How would you change the English language?

[warpus]

I wouldn't change anything, if we're talking about Canadian English.

American spellings of neighbour, colour, cheque, etc. look weird to me, so I would change those, if I had the option.

 

[Winner]

This is the greatest post I have ever seen.

And oldest. This joke has been in circulation for years.

 

[Sharwood]

I feel sorry for you.

Don't feel sorry for me, I'm getting my enjoyment. I was always a selfish lover.

That would probably have made a better punchline.

It sure did. One must think these things through.

youse is an everyday word here... I suspect we may have invented it, no one else seems to use it

We Australians have been saying youse since long before youse came up with it. It's typical Australian incomprehensible yobbo speech. Which raises the question of why Arwon says it.

And oldest. This joke has been in circulation for years.

Don't doubt it. And it's still in circulation because it's awesome.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Nothing. Keep it as it is and get rid of the rest of the world's languages so they won't have the audacity to suggest changes to ours.

I knew you would say this.

Personally I'd have "youse" or "yous" accepted as the standard second-person plural pronoun. I'm tired of being told my usage is somehow wrong. There's nothing wrong with "how are yous doing?" or "where are yous?" It eliminates ambiguity in many sentences.

"Y'all" is generally acceptable around here. In fact, we use it with pride.

 

[Godwynn]

Get rid of it completely and make everyone speak German.

 

[Dachs]

Make everybody adopt Yat. For instance, the word "family" must be replaced with "yamomma'n'dem". Or, make everybody write it in the Arabic script, because it's prettier.

youse is an everyday word here... I suspect we may have invented it, no one else seems to use it

Italian-Americans have been using it in bad mob films since the dawn of time.

"Y'all" is generally acceptable around here. In fact, we use it with pride.

Marylanders aren't worthy.

Get rid of it completely and make everyone speak German.

This is an acceptable alternative.

 

[raketooy]

I wouldn't make it entirely phonetic, but I'd get rid of as many irregular pronunciations as possible. Also I'd try to come up with a good gender-ambiguous personal pronoun. Can't think of a good one ad hoc, though.

 

[Kerozine]

Get rid of it completely and make everyone speak German.

Why?

We may as well switch to Chinese, since 1/6th of the world's population already speak it.

 

[Godwynn]

Why?

We may as well switch to Chinese, since 1/6th of the world's population already speak it.

Chinese isn't a West Germanic Language.

That, and German > Chinese.

 

[Kerozine]

Chinese isn't a West Germanic Language.

That, and German > Chinese.

Why not Dutch instead of German?

 

[Godwynn]

Why not Dutch instead of German?

Then those crazy Dutch will start getting a big head!

 

[Dachs]

Why not Dutch instead of German?

Dutch is bastardized German.

 

[Kerozine]

Dutch is bastardized German.

Much less so than English.

 

[phoenix_sprite]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hJQsvoY6VU&feature=channel_page

^Eddie Izzard on Languages

English is very simple compared to let's say...my first language (French) let's keep it that way.

 

[Zarn]

Force English only speakers to learn a new language.

Ten years down the road, it would be outlawed.

Violators will be accused of being Protestant and shot.

 

[Firestorm94]

youse is an everyday word here... I suspect we may have invented it, no one else seems to use it

so, what youse are saying is youse use youse

 

[Loki130]

get rid of all those damn double letters

 

[Gooblah]

Why the hell would you add genders? It substantially increases the amount of relevant vocabulary, and is totally pointless.

Adding something like -ova to feminine surnames is unnecessary; just look to see if there is a 'Ms' or 'Mrs' beforehand, and if there isn't, assume it's a lady.

Phonetic spellings are another stupid idea. The point of maintaining current spelling is to allow people to connect words due to the presence of suffixes and prefixes. Yes, there are a few dumb ones, but these are few and far between in terms of the entire English vocabulary.

And to note, I'm fluent in two languages, so I'm not just speaking from the monolingual American perspective.

 

[Kerozine]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hJQsvoY6VU&feature=channel_page

^Eddie Izzard on Languages

English is very simple compared to let's say...my first language (French) let's keep it that way.

Thanks for the video. T'was a gud lauf!

Meh, proficiency in a language is directly related to the frequency of its usage.

 

[Bill3000]

Phonetic spellings are another stupid idea. The point of maintaining current spelling is to allow people to connect words due to the presence of suffixes and prefixes. Yes, there are a few dumb ones, but these are few and far between in terms of the entire English vocabulary.

Phonetic spelling isn't a stupid idea, considering the fact that it's the goal of every major language writing system that's created today There's plenty, plenty examples of dumb ones, and more importantly, we simply don't have enough vowel letters to cover the rich vowel system of english. You can still connect suffixes and prefixes and the words don't need to be the same - see portuguese <nação> and <nacional>; Welsh doesn't even enforce stable initial letters: "nation" is <cenedl>, but "in a nation" is <yng nghenedl>!

http://www.xibalba.demon.co.uk/jbr/ortho.html

That's a list of debunkings of reasons to not create a spelling reform.

And I love the progressive and continuous aspects. Simple past/present/future doesn't cut it off for me.