If I were in charge of the English language...

[Cal Weldon]

The first thing I would do is eliminate silent letters. I think silent letters are rather funny.

Mind you:

I really ought naught laugh.
Or is that:
I rilly ot not laf.

Anyone else wonder about our language?

Cal

[SY]

I'd eliminate autoantonyms. Geez, words like "sanction" have to be terribly confusing to non-native English speakers. If an activity is sanctioned, it's approved. If it's not approved, you may be sanctioned!

I had to explain to my three year old tonight why "cutting in two" was the same as "cutting in half".

[dhaen]

Cal,

I agree that English spelling is rediculous, but your simplification only works for North American speakers. To properly transcribe the way I speak English would need a different spelling for 3 out of the 5 words. This is probably why no rationalisation has ever got off the ground.
Perhaps what we need are Ideograms such as the Chinese use, that are not necessarily related to any particular sounds.

We've had discussions on this board before about the minefield that English presents to non-native speakers. One has to admire their tenacity.


SY,

Of course Children with their developing minds are best at learning English. What I've noticed that it's quite common for them to initially learn irregular grammar "parrot fashion", only to stumble later as the English gramatical parameters are getting "set" in their minds. They then have to re-learn the irregulars, of which we have many.

[destroyer X]

And i will create another words.... because you have one word and many translations...have to read all sentence to see what's the meaning.... also i will put portuguese "saudade" in the place of "miss you" and will liberate the F---, because people like to say and like to do..... with their wives and sometimes with some poor foreign countries...hahahahaha.

I am frustrated.... we plant oranges to Uncle Sam, we go to be one of the greatest orange juice producers on earth.... Uncle sam told us.... Precisarr colocarr inoxidable steel here!...need to put inox steel here..... Nóis gostarr ácid and very yellowm this orange...yeaaahhhh american orange..... we like acid and very yellow, this orange, american orange..... we go and we do what Uncle ask us....Amiguinhas bonzinhas, more concentrated please!... good friends, kind guys brazilian, more concentrated juice please...... we done it..... Oh!, muito pouco...need more..... Oh!, not enough, make more!.... and pulled our carpet with my good people stand over it.... we hurt our a---s falling down.... Uncle became bad, and good comercial ideas to US, and decided to give money to their citizens producers.... this way, orange price goes down.....no problem to Smithes, Williamsons, Browns... but f--- us!.... price goes down... our producers with a pain in the ... we sold lower price... this way, american government had the money back.... keep smithies happy and Silvas crying.... hummmm bad trick..... hummmmmmmmmmmmm dirty trick.

Carlos

[roibm]

Spelling is nonsense.
I was always thinking about the languages that a spelled completely different than written. Take 'a', depending where it is, it is 'a' or 'ae' or silent. 'E' is not 'e', it is i(short) etc.

I much more like the languages where you spell like you have it written. It is just the logical way to do it.

[akira]

Well, my opinion is that english is far from beeing the most difficult language to learn (at least at the beginning). Grammar is quite simple (no declinations like in german). In the meantime vocabulary is much more extended than other european languages ...

Is you're looking for a language that s very difficult to spell, try french. Almost every final letters of a word is silent. For example we put an "s" at the end of words for plural (many thingS) but never prononce it ... and this is just one example.

[dhaen]

I much more like the languages where you spell like you have it written.

I assume you mean spoken how it it written...
I agree, but you have a problem there:
1. There would be different spellings for different dialects,
and
2. You will have to revise spellings constantly, as the language "evolves".
Many of the strange spellings of English are indeed the way those words used to be pronounced.

[SY]

The one infallible rule of French is that every word is pronounced exactly the way it sounds.

[destroyer X]

I think the french language is wonderfull, in my idea seems music

German is hard....seems they are saying bad words to us.

French is easy to me.... almost same as portuguese.... no problems...no problems to understand...loose here one word, but always i can capture the idea.

Langue et civilization française, G Mouger... trois annés au echole

45 years ago, three years studying french in school , basic scholl had English as International Language....only verb to be an pencil, i am a boy, good morning, what time is it.... and french because Rio de Janeiro had french invasion and many french descendents too....our pretty girls.... there the french are, with the back from Africa...hummmmm goood!

We Studied German, Spanish and Deutsch.... the worst was portuguese...... and german declinations too...never could pronunciate ausrufunkstszeichen....i think exclamation!

We like to eat some powder, made from indian root.... germans cannot talk this word with this meal... will be a disaster... will spit everyone!

Good conversation....goooood...like this.

Carlos

[akira]

I ve always loved german language. I know my point of view is quite biased (since I m half german, half french). German poetry can be really wonderfull. They had very talentuous poets in the romantic period.

What is true for most languages is also fo german, many dialects many different prononciation. Some are rude, others sounds very round and smooth. The vocabulary is also very rich ... try some pages of the Zaratustra (Nietzsche) ... wonderful.