Growing English

While using Facebook, Twitter, or any other social network, it is not unusual to be corrected by someone or to see someone “teaching” the “right” way to talk or write. Sometimes, this argument may be accompanied by other prejudices: speak right if you want me to listen to you and to consider what you’re saying; illiterate; go to school; if you want to talk about this, learn how to write first. All of the sentences above can be easily said on the internet, but its root is not there. 

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Many people claim that there is a correct English to be spoken: The Standard – Standard American English, United Kingdom Standard English, and the Received Pronunciation. They are the so-called language purists, prescriptive grammarians, people who consider the English taught in school to be the appropriate and unique, criticizing and humiliating others dialects as if they were superior, they claim to use the “good” language.

 

 Language is a tool of power: to build – by its changes and transformations naturally caused by the socials involved; or to destroy and conquest – by colonizing, downgrading the users of a dialect and banning languages as a mean of political control, as it happened with Cajun English and French in southern Louisiana, American Indian languages, or even during the occupation of Korea (1910-1945) when the Japanese prohibited the Koreans to speak their language by 1943, trying to Japanize it. If you are interested in learning about Korea under Japanese Occupation, I recommend the Korean drama “Chicago Typewriter”. 

 

Máquina de Escribir Chicago - Episode 6 | Rakuten Viki

 

This also happened in France, 1977, when the French Government passed a law banning the use of English in official contexts (political, juridic, etc.) aiming to preserve French expressions, but it didn't work out (CRYSTAL, 2002, p. 273). However, from a linguistic point of view, one dialect is neither better nor worse than another, nor purer nor more corrupt, nor more or less logical, nor more or less expressive. It is simply different (FROMKIN et al., 2002). For example, despite American English is the most influential dialect worldwide and British English the “purer” and “elegant” English, it is wrong to assume that they rule the social language use, once we have different dialects, idiolects, regional dialects, cultural groups, word choices that are made according to the context (how formal is the situation, the relationship between the speakers, etc.). 

 

English, as we can see when we study its development, emerged from the contact and transformation of different languages and cultures – as well as other languages. Today, considering the limitless internet, the viability of information, and the use of it as commercial, technical or cultural language (ALGEO, 2009, p. 183) it is baseless and clueless to assume that it has a purity or a pattern that must be followed. It is contradictory to downgrade a dialect or even a pronunciation when it comes to language – being a native or not – once it is made and transformed by its users, that are affected by at the same time that is affecting it.

 

 Language change is not corruption it is richness. 

FOR FURTHER READING

Meet Geoffrey Chaucer

        Geoffrey Chaucer is known as the father of English poetry, not because he was the first but because his works are mesmerizing. He is one of the greatest of all, being literate in French and English, who also read Latin and studied French and Italian poetry (THORNLEY; ROBERTS, 2008, p. 15). He lived during the Middle English period (1100-1500) and was born in the reign of Edward III, 1340, dying in 1400 (HUDSON, 1913, p. 20). The language used, as we will be able to perceive below, changed substantially, being much easier to read the original version when compared to Beowulf, which was written in Old English. Read the original passage below and its translation:

One of the most important and universally studied of the English classics poems of Old English Literature is called Beowulf, which is a heroic epic poem written between 700 AD and 1025 AD by an unknown Anglo-Saxon poet, combining mythical creatures to Christian and pagan elements. An epic poem can be defined as a long narrative poem recounting heroic deeds in both oral or written forms (YOSHIDA, 2019). Our hero is called Beowulf, a strong and brave hero from the tribes of Gautas. He travels to Hrothgar, Denmark, to kill Grendel, a horrendous creature that is attacking the kingdom killing some of Hrothgar’s people every night. After slaying it, Beowulf fights against vengeful Grendel’s mother, killing her with a sword.

Around fifty years later, Beowulf, who was named the king of his country, Geats, confronts and defeats a new enemy: an unnamed dragon, but due to the arduous battle, Beowulf dies as a result of the injuries he suffered during the battle. Wiglaf, a young man that helped him in his last battle, will become his succesor.

Considering this, let’s explore fragments of Beowulf and some poetic devices found in it, with a brief explanation. The fragments that are going to be used to exemplify the devices are part of a translation taken from the book Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney to keep the readers’ understanding. 

ALLITERATION

        When reading Beowulf it is possible to notice that there are no rhymes in it, instead, there is the use of alliteration, a poetic device that consists of the repetition of the same consonant sounds at the beginning of close words, giving a sense of flow. However, it is important to know that in translations it is difficult to keep the repetition of sounds and maintain the sense at the same time, which is why the alliteration will be much more common and violent in the Old English version, once it was a language with the recurrent use of consonants (ALGEO, 2009, p. 87-88)

 SIMILE

          According to Nguyen Thuy Nga and Nguyen Quoc Bao similes can be defined as a direct/explicit comparison using comparison words (like, as) or comparison form. (2008, p. 33). It is possible to identify a simile on the example below, comparing the ship to a bird. 

KENNINGS

            Kennings were common in Old English literature, it is a concise compound or figurative phrase replacing a common noun (BRITANNICA). In other words, it is a poetic word made of other words that describes the characteristics or state of that thing/person replacing it’s name. Truly poetic as we can see below:

HYPERBOLE

            Hyperboles are used as an exaggeration or an overstatement (NGUYEN; NGUYEN, 2008, p. 37), contributing to qualify and emphasize a characteristic.

SOURCES:

When people hear or read the word “Aryan”, they probably think about Nazism, a fascist ideology that defends the supremacism of a “superior German race”, which led to the torture, dehumanization, and death of Europe’s Jewish, Romani and other racialized people, LGBTQ+, and people with disabilities.

 

Aryan (ārya आर्य) is a Classical Sanskrit term which means “one who does noble deeds; a noble one” (WIKIPEDIA, 2020) it was also used to refer to the Indo-European language branch spoken in Iran and India (ALGEO, 2009, p. 51). However, in XIX, some Philologists referred to the Indo-European Family as “Aryan”. In 1861, Max Muller, a German Scholar of Comparative language, religion, and mythology, was the first writer to mention the existence of an “Aryan Race” (DAVID and NICHOLLS, 2016, p. 96).  In 1926, Gordon Childe, Australian Archeologist, specialist in European Prehistory, published a book called The Aryans, which was full of archeological and linguistic arguments in an attempt to establish the supposed homeland of the Indo-European Family.

 

According to Colin Refrew, a British Archeologist and Paleologist, the discussion about a homeland it wasn't purely academic, once the “German Scholars preferred and Indo-European homeland in Northern Europe”. The “Aryan race” Theory then became more and more popular in Germany. While some authors opposed to it, other writers argued that the Aryans were a biologically superior group of humans, based on it's Nordic Traces, while the Semitic were considered an “inferior race”. Muller was deeply saddened that his studies were used to justify and reinforce a false ethnic superiority based on nordic traces. In 1888, he wrote that "an ethnologist who speaks of the Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes and hair, is as great a sinner as a linguist who speaks of a dolichocephalic dictionary, or a brachycephalic grammar".

 

Since this term was appropriated by the Nazis, Linguists substituted “Aryan” to “Indo-European”, a term without a racist connotation, that refers “only to the culture of a group of people who lived in a relatively small area in early times and who spoke a more or less unified language out of which many languages have developed over thousands of years.” (ALGEO, 2009, p. 52). The Academic words, must always be free of prejudice and a sense of superiority, in language and race.

"Indo-European is a matter of culture, not of genes."
— John Algeo 

FOR FURTHER READING

CHILDE, VERE GORDON. The Aryans: A Study of Indo-European Origins. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & CO,. LTD, 1926. 264 p. Disponível em: http://ignca.gov.in/Asi_data/21510.pdf. Acesso em: 12 out. 2020.

Aryan. Wikipedia contributors. 2020, October 15). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Disponível em: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Aryan&oldid=983612531. Acesso em: 17 out. 2020.

ALGEO, John. The Backgrounds of English. In: THE ORIGINS and Development of the English Language. 6. ed. Boston: Wadsworth CENGAGE Learning, 2009. cap. 4, p. 49-77. ISBN 978-1-4282-3145-0.

John R. Davis & Angus Nicholls (2016) Friedrich Max Müller: The Career and Intellectual Trajectory of a German Philologist in Victorian Britain, Publications of the English Goethe Society, 85:2-3, 67-97, DOI: 10.1080/09593683.2016.1224493. 

ARYAN. In: ADVAMEG, Inc. (org.). World Culture Encyclopedia. [S. l.]: Advameg, Inc, 2010. Disponível em: https://www.everyculture.com/South-Asia/Aryan.html. Acesso em: 16 out. 2020.

When children or a second language learner is acquiring English knowledge, they may commit common mistakes, such as in the example below:

The child above chose "eated", "telled" instead of "ate" and "told", that is, misapplying the rule of the -ed suffix. It is fundamental to have in mind that, instead of a bad English performance, that means that the user understood the simple past and it is using their knowledge to communicate using logic. 

Many irregular verbs derive from Proto-Germanic language – that it is also related to Proto-Indo-European – more specifically, from the Germanic Strong Verbs (CHAMONIKOLASOVÁ, 2014, p. 17), which are verbs that suffer the Great Vowel Shift (ablaut), for example: sing – sang – sung (it changes the root vowel). It is interesting to notice that while some irregular verbs are relatively simple (sit - sat), others may be considered "creative" (seek - sought). However, even when a grammatical rule was disused, some verbs kept the old form (being creative or not). Check the words below:

1.  IRREGULAR VERBS: bear, beat, beget, bite, blow, break, choose, cleave, draw, drive, eat, fall, fly, forbid, forget, forsake, freeze, give, grow, know, lie, ride, see, shake, shear, slay, smite, speak, steal, stride, strive, swear, take, tear, throw, tread, wake, weave, and write (WIKIPEDIA)

Oppositely, the regular verbs (preterites and past participles ending in -ed) follows the Germanic Weak Conjugation that was for about ¾ of Old English Verbs (CHAMONIKOLASOVÁ, 2015, p. 30). Initially, the weak conjugation involved -t or –d (dental suffix), but it has developed to add the –ed suffix at the end of verbs in preterites and past participles. Yet, there are a few irregular verbs that partially follows the weak conjugation, for example:

 Well, looks like that the child is not wrong, but playing a major role in language: using the grammatical rules at the same time that is changing it. In short,

SOURCES: 

CHAMONIKOLASOVÁ, Jana. Proto-Germanic. In: CHAMONIKOLASOVÁ, Jana. A Concise History of English. Masarykova Univerzita: [s. n.], 2014. cap. 3, p. 17-21. ISBN 978-80-210-7480-4. Disponível em: https://digilib.phil.muni.cz/data/handle/11222.digilib/131572/monography.pdf. Acesso em: 20 set. 2020.

CHAMONIKOLASOVÁ, Jana. Old English. In: A Concise History of English. Masarykova Univerzita: [s. n.], 2014. cap. 4, p. 22-44. ISBN 978-80-210-7480-4. Disponível em: https://digilib.phil.muni.cz/data/handle/11222.digilib/131572/monography.pdf. Acesso em: 20 set. 2020. 

WHY do We Have Irregular Verbs?. Direção: Arika Okrent. Brasil: Arika Okrent, 2017. Disponível em: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o82_XBJXxMk. Acesso em: 20 set. 2020.

English Irregular Verbs. Wikipedia contributors. 2020, September 17). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Disponível em: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_irregular_verbs. Acesso em: 20 set. 2020.

Verbs with regular and irregular past tense forms. (Fandom Grammar, Deleted Profile)

William Jones (18 September 1745 - 27 April 1794) was a British orientalist and became a judge in India. He realized that India has a lot to offer in the meanings of sciences and arts, and certainly has benefited from it. He translated the Laws of Manu (Manumriti) to English and then, many other works of literature; was the first western to study and write a paper on Indian Classical Music, etc. There's no doubt that he was a man of a brilliant mind considering all those conquests. But he is most acknowledged by proposing that  Sanskrit, classical Greek, and Latin shared a language root in common. Lately, this root was named "Proto-Indo-European". The discovery popularized the comparative linguistics (If you want to know what is comparative linguistics, click here), which led to new theories, techniques, and studies of the Proto-Indo-European languages. 

source: Navrang India

Thanks to his initiative, today we have the Kurgan hypothesis, that proposes that the Proto-Indo-European lived in the Pontic-Caspian steppe of Eastern Europe in the 4th millennium BC. Their language probably split into different languages around 3.500 BC, when they expanded from their original settlement into different parts of Europe and Asia (Jana, 2014). However, in the 20th century, historical linguists discovered the Anatolian and Tocharian languages, which led to a change in some linguistics features and to the acceptance of the Laryngeal Theory (laryngeal consonants that later disappeared from all Indo-European languages except the Anatolian). There are many other possible relationships, but they remain controversial. This lack of pieces of the puzzle persists because there are no written records of Proto-Indo-European, that is the reason why the scientists use methods as reconstruction, comparative, and works with some hypothesis. 

Here is the main division of Indo-European languages (Anthony, 2007):

• 1. Anatolian (4200 BC, Asia Menor, extinct)
• 2. Tocharian (3700 BC, China, extinct). 
• 3. Germanic (3300 BC, earliest runic inscriptions from around the 2nd century AD, earliest coherent texts - as the translation of the Bible into gothic by Wulfila). Old English manuscript tradition from about the 8th century AD. Many contributions).
• 4. Italic (including Latin and the romances languages, 3000 BC)
• 5. Celtic (3000 BC)
• 6. Armenian (2800 BC)
• 7. Balto-Slavic (2800 BC)
• 8. Hellenic (2500 BC)
• 9. Indo-Iranian (2200 BC)
• 10. Albanian (attested from the 14th century AD).

There are many other Indo-European languages, but they are all extinct and the knowledge that we already have is limited due to the lack of information and contributions. 

The information above was taken from:

PROTO-INDO-EUROPEAN. In: CHAMONIKOLASOVÁ, Jana. A Concise History of English. Masarykova Univerzita: [s. n.], 2014. cap. 2, p. 7-15. ISBN 978-80-210-7480-4. Disponível em: https://digilib.phil.muni.cz/data/handle/11222.digilib/131572/monography.pdf. Acesso em: 18 set. 2020.

"Sir William Jones who made the ancient language Sanskrit known world over – British India", Navrangin India, (September 18, 2020).

"Biography of Sir William Jones". Kamat’s Potpourri - The History, Mystery and Diversity of India, (September 18, 2020).

"Sir William Jones". 1911 Encyclopedia, (September 18, 2020).