John Forbes wrote:
Species
See any good dictionary.
There is a word "specie". It means coin, as opposed to paper, money
John
There is also the word speciation. Yet another anomaly.
On Fri, 27 May 2005 23:18:57 +0100, mike wilson
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
John Forbes wrote:
<old fart mode on> I have always considered it thus:
English is the language of England. The clue is in the name.
English has also for some time been the most popular language in
the rest of the British Isles. The language has been taken to
other countries through the vehicle of the British Empire, and over
time has become altered in many of these countries. These
different versions are dialects, and should be distinguished as
such by a suitable qualification, such as "Australian" English.
There is no such thing as British English; it is simply English.
There are, it is true, regional variations within the British
Isles. The Scots have a distinct vocabulary of their own (you can
still hear "wight" and "aye" in Scotland, and a female clerk is a
clerkess).
As Bob, I think, pointed out, the biggest group of English speakers
on the planet is found in India. Indian English speakers use
proper spelling (rather than the American variant), and have
imported many words from local languages, of which one of the most
common is "lakhs", meaning a great many. A "lakh" correctly is
100,000. In turn, English also has many Indian imports, such as
bungalow, jodhpur, chutney, etc..
One interesting development in America is the way the pronunciation
of certain English words has changed quite recently. An educated
American would not I think have rhymed Moscow with cow until a few
years ago, and route was likewise not always rhymed with rout.
What saddens me, and many other old farts too, I expect, is that
many of these linguistic changes are not, as supporters claim, a
sign of richness or diversity, but of simple ignorance, stemming
partly from poor education and partly from incorrect usage by
non-native speakers. "Lense" is a case in point. "Specie" for
"species" is another, and "criteria" for "criterion" is a third.
The worst is "media" for "medium", as in "a media". The proponents
of richness and diversity claim this is just organic change; I say
it is degeneration.
</old fart mode off>
John
How would you write the singular for species?
On Fri, 27 May 2005 21:46:58 +0100, E.R.N. Reed
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Bob W wrote:
Hi,
*no such thing as "British" spelling. There's American English,
and then English used by everybody else in the English speaking
world. "British spelling" implies the non-American version is
the minority version, where in fact the opposite is true.
And that's my pet rant, guys!
ERNR
Well said! Mine too, and thanks for saying it. It DID need saying.
I'm sorry, but there is such a thing as British spelling, and British
English, and British English is a minority variety (I think
Indian English
has the most speakers). There are also such things as Jamaican
English, Australian English, Canadian
English, African American English, Scots English, Estuary English,
... I
could go on. Each of them has its own spelling varieties too.
As I said in my response to Graywolf, I was strictly referring to
SPELLING and to my knowledge are two standards of spelling in English.
Accents, slang, pronunciation and the use of different words for
the same object (e.g. lorry vs. truck) are not included in spelling.
By "spelling" I mean cheque vs. check, tire vs. tyre, and is there
a "u" in colour, honour, armour, etc., and where do you put the R
in centre?
Anyway I can knock at least one example off your list. Standard
English spelling in Jamaica is the one that Americans refer to as
"British" spelling.
(The fact that neither major Jamaican newspaper seems to employ a
copy editor does not imply a different spelling standard.)