The Very-Many-Questions-Not-Worth-Their-Own-Thread Thread 36

[Takhisis]

They are mad at the Americans for changing the English language.

So desu ne!

How do you tell what's generating sound on your computer? I hear something coming from my speakers that sounds like typing, but I've got no idea what's causing it.

Maybe there's interference from a nearby lamp or other electric device.

 

[Farm Boy]

trackball

Filled with warfarin.

 

[Ajidica]

They are mad at the Americans for changing the English language.

Blame the English, not the Americans. I can still easily read documents written in colonial days, but if you hand one of your friends a copy of Beowulf or something by Chaucer, unless they had real experience with those documents, would be left trying to sound things out phonetically and guessing.

Hwæt. We Gardena in geardagum,
þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon,
hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon.
Oft Scyld Scefing sceaþena þreatum,
monegum mægþum, meodosetla ofteah,
egsode eorlas. Syððan ærest wearð
feasceaft funden, he þæs frofre gebad,
weox under wolcnum, weorðmyndum þah,
oðþæt him æghwylc þara ymbsittendra
ofer hronrade hyran scolde,
gomban gyldan.

LO, praise of the prowess of people-kings
of spear-armed Danes, in days long sped,
we have heard, and what honor the athelings won!
Oft Scyld the Scefing from squadroned foes,
from many a tribe, the mead-bench tore,
awing the earls. Since erst he lay
friendless, a foundling, fate repaid him:
for he waxed under welkin, in wealth he throve,
till before him the folk, both far and near,
who house by the whale-path, heard his mandate,
gave him gifts: a good king he!

Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote,
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote,
And bathed every veyne in swich licóur
Of which vertú engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours y-ronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open ye,
So priketh hem Natúre in hir corages,
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages,
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes,
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
And specially, from every shires ende
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blisful martir for to seke,
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke.

 

[Cutlass]

I think it's mostly just custom. I don't know why TIL wasn't serialised, for instance.

It was because I started the first one.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Non serialized threads are better in general.

 

[Arakhor]

Come back and say that when the US is 600-1200 years old, Ajidica.

 

[Takhisis]

It was because I started the first one.

*tips hat*

 

[Ajidica]

Come back and say that when the US is 600-1200 years old, Ajidica.

Hey, you guys are legally only about 70 years older than USA#1!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acts_of_Union_1707

 

[Takhisis]

So respect your danged elders.

WORSHIP GRORIOUS JAPAN

 

[Traitorfish]

Blame the English, not the Americans. I can still easily read documents written in colonial days, but if you hand one of your friends a copy of Beowulf or something by Chaucer, unless they had real experience with those documents, would be left trying to sound things out phonetically and guessing.

I mean, sounding things out phonetically and guessing is how most non-elite colonial writers approached spelling, so that "easily" part may depend on the specific document.

 

[Chukchi Husky]

Blame the English, not the Americans. I can still easily read documents written in colonial days, but if you hand one of your friends a copy of Beowulf or something by Chaucer, unless they had real experience with those documents, would be left trying to sound things out phonetically and guessing.

I think they have studied Beowulf. I know I did when I was at school.

I know the one thing that annoys them about how Americans are changing the English language is how the word sloth is pronounced has changed in England because of the Americans.

 

[Arakhor]

People who've only encountered the word through the Ice Age films will likely copy the American pronunciation. Those who've watched BBC nature documentaries or talked to more educated people are likely to continue using the normal pronunciation. This is no different to any other word.

 

[The_J]

Language changes anyways, it's not a fixed thing. Who's fault it is doesn't matter too much, IMHO, since nobody really posses it, and whatever the majority adopts is the de-facto language.

 

[Takhisis]

That will be ‘different from’, Mr. Arakhor, by the way, and I assume that the ‘normal’ pronounciation you allude to is ‘slowth’ -am I correct?

 

[cardgame]

I was not aware a different pronunciation of sloth was even possible. How silly.

 

[Takhisis]

I'm gonna floor you with this one, cardgame, but the real pronounciation of ‘Mackenzie’ is ‘Mackenyie’.

 

[cardgame]

No

 

[Takhisis]

It just is. For a given value of real. Don't let Flemish upvotes get in the way of clear reasoning and happy trolling.

 

[Arakhor]

That will be ‘different from’, Mr. Arakhor, by the way, and I assume that the ‘normal’ pronounciation you allude to is ‘slowth’ -am I correct?

Of course. I am British, after all.

 

[Gori the Grey]

The word derives from slow! It's not just some happy coincidence that sloths are slow. Sloth (the sin) is effectively just slowness. And then sloths are just "those slow creatures over there; you see them, we'll call them slows, how 'bout."

That 'Mercans would let that nice long o turn into a flaccid short o, that's just slothful pronunciation.