Can you relate? You are sitting in your father’s living room watching the evening news. All of a sudden, your father clenches his raised fist and yells, “That’s not how you say it!” The word is “Auspice’ not Ass…….ss!” Your father gets up and starts to write a letter to the TV station manager. Thirty minutes later he emerges with a smile saying… “I faxed it!”
This is not a fictional account. In the last six years my Pops has made a point of taking on the badge of ‘English Language Enforcer,’ identifying the media offenders on radio, TV and newsprint. A single word can send my Pops into a rant that causes the family to bow their heads in capitulation.
Like an episode of “All in the Family” my Pops and I get into a tense discussion on the English language. My position is that English is a living language with new words and expressions salting speech in an ever-evolving process, and his position is that a language is static. Words don’t change, only people pervert the spoken word. But my Pops position is one that has been instilled by his heritage, since he was raised in a two-language family. His mother and father’s native tongue was German and my father as well as his siblings all learned German in their youth.
So why is this an important fact?
German is the second largest language on the planet, closely followed by Russian. German has 185,000 words, with Russian holding onto to third place with 130,000 words. With that many words to its credit, a German game of “Kratzen” should be a cakewalk. The interesting part is that Germans do not add many words yearly to their language. So to a man of German heritage there may be only one way of expression, depending on what the topic is.
English is a beast that cannot be tamed!
English is a language that has 616,500 words with over 1,000 words added to it every year. Many of these words come to us from other languages, and more are added because of how they are used. “Ain’t, ain’t in the dictionary” is no longer a statement of fact. This example demonstrates how English is a living language, with new words and expressions salting speech in an ever-evolving process.
This simple fact should not leave one aghast, alarmed, amazed, appalled, astonished, bewildered, blown away, bowled over, confounded, dumbfounded, electrified, flabbergasted, flummoxed, overwhelmed, shocked, startled, stunned, stupefied, surprised, taken back, or thunderstruck at this capacious cornucopia we call the English language.
Canadians have a unique English experience. English Canada was founded on the Queen’s English, which is spoken by only 16% of all the English speakers in the world today. In contrast, are the ‘twisters’ of the language our American cousins to the south, who strongly influence Canada through Television, Radio and Newspapers. Over 66% of English speakers use American English in their written and spoken word.
By the end of the 21st century, the Queen’s English will have bit the dust, bought the farm, breathed its last breath, came to an end, cashed in its chips, deep-sixed, expired, gave up the ghost, kicked off, kicked the bucket, lay with the lilies, permanently changed its address, sprouted wings, took the dirt nap, went belly up, went to his final reward, punctuated its last period. In short, it may die.
The Americans have invaded the purity of the English that was taught in the classroom 50 years ago and it started long before that nation was formed. Because the English language is made up of 300 other spoken tongues, with the users of our language changing words yearly in contravention of the rules your grade three English teacher laid out.
One example of how our American cousins have changed the Queen’s English, is that at the end of World War II, according to Sir Winston Churchill, the Allied leaders nearly came to blows over the use of a single word during their negotiations, when some diplomats suggested that it was time to “table” an important motion. This small word, to the Canadians and British meant for the motion to be put on the table for discussion. But to the Americans it meant just the opposite. It means to put-off the motion to a later meeting. To anyone today who have served on a committee or a board, we now understand the term “to table” in the same way the Americans do. It took less than 50 years for us to toss out a snippet of the Queen’s English usage of a word.
Has English changed more since then?
So, when you are watching the news on TV and your father jumps from a daze and mumbles some incoherent insult at the News Anchor, remember that it will only get worse, devalue, degrade or rot away, … you get the picture.
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