><br>
<br>
> From: <span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Paul Finlow-Bates</span> <<a href="mailto:wolf_thunder51@yahoo.co.uk" target="_blank">wolf_thunder51@yahoo.co.uk</a>></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">> Subject: LL-L
"Grammar" 2011.03.16 (03) [EN]</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">>The idea of expressing
"rock-being-thrown-ness" and "rock-sitting-on-the-ground-ness"
by simply re-arranging the same few simpler words is a development of logic.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">>
It is difficult to imagine the reverse process occurring, so that may explain
why grammar doesn't get more complex.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">>
Also, the world of more ancient people, with simpler technologies, simply
didn't have the same amount of things in them to name. As bronze and iron,
ploughs and microchips turn up, you are probably less inclined give each of
them half a dozen different names according to their circumstances.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">This
really isn't what determines language complexity. Up until recently indigenous
Australians did have a relatively simple lifestyle, but their languages are
some of the most complex in the world. In fact to fit a technologically-driven
language change theory to the facts, you'd probably have to concern yourself
more with explaining why peoples with simpler lifestyles tend to have more
complex languages!</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">>
From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com" target="_blank">sassisch@yahoo.com</a>><br>
> Subject: Grammar<br>
<br>
> Thanks for all the interesting responses!<br>
<br>
> Let me bounce another tentative assertion off you:<br>
<br>
> Languages with simplified grammars (such as English and Afrikaans) are
more suitable as liguae francae because they do not require the foreign learner
to deal with complex morphological rules prior to acquiring a beginner’s
working knowledge.<br>
<br>
> Correct or false, and why?</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Allow
to me eschew the law of the excluded middle on this one :)</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">There
might be some truth in it but I don't see why German (say) isn't just as good
as a lingua franca: beginners make a dog's breakfast of both languages, but as
a bazaar language this is acceptable. And when you get past the beginner stage,
you can just as easily get as good at a complex language as you could at a
"simple" one, since what we're referring to here as
"simple" languages are only superficially simple, really.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">I'd
say the choice of a lingua franca will be due to political and economic, rather
than linguistic, factors.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">The
dearth of inflection structures in English and its laissez faire approach to
orthography does seem to me to make choice of English as a lingua franca
fortunate (in some ways) as other-cultural concepts such as pizza, llamas and
feng shui can just be taken up in English in their original spellings or any
suitable transliteration. But fortunate as this might be (in some ways), it's
not the _reason_ English has become a lingua franca.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Sandy
Fleming</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://scotstext.org/" target="_blank">http://scotstext.org/</a></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
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