Comment on [deleted]
lordnikon@lemmy.world 11 months ago
This is what I find fascinating Esperanto was constructed ment to unify all the major western languages but English became the standard and in a way English was built organically in the same way as Esperanto. As it pulls from other languages to use in its language all the time.
It’s more a reflection of global power. Before English had that standard in Europe, it was French. We still describe such languages as a “lingua franca” even in contexts where that lingua isn’t franca anymore.
Esperanto isn’t anyone’s native language by design, but it meant that there was no major global power which necessitated its use.
And long before that, pidgin Latin was the lingua franca in the west. After that and before WWI, the French were trying really hard to make French the common language Western international language.
Us Americans should be pushing for adoption of Esperanto. We’ve benefited from it because of our economic dominance, but as our empire crumbles, there is a very real chance that the lingua franca will change. We may find ourselves forced to learn Mandari or Hindi to participate in the global economy; it would behoove us to use our waning dominance to push for adoption of an easy, regular language. If the language doesn’t give an advantage to one power group, it has a better chance of surviving global power shifts. The best global language is one which is everyone’s second language: it levels the playing field.
One day, Americans are going to find themselves at the bottom of that hill. We’d be smarter you flatten it as much as possible before that happens.
I think it’s unfair to say that the US is what dictates the direction and usage of the English language. It contributed, maybe, but it’s not because of the US that English is so widely-spoken in the first place. We have Britain to thank for that.
If the US ever adopts a second language to use for trade, it will be Spanish, just by virtue of who its neighbors are and how many native Spanish speakers live in the US already.
Except for Esperanto has adequate rules and English is just a burning dumpster of shit-oil mix.
I’ve learned some Spanish and French, conversational in neither, but I know enough to understand how the languages are constructed and I have a decent enough vocab to feel like I’ve experienced the languages. French is just as dumb as English and worse in some places and Spanish is definitely an easier language to learn and construct sentences in.
People act like English is the only language that has borrowed vocabulary or inconsistent conjugation and pronunciation, when a lot of languages are just the same.
English seems to lean in a lot harder and consistently as time goes on compared to other languages.
It isn’t though.
It may seem like it is, but English is actually becoming more regular over time in many dialects.
Dialects dropping the 3rd person singular -s, dropping irregular (and even regular!) plurals, dialects eliminating the subjunctive, and past tense/participle distinctions. In the phonology you have marked features like English’s interdental fricatives going away as well. All of these processes are producing less marked and more regular structures across the English-speaking world.
As always, there are processes countering these and introducing more irregularity, but as cattywampas mentioned, these are the sorts of processes that all languages are always undergoing. English really isn’t special - it’s just a natural language like any other.
Thank you for your eloquence.
deur@feddit.nl 11 months ago
English is not “constructed” nor does its development to the point reflect high levels of intent like someone sitting down and deciding they decide what the best language is.