"The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary."
- James D. Nicoll
"English is the result of Norman men-at-arms attempting to pick up Saxon barmaids and is no more legitimate than any of the other results."
- H. Beam Piper
(Thanks Kate!)
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stalker gen
 I've now permanently moved my blog over to http://chocolateandvodka.com/ and will no long be updating this version, other than with the occasional summary of new posts. Please do not leave comments here, but instead find the equivalent post on my new site, and comment there instead. Comments left here will not be published, as I'd like to keep things all together on the new installation. Sorry if this is an inconvenience. |
The purity of the English language
by
Suw Charman
on Mon 03 Jan 2005 11:31 AM GMT | Permanent Link
Comments
Re: The purity of the English language
by
B. Janssen
on Thu 06 Jan 2005 06:10 PM GMT | Profile | Permanent Link
There is no pure language. The quotes are funny but not to be taken seriously.
The only pure languages are artificial coding languages I think, and look how enthralling they can be. People always nag about languages growing increasingly impure, but it's a fact that change is what defines language, it is what language is. Language is a creative process. Even the artificial languages are. In other words, even pure language are subject to change. I'm not saying this to Suw :^P I know you know. I'm telling this to the passer-by who doesn't know. |
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