"mere mistakes"

[Dennis R. Preston]

I'm not sure how to deal with this diatribe against language legislation by
expert bodies (which is generally universally ignored as quaint bullshit)
which goes on to apply pet-peeve legislation at the individual level.

Of course the history of every language is more than a little firmly rooted
in "mere mistakes." Since I am a native speaker of "I like to fuckin'
died," I was intrigued by the transportation of the "infinitive marker"
(which it isn't) from "like to" to "about" in the expression. Those who are
not intrigued by "mistakes" like these (and the underlying grammar which
licenses them) are missing out on all the fun (not to mention the science).

This does not mean, of course, that us linguists do not have ordinary
feelings which reflect our own life experiences, and these little
prejudices are fun to read. I jot them down in the interest of language
attitude and folk linguistic research all the time.

dInIs


 >> Isn't anyone bothered by "exetera"?
>>
>
>I guess it becomes a puristic argument similar to a meeting of anonymous
>alcoholics. People who are fond of the language are always bothered when
>other people talk incorrectly. But we are helpless, for if you hear
>"exetera" around, it will be "exetera" and not the old good Latin "et
>cetera." When I was younger, I was furious about "kofe" (russian "coffee")
>being colloquially used in neutrum. It has to be masculine, I knew it, I
>heard it in my family, I read it in books. A couple of years ago a
>freaking "language academy" introduced a new "law," allowing (sic!) people
>to regard "kofe" as neutrum. Those for whom language was merely means of
>communication were celebrating - they did not have to fight themselves
>anymore. What academy can introduce laws for language which is a form of
>existence and a living body (at least, for me)?
>A couple of further examples. The german-whatever-academy for a long time
>now tries to get rid of es-zet, a gothic letter sounding like "ss" in
>English. They also try to eliminate "ph" in Greek words and substitute
>simple "f" for it. It is normal, it is orthography, nothing more, nothing
>less, but why does it have to be artificial?
>A construct "I about to fucking died" appeared recently on the list. It
>does not have to be studied (maybe, just noted). It has to be eliminated.
>A person using such a construct does not suggest an interesting usage of
>grammatical and lexical units, he is merely mistaken. For me, it is
>disgusting (though I do not possess exemplary knowledge of the English
>language myself).
>On the other hand, one can do nothing about that. I can bring more
>examples from Hebrew with its poor lexicon heading to the huge gap which
>already exists in Arabic between the spoken language and the literature,
>but the efforts to stops this process are probably vain. The language will
>"develop." For me, a consolation is that the good old language does not
>die. It may not be spoken, but it is in the books.
>I vainly hope that the "language academies" will rather die while standing
>than live on their knees, "legalizing" "I about to fucking died" instead
>of supporting propoer language education. This may decelerate the process
>of language degeneration and stimulated deterioration.
>
>Of course, "exetera" bothers me.
>
>                                                        A.Fuchs
>
>P.S. "Don't afraid. Everybody must dead." is my favourite movie quotation.

Dennis R. Preston
Professor of Linguistics
Department of Linguistics and Languages
Michigan State University
East Lansing MI 48824-1027 USA
preston at pilot.msu.edu
Office: (517)353-0740
Fax: (517)432-2736