Be kind to yourselves

I love your wise words. You offer inspiration and positivity like no other @wordman ! I believe the same as you - being kind to yourself is the first step to better wellbeing.

Thank you again for what you offer here

In kindness,

Hanami

@hanami Hello Hanami. Your words are most refreshing. Your words mean that I may continue as I am. Thank you VERY MUCH

Kind Regards

Wordman

Hi @wordman

I read back on some of your posts in Ever Wonder Why - there is some great writing there and I am looking forward to reading more there.

You are a great writer yourself - thanks for sharing your thoughts - you have given me a lot to think about.

Someone wrote there - I can't find the item again but it's important. Do linguists understand the complexities of language? I can assure you - we do - and language is a living thing and changes all the time. I did study some linguistics at university, and it is a fantastic study.

Keep up the good work - I hope we can converse in the future when I have had a chance to catch up on events that have taken place while I have been taking time out

Owlunar

@Owlunar Hello owlunar. Thank you for your encouragement and kind words. Your words inspire me to continue as I am. I find it interesting that you have studied linguistics. I find language to be totally fascinating. I am glad you answered my question. Thank you again for your reply. I too hope that we continue our dialogue together. I now know if I have any questions about language I know who to ask. Be safe. Keep the faith.

Kind Regards

Wordman

Thanks @wordman

I have indeed studied linguistics at university - first year - and I might have continued that formally - my major was English - minor sequence General and Comparative Literature and I did my fourth year to graduate when I was fifty

But my private study into etymology has been extensive and I am happy to answer any questions - if I don't know the answer I know where to look for it

Someone asked me why English spelling is so complex - I checked that this really Aussie-sounding bloke had English as his first language and it is not - so I could answer

You probably know - English borrows words from so many different languages it's hard to keep track of them - and why do we say we have borrowed them because we are never going to give them back? Interesting point but then - people are using a lot of English words in their languages too - I think English I already a major world Lingua-Franca

It's so great to have found this thread - or maybe series of threads -

Owlunar

@Owlunar Hello owlunar. Thank you for your reply. I also briefly studied linguistics at Latrobe uni. I learnt that the English language when it transitioned from Germanic to English borrowed heavily from the French language. This occurred 10th or 11th century. I am not certain about the time this borrowing of the French language occurred, perhaps you may be able to clarify. You mentioned that English borrows from several different languages. I am curious about this and would like to ask from what other languages English has borrowed from. I would love to know more. You must love language to study etymology. I admire this and will definitely ask questions of you whenever I have a curiosity about the English language. I speak fluent Italian and I often have wondered of the origins of the Italian Language. All I know about the Italian language is that it is a romance language. Keep up the good work. I am pleased you have taken the effort to learn and educate yourself about a topic that is somewhat either misunderstood or not really appreciated.

Kind Regards

Wordman

Hi @wordman

I spent some time refreshing myself with one of my textbooks that I fortunately kept all these years. It's on the history of the English Language and I can answer some of your questions easily. A lot of what you ask is easily available on the internet - I love the internet.

Old English was the language spoken by the Anglo-Saxons. It was similar to German. We have a lot of German words in our vocabulary now. The Germanic languages had a Latinate Grammar - German still does. I struggled with this at university - discontinued with that and did a different subject but continued with Middle English which started with the Norman Invasion of England by William the Conqueror around 1066.

When Willliam the Conqueror's court took over in England, they spoke French and of course didn't have any reason to learn English and the upper classes either spoke French or soon learned it. English was seen as the language of the lower classes. It was a social issue. Over time people who only spoke French learned to speak English to deal with their labourers etc. - some of the landowners started to learn French to communicate with their betters. Until about the C15th the languages merged into Middle English and Modern English began with the first Elizabethan period and William Shakespeare invented many English words still in use today.

It's great that you have fluent Italian. I was an accountant in the auto-motive trades for years and had to speak with the Italians there and learn to understand them when they spoke Italian to me - but I never learned to speak it - I guess the workers learned to understand the English spoken around them. It was interesting.

Italian evolved from the Latin spoken but the ordinary Romans - called now Vulgate Latin. French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese are all Romance languages. There are others. Roman - Romance.

The words that English has "borrowed" from other languages is long - I did research using an Oxford English Dictionary many years ago. The languages used today in Western countries mostly come from what is known as the Indo-European Languages. It's vastly interesting - information on any word can be found on the internet - type in the word and ask your phone or computer for the etymology. English has borrowed words from just about every language possible. This list is huge. And I love it.

This is just a very surface answer. For your better information I can give you some links - but it is also easy to just ask your phone. It's fascinating.

Owlunar

English is the main language of the internet, it is also the official language of the aviation industry, and of course the British colonised so much of the world bringing English language with them (usually by force). So many people learn English as a second language it has become the defacto trading language of the world and allows many people to communicate. Before English it was French, and of course in Roman times the same was true of Latin. Languages change and evolve as we do, not until we started writing things down did we probably even know this, but English seems to transform more than most. I think because it has changed so much over time people don't mind if it changes even more.