06-05-2020, 09:18 PM
When we look at foreign languages, we'll often find interesting features that catch our eyes. For example, Korean has its Hangul writing system: an excellent featural script which fits the language like a glove. Then we have the consonontal root system found in the Semitic languages (such as Hebrew and Arabic): this blew my mind the first time I saw it . Or, for an example closer to home, Welsh has a weird phonology, which is heavy on voiceless sonorants: I only have to travel 10 miles before I encounter place names that I can't pronounce .
However, what I'd like to ask in this thread is: what are the most interesting features of the English language? This might be a hard question for native English-speakers to answer: we've lived with these features for our entire lives, so to us, they're completely normal. Indeed, the features I listed in the above paragraph are interesting to me, in large part because they're so different from what I'm used to in English! Still, our language must have some interesting features - and, I'd like to hear what features people here would suggest (and, in particular, whether the features suggested by native speakers differ from those suggested by non-native speakers).
I'll start by mentioning our language's vocabulary and etymology. We have such a rich variety of words, pulled from different languages around the world - particularly from Latin, French, and Greek. One consequence of this is that some of our nouns are very different from the corresponding adjectives (for example: "moon" and "lunar"; "cow" and "bovine"; "sight" and "visual"). Where we have "collateral adjectives" like these, it's often because the noun has been borrowed from one language, while the adjective has been borrowed from another . (Of course, this is something that would be all but lost in Anglish: the language might be more internally consistent, but it'd be less interesting in this regard )
I might also suggest our weird historical spelling system: many of our words are spelled as they were pronounced several hundred years ago . Then again, I don't know whether that's 'interesting' or 'painful' (for native and non-native speakers alike). English certainly isn't the only language that has this problem (I hear Tibetan spelling is even worse with this), but it's up there .
So, do you have any other features that you'd like to suggest?
However, what I'd like to ask in this thread is: what are the most interesting features of the English language? This might be a hard question for native English-speakers to answer: we've lived with these features for our entire lives, so to us, they're completely normal. Indeed, the features I listed in the above paragraph are interesting to me, in large part because they're so different from what I'm used to in English! Still, our language must have some interesting features - and, I'd like to hear what features people here would suggest (and, in particular, whether the features suggested by native speakers differ from those suggested by non-native speakers).
I'll start by mentioning our language's vocabulary and etymology. We have such a rich variety of words, pulled from different languages around the world - particularly from Latin, French, and Greek. One consequence of this is that some of our nouns are very different from the corresponding adjectives (for example: "moon" and "lunar"; "cow" and "bovine"; "sight" and "visual"). Where we have "collateral adjectives" like these, it's often because the noun has been borrowed from one language, while the adjective has been borrowed from another . (Of course, this is something that would be all but lost in Anglish: the language might be more internally consistent, but it'd be less interesting in this regard )
I might also suggest our weird historical spelling system: many of our words are spelled as they were pronounced several hundred years ago . Then again, I don't know whether that's 'interesting' or 'painful' (for native and non-native speakers alike). English certainly isn't the only language that has this problem (I hear Tibetan spelling is even worse with this), but it's up there .
So, do you have any other features that you'd like to suggest?
Board Information and Policies
Affiliation | Coffee Credits | Ranks and Awards | Name Changes
Account Deletion | BBCode Reference
Moonface (in 'Woman runs 49 red lights in ex's car')' Wrote: If only she had ran another 20 lights.
(Thanks to Nilla for the avatar, and Detective Osprey for the sig!)
My Items