Gordon Smith writes:
> Hello Margin
>
> I asked:
>
> > Why couldn't you invent your own language, don't you have the collective
> > intelligence? ;-)
>
> You replied:
>
> We did.
>
> You did what? You mean you did have the collective intelligence, but
> don't any longer? <snigger>. if you mean you did invent your own
> language, that's a blatant "fib" (assuming that you know what a "fib" is?
Yes, I know. Afib stands for atrial fibrillation or afib which is
a potentially fatal disruption of cardiac rhythm. that's
according to one of the drug company commercials we hear with
incessant regularity on our nightly network news broadcasts and
that's no lie.
In truth, the word fib is in relatively common use, here
and means a lie, but not a really bad lie such as the wife may
say to the husband, "Does this dress make me look fat?"
The husband, knowing what may follow if he says "yes"
says "Why no, of course not" If, in his heart, he is thinking
otherwise, that's a fib.
Gordon Keen hit the nail on the head when he talked
about Latin and French words being mixed in to English. American
English is this process on steroids as millions of non-native
English speakers came here and a lot of our words became mutual
misunderstandings of each other's vocalization attempts.
Some words have gotten so bastardized that nobody really
knows how they came about.
I once read an article about the West Indies and how
Queen Elizabeth the First would have understood some of the
English spoken there because that represented the time when that
population became isolated from England.
I will be careful, here, but one of the interesting
parts of our common language is profanity. A good book to read
is "The Fatal Shore" about England's practice of forced
deportation of criminals to Australia between 1750 or so and the
late 1800's. In a brief section of the book, a prison guard
disciplines a female prisoner because she responded to an order
by telling the guard he could just kiss her ----. On any street
in any town in America or England, that response would be
crystal clear in its meaning some 200 years later.
I must admit, the British do insults and profanity much
more colorfully at least it is more creative. Ours tends to get
right to the point.
This list isn't appropriate for examples, but there is a
credit card scam on the loose here and they have been calling our
house regularly. Maybe I can get them to post some of our
responses to a web site and you can hear them in my own voice.
Otherwise, you can use your imaginations.
Martin
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