NationStates Jolt Archive

English is slowly driving me crazy!

We'llbegin with a box, and the plural is boxes, but the plural of ox became oxen not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese, but the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice, but the plural of house is houses, not hice.
The plural of man is always called men, why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?
If I spoke of my foot, and showed you my feet, and if I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
Then one may be that, and three may be those; yet hat in the plural would never be hose, and the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren, but though we say mother, we'd never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him, but imagine the feminen, she, shis and shim.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger, neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins were'nt invented in England.
Quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square, and a guinea pig is neither a pig nor from Guinea.
And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham.
Dosen't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend?
If you have a bunch of odds and ends, and you get rid of all but one, what is it?

Yeeesh...

I agree! English is the dumbest language in the world. It has rules but doesn't follow any of them. Live (to be alive) and Live (happening right now) are two different words. That and read (to be reading) and read (to have read). That's another one that's always bugged me. Also that we drive on a parkway, and park on a driveway. And why can't I call my damn fish fishes!!!!

GRRRRRR

Sho 'nuff! :p

hahaha
so true, thats what happens when your language is made from 5 differnet lanuages

This following sentence demonstrates what exactly is wrong with the English language. Think about it now:

"This statement is not true."

'If you notice this notice, you will notice this notice is not to be not noticed.'

Improving English
EC PRESS RELEASE
Having chosen English as the preferred language in the EEC (now officially the European Union, or EU), the European Parliament has commissioned a feasible study in ways of improving efficiency in communications between Government departments.

European officials have often pointed out that English spelling is unnecessarily difficult; for example: cough, plough, rough, through, and thorough. What is clearly needed is a phased program of changes to iron out these anomalies. The program would, of course, be administered by a committee staff at top level by participating nations.

In the first year, for example, the committee would suggest using “s” instead of the soft “c”. Sertainly, sivil servants in all sities would resieve this news with joy. Then the hard “c” could be replased by “k” sinse both letters are pronounsed alike. Not only would this klear up konfusion in the minds of klerikal workers, but typewriters kould be made with one less letter.

There would be growing enthusiasm when in the sekond year, it was anounsed that the troublesome “ph” would henseforth be written “f”. This would make words like “fotograf” twenty persent shorter in print.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reash the stage where more komplikated shanges are possible. Governments would enkourage the removal of double letters whikh have always been a deterent to akurate speling.

We would al agre that the horible mes of silent e’s in the language is disgrasful. Therefor we kould drop thes and kontinu to read and writ as though nothing had hapend. By this tim it would be four years sins the skem began and peopl would be reseptive to steps sush as replasing “th” by “z”. Perhaps zen ze funktion of “w” kould be taken on by “v”, vitsh is, after al, half of “w”. Shortly after zis, ze uneseary “o” kould be dropd from vords kontaining “ou”. Similar arguments vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

Kontinuing zis proses yer after yer, ve vud eventuli hav a reli sensibl riten styl. After tventi yers zer vud be no mor trubls, difikultis, and evrivun vud fin it ezi to understand esh ozer. Ze drems of ze Guvermnt vud finali hav kum tru.

Improving English
EC PRESS RELEASE
Having chosen English as the preferred language in the EEC (now officially the European Union, or EU), the European Parliament has commissioned a feasible study in ways of improving efficiency in communications between Government departments.

European officials have often pointed out that English spelling is unnecessarily difficult; for example: cough, plough, rough, through, and thorough. What is clearly needed is a phased program of changes to iron out these anomalies. The program would, of course, be administered by a committee staff at top level by participating nations.

In the first year, for example, the committee would suggest using “s” instead of the soft “c”. Sertainly, sivil servants in all sities would resieve this news with joy. Then the hard “c” could be replased by “k” sinse both letters are pronounsed alike. Not only would this klear up konfusion in the minds of klerikal workers, but typewriters kould be made with one less letter.

There would be growing enthusiasm when in the sekond year, it was anounsed that the troublesome “ph” would henseforth be written “f”. This would make words like “fotograf” twenty persent shorter in print.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reash the stage where more komplikated shanges are possible. Governments would enkourage the removal of double letters whikh have always been a deterent to akurate speling.

We would al agre that the horible mes of silent e’s in the language is disgrasful. Therefor we kould drop thes and kontinu to read and writ as though nothing had hapend. By this tim it would be four years sins the skem began and peopl would be reseptive to steps sush as replasing “th” by “z”. Perhaps zen ze funktion of “w” kould be taken on by “v”, vitsh is, after al, half of “w”. Shortly after zis, ze uneseary “o” kould be dropd from vords kontaining “ou”. Similar arguments vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

Kontinuing zis proses yer after yer, ve vud eventuli hav a reli sensibl riten styl. After tventi yers zer vud be no mor trubls, difikultis, and evrivun vud fin it ezi to understand esh ozer. Ze drems of ze Guvermnt vud finali hav kum tru.

it would actually be a good idea to do something like that, a phentic lanuage would make it a true world language

SSR - did you come up with that? If so, Bravo. It made my night.

I thought that was Arnold Schwarzeneger's English language reform plan? That's been doing the rounds for a while.

First off, there's pronunciation. How would you pronounce the word "ghoti." Well, most people say it's pronounced "goaty" or "gotti," but it's actually pronounced "fish." Take the 'gh' from tough, the 'o' from women, and the 'ti' from station, and there you have it.

I'll sum up the grammer and vocabulary in one simple statement. There are a handful of English words that are their own antonyms, such as sanction. A sanction can mean either an official endorsement or it can mean an official forbiddence. Go figure.

That poem is up on the wall in my English classroom.......................

I'll sum up the grammer and vocabulary in one simple statement. There are a handful of English words that are their own antonyms, such as sanction. A sanction can mean either an official endorsement or it can mean an official forbiddence. Go figure.

Just like how communism can mean a stateless, classless, moneyless society or a totalitarian dictatorship.

Let's all be clear. English is SUPPOSED to be tricky. Let's call it a 'barrier to entry' to keep out all of these people too stoopid to learn it proper like what i have

Congratulations to Corrupted Halo for getting everyone to speak English with a German accent.