NationStates Jolt Archive

English is, of course, the mothertongue of many forum users. But English is a foreign language to many. Do you think it's ugly? It could be unpleasant sounds, disgusting or weird phrases, and ugly spelling, or even the opinion that the (Latin) alphabet is ugly. Or, it could be a specific dialect or accent of English, or even the people who speak English or some of its dialects. Or, it's just "a stupid language for stupid people"*.

You should also list which languages you compare it to (and which languages you actually know rather than just hear somewhere).

*EDIT: this is an actual opinion I've heard countless times, especially in the form that "I'm trying to learn English, but because I just heard American English on the TV, I can't learn it properly."

I find English can be used for great beauty as well as great vulgarity. I've been studying Arabic and it is a very fluid and poetic language, but lacks a lot of the expressiveness of English.

French is nice for precision, Hebrew is a gorgeous language in many ways, and Japanese is exceedingly polite.

On the whole, though, I'd have to say English is one of the best languages on the planet.

I think that English is pretty ugly compared to some other languages. But I don't feel too strongly one way or the other. The problem I have with English is its inconsistancies. There is no way to tell vowel length or consonantal sound, or whether a letter is silent or not. And verb conjugation is just insane. But, all the same, it does have its bright points. Shakespeare being one of them.

Ho hum...

I think English is wonderful for its levels of sheer expressiveness. Anyone who's ever had to translate Hebrew, beautiful as it is, will probably have encountered a rather restricting lack of synonyms.

Though our grammar is absolutely screwy and I don't like our lack of declensions as I think that adds class to a language. Look at Greek, how cool is it...logos, loge, logon, logou, logoi...OK don't correct me it's been a while.

I don't think we can say too much about pronounciation as it's so varied. However, at risk of flaming, I think Americans talk through their noses and that the Irish have the best accent on the planet.

On a final note...people may moan about the alphabet but it's a very well designed one, it has vowels which make reading much easier and it is quick and simple to write. I think English has benefited from its mongrel nature and has taken the precision of greek, the practicality of latin and the pizzaz of its history as an imperial tongue and produced something truely spectacular.

English is a graceful and fluid lanuage. If you know what you're doing.

At the same time, it is a hideous and apalling language, again, if you know what you're doing.

That is precisely the beauty in English; you can make it sound wonderful, or you can make it horrible. It all depends upon the speaker/writer's skill, or lack thereof.

It is also more lyrical than most think. Alternating stresses, pentameters, give it a bit of a musical quality, perhaps not as much so as, say, Italian, but a certain musical attribute does exist.

Vote: Native/Not ugly.

My biggest problem with English is the fact that it is truly a bastard language. We have all of these words from different languages that we try to tie together with a bunch of Latin rules. SOme of the supposedly simple ways of checking such as I before E except after C are constatnly being broken. example Ancient. The correct spelling does not follow the afore mentioned rule. How then can we stand such a language that you must break every rule twice for every single time you follow said rule? And on another note, Shakespeare is a moron. If he were to have written about flying mutant toasters from Mars, would we believe him? How then can we believe such a story as Romeo and Juliet. Also, he has gone down as a great writer. Great, yes. Writer, no. He is actually the greatest plagiarize. None of his stories were actually his own conception. He read all of them out of other pieces of text.

Glenorand :sniper:

i think it's not ugly. you can make it sound however you want. if you speak french, it's hard to sound...what's the word i'm looking for...it's kind of hard to sound angry and rude if you want to get that point across. it must be like near impossible to learn tho if you aren't a native speaker. the spelling and pronunciation are INSANE, i mean, if native speakers have a tough time with it...

I'd say that English is the most beautiful of the Germanic languages, at the very least.

English is cool in that it is one of the most egalitarian languages (many languages have a special pronoun for refering to high ranking listeners and some, such as Japanese have a whole set of suffixes and whatnot for various levels of respect and almost seem to have been designed with brownnosing in mind). However, if I ignore my usedness to it, it doesn't seem pretty at all. It also seems rather jumbled together.

Cellar Door :)

English has loads of easy to follow rules, but they all have exceptions. I've heard its a hard language to learn. On the plus side, you can speak really screwy english (pidgin english) and still be understood enough to get by generally.

Cellar Door :)

I never agreed too much on that.... beautiful, but notTHE most beautiful :) I own the DVD though hehe.

Anywho, no English is not an ugly language. Is it the most beautiful? Hell no. I speak fluent English and Cantonese, used to speak fluent Mandarin, and have learned French and Italian (learning italian right now). Amongst those languages....

Italian is the most beautiful of those languages I have to say... I think french sounds rather ugly, even though I know alot of people really like it. Chinese and English both sound "normal" (average) to me... and languages such as Russian and German (although I can't speak them, just from the way it sounds) sound far too harsh.

I voted "Only American English / I'm American". I said this because overall I think that English is a more vulgar language than others, though not quite ugly, but I like British English a lot. English, Scottish, and Irish English are all pretty awesome.

I like British English and I guess Canadian english would be similar to that, in how the words are spelt and pronounced anyway.

I don't think it's especially ugly, but it is annoyingly inconsistent in terms of word and grammar construction. I've always admired the fact that non-native speakers who've learnt it have been able to speak it so well - better than many people from around here, whose speak it natively!

I think the English language is a very good, very flexible langauge due to its mix of nice soft Frenchy/Latiny type words, and harder more abrasive Germanic words. This gives the language great poetic flexablilty as it has many synonms of different tonality and sounds, that can be combined to great effect.
Also a point about Shakespear; he isn't considered a great writter because of his plots, the small fact that he invented thousands of new words and phrases that are still common today is the reason he is so respected.

English, like almost all other languages, is simply the result of centuries of adaptation and alteration. It's not so much ugly as it is ungainly for non-speakers to learn. I find it a very easy language to understand, but that's simply because it's my native language.

English is, of course, the mothertongue of many forum users. But English is a foreign language to many. Do you think it's ugly? It could be unpleasant sounds, disgusting or weird phrases, and ugly spelling, or even the opinion that the (Latin) alphabet is ugly. Or, it could be a specific dialect or accent of English, or even the people who speak English or some of its dialects. Or, it's just "a stupid language for stupid people"*.

You should also list which languages you compare it to (and which languages you actually know rather than just hear somewhere).

*EDIT: this is an actual opinion I've heard countless times, especially in the form that "I'm trying to learn English, but because I just heard American English on the TV, I can't learn it properly."
Simple English is unique its Germanic and when Angles Saxons and Jutes took Brittanic they brought their language.
But the home lands got taken over by others and so it has no real relative :(

It has taken things from Frrench possesion thru the normans and such
something funny here When speaking about Sheep(other Animals as well)as an animal the word is English when speaking about the eating of it it is French because the french Nobles got the food :D

It is messy and many people struggle with it as a second language
Promonkians is pretty much dead on the button but i like what i said more ;)
1000 posts Woooooo

English is, of course, the mothertongue of many forum users. But English is a foreign language to many. Do you think it's ugly? It could be unpleasant sounds, disgusting or weird phrases, and ugly spelling, or even the opinion that the (Latin) alphabet is ugly. Or, it could be a specific dialect or accent of English, or even the people who speak English or some of its dialects. Or, it's just "a stupid language for stupid people"*.

You should also list which languages you compare it to (and which languages you actually know rather than just hear somewhere).

*EDIT: this is an actual opinion I've heard countless times, especially in the form that "I'm trying to learn English, but because I just heard American English on the TV, I can't learn it properly."

English, like most languages, varies a lot (at least to my ears). I quite like the sound of some England-English accents and also Scottish and Irish people speaking it. I am not so keen on some American accents, particularly of the Bush, Clinton (southern?) variety. But, generally I don't think English is that ugly. I can think of uglier languages; Arabic and Hebrew always sound awful to me for instance. But, I'm not sure Swedish is so much better... (or Finnish, which I am guessing from your name is your mother language, Perkeleenmaa.

For me the sexiest sounding languages are some of the southern European ones, Italian and French especially. I wish I could speak them!

This may be just because I'm a native speaker, but I think English sounds very good in music, even better than many of the Romance languages out there. French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese... these, with their ease of rhyme, may be convernient to write lyrics in, but melodies become jumpy and sing-songy. I like a little dissonance and surprise in my music.

English, like most languages, varies a lot (at least to my ears). I quite like the sound of some England-English accents and also Scottish and Irish people speaking it. I am not so keen on some American accents, particularly of the Bush, Clinton (southern?) variety. But, generally I don't think English is that ugly. I can think of uglier languages; Arabic and Hebrew always sound awful to me for instance. But, I'm not sure Swedish is so much better... (or Finnish, which I am guessing from your name is your mother language, Perkeleenmaa.

For me the sexiest sounding languages are some of the southern European ones, Italian and French especially. I wish I could speak them!

Before anyone gets the wrong idea, Swedish and Finnish are just as much related as English and Japanese. Finnish isn't even remotely like Swedish.

Swedish is an ugly language. It's semitonal, it uses sj/tj (sh/ch) and I challenge you to translate this to Swedish: "Island, island, hay island, hay island's gentle bride."

But I agree, Semitic languages are pure ugliness. British English is good. Sometimes American English sounds retarded, say, when Bush speaks it. Scientific English is a terse, but inflexible language.

But I've noticed that English is an ugly language in the sense that the sounds it uses are ugly, and the orthography is not nice. Old English is even worse; it vaguely reminds me of Old Swedish. Some idioms and metaphors are absolutely terrible; for examples, check the sex terminology. "Doggy style"? The first thing the English speaker thinks is DOGS?? That's sick.

Might I say there is no such thing as 'American English'. This is just an excuse for people who are too lazy to learn to spell properly to abuse the English Language.

The main problem with English is its inconsistent spelling or pronunciation. It seems that pronunciation has moved on while many spellings are frozen in time. It's a challenge for native and non-native speakers alike, but I like the strange spellings because each one tells me a little of the history of my language.

As a writer, I revel in the fact that English has a massive vocabulary - estimated at over 600,000 words (ignoring technical and derived words). It allows me to choose the exact word I want, even for simple ideas: The words start, begin, commence and so on all have subtle colours, and depending on the precise context I could opt for any one of twenty or more phrases.

To those who learn English as a second language - I salute you. :)

English is okay.

Arab and middle-eastern countries (hebrew too), kinda gross me out sometimes.

I don't like some of their words where it sounds like they have to clear their throat.

As a writer, I revel in the fact that English has a massive vocabulary - estimated at over 600,000 words (ignoring technical and derived words). It allows me to choose the exact word I want, even for simple ideas: The words start, begin, commence and so on all have subtle colours, and depending on the precise context I could opt for any one of twenty or more phrases.

To those who learn English as a second language - I salute you. :)


The thing about "many words" is that that's the way English is constructive. It's about knowing "fancy words". The best example was the one I heard in Mythbusters, a Discovery Channel show. Presenter Hyneman commented about a bullet: "it needs more stay-in-there-edness". The other presenter, Savage, laughed at him and asked if that's the official technical term. Well, why isn't it? At least in my own language, the equivalent could be the "official term". Yet, there's some fancy Latin word for that, and because you need so many of those, a huge vocabulary is created. This is to say, it's not a measure of goodness; it's more of a symptom of the lack of the expressive power of the grammar. As a language, English is a "toolkit". (The best analogy is Windows vs. Unix, of which English is the former.)

Before anyone gets the wrong idea, Swedish and Finnish are just as much related as English and Japanese. Finnish isn't even remotely like Swedish.

Swedish is an ugly language. It's semitonal, it uses sj/tj (sh/ch) and I challenge you to translate this to Swedish: "Island, island, hay island, hay island's gentle bride."

But I agree, Semitic languages are pure ugliness. British English is good. Sometimes American English sounds retarded, say, when Bush speaks it. Scientific English is a terse, but inflexible language.

But I've noticed that English is an ugly language in the sense that the sounds it uses are ugly, and the orthography is not nice. Old English is even worse; it vaguely reminds me of Old Swedish. Some idioms and metaphors are absolutely terrible; for examples, check the sex terminology. "Doggy style"? The first thing the English speaker thinks is DOGS?? That's sick.

Perhaps a little harsh on us Swedish speakers! I think this is a Sweden - Finland rivalry thing. Although, the finlandssvenska accent isn't the most beautiful of Swedish dialects to be fair...

I agree, English does sound retarded when Bush (sort of) speaks it. To be fair, we should take into account he clearly isn't a fluent speaker though! ;-)

By the way Perkeleenmaa, does your name translate to Devils Land? Isn't the Finnish swearword "perkele" meaning "Satan" and "maa" means "land" right (as in Uusimaa-Nyland)?

The English language isn't ugly, it's just what happens when you cross breed ancient German and Norman French, with a little bit of Celtic. And it's really a sort of lazy language.

I personally can't stand the language (I'm a native speaker). There are obvious reasons: non-phonetic spelling, ugly consonant clusters, horid-sounding words, etc. But also on the level that's it's the interlingua of the world, when a better one could've been (like French, Italian, etc.)

I think English is a beautiful language. I love the way it sounds and I love the way the sounds fit together. I love the irregular spellings because they show the language's rich history and make the text visually interesting. I love how vast and useful it is.

P.S. I also like semi-regular grammar... English has too many gramatical exceptions, irregular verbs, etc.

Perhaps a little harsh on us Swedish speakers! I think this is a Sweden - Finland rivalry thing. Although, the finlandssvenska accent isn't the most beautiful of Swedish dialects to be fair...

I agree, English does sound retarded when Bush (sort of) speaks it. To be fair, we should take into account he clearly isn't a fluent speaker though! ;-)

By the way Perkeleenmaa, does your name translate to Devils Land? Isn't the Finnish swearword "perkele" meaning "Satan" and "maa" means "land" right (as in Uusimaa-Nyland)?

It's not necessarily a rivalry thing. I can just ignore Finland-Swedish, but not Realm Swedish, only because of the tone of the language. Tonal variation is annoying, in the "makes me want remove my brains with a rusty spoon" way. It addles thoughts. One grammaticalization difference is that those tones of voice are usually used in Finnish to signify you're either complaining, or joking and making fun of the listener. Fortunately, English has little of those things.

This NationState is called "Perkeleenmaa" because it's an experiment for the "what would Anton Szandor do" policy.

I'm not English, but I think in English :confused:

Perhaps a little harsh on us Swedish speakers! I think this is a Sweden - Finland rivalry thing. Although, the finlandssvenska accent isn't the most beautiful of Swedish dialects to be fair...


IMO Skåne (southern anyway) accent sounds a bit like Scottish. I was watching football (tv) in England and wondered why on earth the commentator spoke Swedish. It took me about half an hour before I realised he was actually speaking English. I quess I didn't really pay attention to it, as I can understand both. I mix languages quite fluently... :D

I don't like how you pronounce "u" like in gul or jul. But otherwise I don't find Swedish "ugly" in any way. Danish is ugly ;)

What stupid sentences you teach to foreigners?
My favourites are
Alavalla maalla hallan vaaraa or
Älä lyö löylyä!

To anybody that doesn't like english better get use to it because it is probable that it will be the world language. As it is used by most people.

I'm a native English speaker (America, though again, us being 'native English speakers' could be argued), and I'm rather unfond of our language. It's a bit ugly. Okay, a lot ugly, and we've got lots of rules that aren't really rules that we break all the time.

I don't know why English should be the language of the world -- I mean, if it were up to me, I'd pick Spanish. Lot easier (in my book). But what do I know?

french is the langauge to use when your trying to get someone in bed. Its very poetic and beautiful. Works especially well when the other person doesn't speak the langauge. :fluffle:

german is different kinds of hacking and spitting, most of which make the speaker sound very very upset.

I'v got no real opinion of spanish, other than that I worked in a restaurant and knowing spanish was almost a prerequisite to work in the kitchen.

English (American, not 'The Kings') is the way go to. Its easy to read, easy to write, easy to say. The grammar and rules can get screwy but so can any other langauge.

the English insitence on adding a 'u' to works like color or labor is ugly. Calling an elevator is lift is ugly, and saying bloody wanker is really really ugly. Stupid brits :)

french is the langauge to use when your trying to get someone in bed. Its very poetic and beautiful. Works especially well when the other person doesn't speak the langauge. :fluffle:

german is different kinds of hacking and spitting, most of which make the speaker sound very very upset.

I'v got no real opinion of spanish, other than that I worked in a restaurant and knowing spanish was almost a prerequisite to work in the kitchen.

English (American, not 'The Kings') is the way go to. Its easy to read, easy to write, easy to say. The grammar and rules can get screwy but so can any other langauge.

the English insitence on adding a 'u' to works like color or labor is ugly. Calling an elevator is lift is ugly, and saying bloody wanker is really really ugly. Stupid brits :)
There is only English, Australian English, American English are labels placed on regional variations. they are no more valid than saying Northumbrian English, and as Northumbrian English (esp Ashington pitmatic) vary further from the 'norm' than both Australian and American variations it makes the whole thing a nonsense.
The problem it, english is a spoken language foremost, it is the modern obsesion with rules etc that make the written form so difficult.
So gan canny me wee bairns and when ya sat at the cheble after ya dinna eating ket think of me, I'll raise a glass of dog wi' me marras to ya.

I think that English is pretty ugly compared to some other languages. But I don't feel too strongly one way or the other. The problem I have with English is its inconsistancies. There is no way to tell vowel length or consonantal sound, or whether a letter is silent or not. And verb conjugation is just insane. But, all the same, it does have its bright points. Shakespeare being one of them.

I am not a native speaker, yet I find English quite atractive. I am not speaking about its spelling or grammar or anything like that. I say English is atractive because you can learn a lot about anything if you learn the lanugage: most web pages are in English, most movies are in English, most science books are in English.

What makes a language atractive? I think the doors an opportunities it opens for you define that.

I am not a native speaker, yet I find English quite atractive. I am not speaking about its spelling or grammar or anything like that. I say English is atractive because you can learn a lot about anything if you learn the lanugage: most web pages are in English, most movies are in English, most science books are in English.

What makes a language atractive? I think the doors an opportunities it opens for you define that.
It's a fact that has made the English very lazy when it comes to learning other languages that if you speak English you are pretty likley to be understood in most places in the world.
Watched a program with Palin the other week, up in the Himalayas and he comes across people in remote villages that can talk to him in English.

it must be like near impossible to learn tho if you aren't a native speaker. the spelling and pronunciation are INSANE, i mean, if native speakers have a tough time with it...

True, pronunciation and spelling are a problem. But they are NOTHING compared to other languages. I find French beautiful, but impossible to pronounce. Japanese pronounciation is easier for me (I use Spanish as native language), but spelling is a real killer. German almost sounds as if you were barking (sorry, that's what I think). And Spanish is way harder to learn than English... all the verbs are different for each person, tense, etc... And we also have to deal with accents (though not as many as French speakers).

So, I think English is not as hard to learn as other languages.

Might I say there is no such thing as 'American English'. This is just an excuse for people who are too lazy to learn to spell properly to abuse the English Language.

Not true! Have you heard Spanish from Mexico and Spanish from Spain? They are WAY different! I think language is always evolving and changing, and US people speak differently from UK people because their language has evolved into something else, maybe not a radical change, but a change after all. I think it is OK to call it "American English" or "Whatever English".

The main problem with English is its inconsistent spelling or pronunciation. It seems that pronunciation has moved on while many spellings are frozen in time. It's a challenge for native and non-native speakers alike, but I like the strange spellings because each one tells me a little of the history of my language.

As a writer, I revel in the fact that English has a massive vocabulary - estimated at over 600,000 words (ignoring technical and derived words). It allows me to choose the exact word I want, even for simple ideas: The words start, begin, commence and so on all have subtle colours, and depending on the precise context I could opt for any one of twenty or more phrases.

To those who learn English as a second language - I salute you. :)

Muchas gracias :)

Not true! Have you heard Spanish from Mexico and Spanish from Spain? They are WAY different! I think language is always evolving and changing, and US people speak differently from UK people because their language has evolved into something else, maybe not a radical change, but a change after all. I think it is OK to call it "American English" or "Whatever English".
Only in spelling, the variation in pronuciation does not vary enough to be considered a sub language. As I have satetd the difference in English as spoken in that green and pleasant land varries more than that of a Londoner and an American.

As others have said, English can be quite a beautiful language, when used properly. Of course, it can be as ugly as sin as well. But you could say that about any other language as well. Being a native speaker, the thing I like most about English is its versatility. Not only does it have a huge vocabulary set that can express just about anything you could think of, it's also very good at incorporating foreign words. I love the fact that, with the English syllabary, I can pronounce words from many other major languages. I mean, French doesn't allow any foreign words to enter the vocabulary, and Japanese and Chinese are awful at incorporating new words. For example my last name, a very simple one-syllable word, becomes "burodo" in Japanese. They have a very hard time pronouncing my name correctly, while I can pronounce any of their names with little difficulty.

After that slightly off-topic rant, I'd just like to say that Spanish is the most beautiful language in my book. The ugliest would probably be Hebrew, or maybe Mandarin Chinese.

Only in spelling, the variation in pronuciation does not vary enough to be considered a sub language. As I have satetd the difference in English as spoken in that green and pleasant land varries more than that of a Londoner and an American.

Mmmh... ok, not a sub-language. I agree with that.

But if I tell you I learned (well, I tried to learn) to speak "US" English, instead of just "English", you may now know what kind of slang and pronounciation I would use, no?

But I have a great idea: why don't you all learn Spanish and then we could talk about it? It would be easier for me!

LOL!!!! :D

Mmmh... ok, not a sub-language. I agree with that.

But if I tell you I learned (well, I tried to learn) to speak "US" English, instead of just "English", you may now know what kind of slang and pronounciation I would use, no?

But I have a great idea: why don't you all learn Spanish and then we could talk about it? It would be easier for me!

LOL!!!! :D
Or Dutch... :p

Mmmh... ok, not a sub-language. I agree with that.

But if I tell you I learned (well, I tried to learn) to speak "US" English, instead of just "English", you may now know what kind of slang and pronounciation I would use, no?

But I have a great idea: why don't you all learn Spanish and then we could talk about it? It would be easier for me!

LOL!!!! :D
Sorry English, too lazy to learn another language and our education system is crap at it anyway.

i don't really know what you understand by a beautiful/ugly language, but english isn't an ugly language. first of all, english is nothing but poor in swearings. latin laguages are much better and slav ones on top of latin ones.

english is rather simple and a bad english is not as unpleaseant as a bad french or a bad italian.

I hate urbonics, a.k.a. ghettospeak. It's disgusting.

Proper American and British English are great languages, though.

Proper American and British English are great languages, though.

as far as i know, there is only one english language and the proper one would be the kind of english spoken in UK.

Spelling "Organise" with a 'z' really gets to me.

There doesn't seem to be a real variation in how English is spoken. Only the accents make it harder to understand.

English is the most functional language there is. It is much more techincal, and is used accross the IT industry as a universal form of communication.

as far as i know, there is only one english language and the proper one would be the kind of english spoken in UK.

No, actually, there are two distinct kinds of English. Back around the Revolution, some guy got it into his head that in order to differentiate ourselves from our redcoat oppressors, we had to have our own version of the language. He then proceded to write a dictionary where words such as "olde" didn't have the "e" at the end, some words had z's instead of s's, etc. This was gradually accepted, and became what is today known as "American English", a language subtly different from British English in terms of spelling and pronunciation.

Hi!

As a native-speaker of Canadian English, I am used to the language. Certainly there are more beautiful ones; such as Arabic, Italian, and Hawai'ian; but I think English is alright.

That said, I really wish we had a proper spelling system. The Continental European languages have that down much better than we do. I speak German, and I love how easy it is to pronounce anything just by reading it. Words like 'read' and 'wind' are rotten in English, since they have two completely different pronounciations each. If people simply learned the rules for English, I think the language could be improved greatly. I also think it is possibly one of the most disrespectful things that a person can do to spell honour and valour without the 'u'. I guess that is just me, though.

As for political correctedness, nothing can beat Turkish. Gender var yok! Ahem... There's no gender in Turkish, although there are two polite forms and a casual form. I am only just beginning to learn it, but I really enjoy it.

As for music; I love Croatian, Italian, German, Turkish, Arabic, French, Mandarin, and yes, even English. And instrumental, of course...

Well, bye for now! Tschuss! Gule Gule!


P.S.: Anyone read 'Eats, Shoots, And Leaves'? It's a fantastic book.

No, actually, there are two distinct kinds of English. Back around the Revolution, some guy got it into his head that in order to differentiate ourselves from our redcoat oppressors, we had to have our own version of the language. He then proceded to write a dictionary where words such as "olde" didn't have the "e" at the end, some words had z's instead of s's, etc. This was gradually accepted, and became what is today known as "American English", a language subtly different from British English in terms of spelling and pronunciation.
Still have to say it is English, a slightly distorted form but English. Travel through Britain (Outside London) and you will see a huge variation in language, not only in how words a spoken but what they mean.
Call someone from Hull a twaet and you will get a jovial reply, do the same in Liverpool and the response will be, shall we say more physical.

I like British English and I guess Canadian english would be similar to that, in how the words are spelt and pronounced anyway.
Canadians sound just like Americans, although Canadians spell some of their words like the British.

I believe Cervantes once said he spoke French to his lover, Spanish to talk to God, and English when commanding his dog.

Which only goes to show that even great writers can be ethnocentric assholes sometimes.

No, actually, there are two distinct kinds of English. Back around the Revolution, some guy got it into his head that in order to differentiate ourselves from our redcoat oppressors, we had to have our own version of the language. He then proceded to write a dictionary where words such as "olde" didn't have the "e" at the end, some words had z's instead of s's, etc. This was gradually accepted, and became what is today known as "American English", a language subtly different from British English in terms of spelling and pronunciation.
Erm, no. Olde was never a word. The word 'old' is middle English which was derived from the old English word eald, which meant the same thing.
Olde (pronounced 'old-e') is a modern way of spelling the word when we try and make something sound old, not proper English.

Did you just call me ugly?

Now what's this about English?

"Eats, Shoots and Leaves," by the way, was a totally overrated load. The publishers pushed what was essentially a mediocre book very hard and released their U.S. edition without correcting for differences between American and British use.

Add that to the fact that Truss buries her interesting grammar anecdotes under a huge volume of condescending grade-school crap and you get a very unappealing package.

"Transitive Vampire" is a more fun grammar book.

It is of my opinion that English is one of the ugliest if not worst languages in existence. It requires a large amount of knowledge of words to sound fluent in this language, and last I checked, there is over 400,000 words in the language. Second, I strongly detest how when the vowel shift occurred, a spelling shift did not. Hence, we're left with an outdated, unphonetical alphabet. It's ironic how 'phonetical' isn't phonetical. p'ho'neh-ti-chawl, anyone? English's lack of accented letters is annoying. It may be my first language but compared to Spanish, which I am currently studying, English is horrible. In Spanish, the only thing I dislike is the silent H and the various states of G and Q. However, each vowel can make only one sound (Considering "eh" and "ae" to be nearly the same sound anyway). In English, this is not true as one letter can carry more than one sound and one sound can be represented by more than one letter. Sure, English may have a vast amount of synonyms to choose from, but I don't think that truly 400,000 words is necessary. At least English could be phoneticised. No wonder so many people have such hard times learning the pathetic lingua franca that English has become.

On a side note, I wish I knew when this puppet was born. I /DO/ know that my main nation's a year older. =P

Whoops. I chose the wrong option.

Whoops. I chose the wrong option.
What'd you choose? c.c

english would be fine if people didn't abuse it. In my area in particular, there seems to be only one vowel left, and words like up'er (up there) yuns (you ones) parre (power) run rampant. in the end i just hate stupid people

Erm, no. Olde was never a word. The word 'old' is middle English which was derived from the old English word eald, which meant the same thing.
Olde (pronounced 'old-e') is a modern way of spelling the word when we try and make something sound old, not proper English.

Well, OK then. I concede defeat. But I still say that urbonics is a horrible mutilation of the English language, and makes whoever speaks it sound stupid.

Hey whoever rules the world sets the language of the world. Its as certain as death and taxes.

English is the most amazing language in human history.

The most complex by far, the most magnificent without doubt.

It is not for nothing that the Oxford English Dictionary is the greatest scholarly endevour in the history of mankind.

There's a reason why English is the hardest language to learn. Who the heck thought up silent vowels and doing things like using alphabet instead of alfabet.

Personally I believe it would be easiest with Japanese language (which I'm studying), using only katakana or hiragana writing systems (Kanji is also confusing as hell).

Well....know/speak/learning greek, hebrew, sumerian, english, spanish, italian, german, latin, russian and a very limited portion of cantonese......

Of those languages.....the most pleasing to the ear is hebrew.....

The most descriptive is greek.

The most challenging to read/learn is a tie between english (stupid phonics etc.) and russian (only becasue of cyrillic)

Most poetic/emotional has to be english though.....expressiveness is the core of the english language....english is not easy to read a play in for example....shaekspear is difficult to read for the sheer fact that the literary devices used are tied to a particular emotion that can only be captured by speaking or by seeing actions tied to them.

I hate listening to people who do not have a firm grip on their own language. I hate "ebonics." I can't understand people who speak like that...it's easier to pick up on a fast talking mexican woman than to understand sub-human speaking like that....english abused is a terrible thing....i can't stand southern accents....sound like an unintelligent/naive person (although they are not in most cases) I hate the myriad of accents in the area of New York City....Most intellectually stimulating come from the midwest....especially the michigan area.....the expressiveness in the voices and facial expressions is captivating...

Hebrew, however beautiful, can make you fall to sleep due to it's monotony.

Italian is the most beautiful singing language.....O Mio Babbino Caro is beautiful in the original italian.

German is the most aurally unappealing....and very vulgar as well....but i like german bar songs.....german is very intimidating and militaristic.....germanic languages in general seem to be more expressive than the "romantic" languages...French is detestable.....sounds elitest...and the only thing i hate more than elitists are ignorant people...however, they seem to fall into the same category far too often...

i think english isnt so much beautiful or ugly as it is simple in structure and complex in meaning. for instance, there is no change in spellings for words of different 'genders' (a strange and confusing rule in the romantic languages, at least french) and verbs are generally kept the same for different subjects (he runs, she runs, we run) and are not conjugated a million times.
also, the complexity of english allows for more functional or descriptive discourse about an object, especially when cursing, of which i believe english is the most varied in the world (that i know of). for instance, french curses are largely concerned with religion, while english relies more on bodily functions and animals, with a few religious references. two different curses in english can mean the same thing, but imply varying levels of severity. i'll leave that to your imagination.

especially when cursing, of which i believe english is the most varied in the world (that i know of).
same thing with many other languages. you gotta live somewhere where they speak a foreign language for a while to get to hear the most beautiful cursing ;)

I'm a native English speaker and I don't like it. Russian is like cognac to the ears, I love it more than my mother tongue.

English is indeed ugly (I'm a Native speaker)

C'est pourquoi je voudrais parler francais tous les temps, que va commencer maintenant

I believe Cervantes once said he spoke French to his lover, Spanish to talk to God, and English when commanding his dog.

Which only goes to show that even great writers can be ethnocentric assholes sometimes.

No, Cervantes is right. I've seen this, except that the command language for dogs was Swedish, a language very similar to English. Namely, the problem with the expected language was that essentially all words are polysyllablic, so the agility trainer chose a language with mostly monosyllablic, simple, but phonology-wise different words: Här! Hit! Sit! Hop!

Germanic languages in general are just "barking".

I'm taking French as a second language. English sounds very ugly in comparision, but perhaps that's because I use if every day and sort of take it for granted.

I think English has the potential to be beautiful. Some of the great writers like Shakespeare and Poe are an exellent demonstration of which.

However, it's pretty ugly in casual language. If you listen to my friends talking to one another, or even to me, it's not very pleasing aurally.

And it's not getting any better. This entire generation of kids and teenagers are causing a serious decay in the beauty of the English language. With all the new slang arising, and especially the advent of shortcut typing, the apoch of virtual apathy.

But that's a different topic for a different time. I voted No/I'm a native English speaker in the poll.

i think english isnt so much beautiful or ugly as it is simple in structure and complex in meaning. for instance, there is no change in spellings for words of different 'genders' (a strange and confusing rule in the romantic languages, at least french) and verbs are generally kept the same for different subjects (he runs, she runs, we run) and are not conjugated a million times.


Lack of gender in English is a good thing; genders are a pointless hurdle to learners. The conjugation, however, obviously loses some of the meaning. Ever wondered how some languages can do without a plural and do it all by context? Well, in English, the lack of verb inflection is very similar. (E.g. Finnish käännä, käänny, käännähdä, käännähtele, kääntelehdi all translate to "turn" in a little simplistic translation. Yet they have completely different meanings.)


also, the complexity of english allows for more functional or descriptive discourse about an object, especially when cursing, of which i believe english is the most varied in the world (that i know of). for instance, french curses are largely concerned with religion, while english relies more on bodily functions and animals, with a few religious references. two different curses in english can mean the same thing, but imply varying levels of severity. i'll leave that to your imagination.

Bullshit! I bet your example (French) is the only one you can give. I'm certain there's more than a few languages with a better expletive capability than English. Fr'nstans, you've obviosly never seen anyone cursing in an agglunative language. In that context, English has only one proper curse word, "fuck". Even that can't be used everywhere.