IIT.PITY.SCOUNDRELS!
> Chief Kwabby,
>
> Thanks for your thoughtful intervention. Actually, my central thesis in that
> essay is that there is no authentic, pristine English and that all English,
> to the extent that it's always been a mishmash of several languages, is
> "bastardized." But I also pointed out that many idiosyncratic phonological
> and syntactical features of American English are more proximate to the
> "proto-language" than contemporary British English if we hold up the most
> socially prestigious variant of early modern English as the reference point
> for "authenticity."
>
> Your two questions are not mutually exclusive; they are, in fact, mutually
> reinforcing. This is what I mean: My argument is that American English's
> relentless borrowing from several languages shows fidelity to the "bastard"
> heritage of the English language. So my answer to your first question is
> "yes." You asked how American English's extensive borrowing from other
> languages is different from Old English's linguistic alchemy. Well, it's not
> different. That's why I noted in the article that, "the most important
> reason why American English is not a bastardization of the 'authentic'
> English, ironically, is that only the American variety of the English
> language is continuing with English?s germinal 'bastard' heritage." In other
> words, lexical purism has always been alien to the English language and
> American English, in more ways than the more conservative contemporary
> "standard" British English, is spurning purism by borrowing extensively from
> other languages.
>
> Yes, you're right that it should be "bastardized," not "bastardize." That's
> actually how it appeared on my blog--and in the newspaper where it was first
> published--but in copying and pasting the article to my email I missed the
> "d."
>
> Farooq
>
>
> 1 Park Place South
> Suite 817C
> Atlanta, GA, USA.
> 30303
> Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
> Blog: www.farooqkperogi.blogspot.com
>
> "The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either
> proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
>
>
>
> On Tue, Apr 26, 2011 at 9:23 PM, <KwabbyG@aol.com> wrote:
>
>> Farooq,
>>
>> Great article, as usual! While you manage to put together, impressively, a
>> number of examples to show that the British variant of the English Language
>> is more "bastardized" than its American cousin (I prefer offspring), you do
>> not seem, yourself, to be wholly convinced by the central theme of your
>> argument.
>>
>> Towards the conclusion of your article, you wrote the following:
>>
>> In more ways than any other variety, it is pushing the semantic and lexical
>> frontiers of the language and enriching it in the process. Many
>> international borrowings into the English language now come by way of
>> American English, *precisely because America is the world?s most racially
>> and culturally diverse country *(emphasis mine).
>>
>> Are you by the above not suggesting that since "America is the world's most
>> racially and culturally diverse country" it is "pushing the semantic and
>> lexical frontiers of the language and enriching it in the process" by
>> allowing its variant of the English Language to be influenced by its more
>> diverse racial composition?
>>
>> If yes, how is this development process different from earlier ones where
>> British English, to further quote you, "sprang forth from the linguistic
>> alchemy of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and Celts"?
>>
>> If no, are you then suggesting that influence of American English when
>> it has come into contact with other racial or national identities has been a
>> one-way street? I doubt that very much since that is not what
>> your other articles ("*The African Origins of Common English
>> Words*<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/09/african-origins-of-common-english-words.html>"
>> comes
>> to mind) have suggested.
>>
>> On a minor note, your concluding statement read "All English is *
>> bastardize*" (emphasis mine). Obviously a typographical error, you will
>> agree with me that the verb should have been in the past tense (as in
>> bastardized).
>>
>> Many thanks for your illuminating articles!
>>
>> Kwabby
>>
>>
>> In a message dated 4/22/2011 4:24:33 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
>> farooqkperogi@gmail.com writes:
>>
>> Is American English Bastardized (British)
>> English?<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2011/04/is-american-english-bastardized-english.html>
>> *By Farooq A. Kperogi*
>>
>> Like other Nigerians, I was educated in British English?and taught to
>> disdain American English as inauthentic, debased form of (British) English.
>> But is there any truth to this notion? The straightforward answer is no. As
>> a matter of fact, in spite of appearances to the contrary, American English
>> actually precedes contemporary British English. In other words, contemporary
>> British English is worthier to be labeled ?bastardized? English than
>> American English is, as I will show shortly.
>>
>> But, first, although Brits (and heirs of their linguistic tradition, like
>> Nigerians) cherish the thought that they are the custodians of the
>> ?original? English tongue, the idea that there is such a thing as ?original?
>> English as opposed to ?bastardized? English is itself ahistorical at best
>> and ignorant at worst. English, as most people know, has always been a
>> mélange of several languages. In other words, it has been a lingual
>> ?bastard? from its very nascence.
>>
>> The English language came forth when a vast multitude of West Germanic
>> warriors called Angles invaded what is today Britain in the 5th century.
>> The Angles conquered and later commixed with an autochthonous population
>> known as Celts. Much later, other Germanic people, notably the Saxons and
>> the Jutes, joined the Angles to further overwhelm the Celts. One of the
>> consequences of these invasions and resettlements was that a language (which
>> linguistic historians now call Old English) was born. It sprang forth from
>> the linguistic alchemy of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and Celts. In this fusion,
>> according to linguists, the Saxon dialect dominated and the
>> indigenous Celtic
>> language was
>> marginalized<http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/page/thehistoryofenglish/the-history-of-english>.
>> (The Celtic language, more popularly called Gaelic, has survived in
>> Scotland, Northern Ireland, and the Irish Republic with dialectal
>> variations).
>>
>> Two centuries later, another horde of northern Germanic warriors invaded
>> what had by then become known as the Land of the Angles (which was later
>> shortened to England) and brought to bear their own dialect in the lexis and
>> structure of the emergent language. In the 11th century, people from
>> northern France, called the Normans, invaded England, overthrew its
>> Anglo-Saxon ruling class, and imposed French (or what some people call
>> Anglo-Norman French) as the official language for over 300 years. This
>> historical fact radically altered the structure and vocabulary of English.
>>
>> In the eighteenth century, the English (by now an ethnic and linguistic
>> synthesis of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Celts, the French, etc) embarked on
>> imperial conquests in Asia, Africa, and the Americas and found themselves
>> borrowing words extensively into their language from the several languages
>> they encountered.
>>
>> Numerous other influences were brought to bear on the language. For
>> instance, many of the vocabularies we use in astronomy (nadir, summit, acme,
>> etc), mathematics (algebra, etc), and other sciences are derived from
>> Arabic. The modern vocabulary of scholarship and learning is almost entirely
>> Latinate. And several common words we use in modern conversational English
>> are borrowed from other languages.
>>
>> According to one study, 29 percent of the vocabulary of modern English is
>> derived from Latin. Another 29 percent is derived from French. Germanic
>> languages (that is, the ?original? tongue) account for only 26 percent. And
>> 16 percent of English vocabulary is derived from a hotchpotch of other
>> languages, notably Greek, Arabic, Hindi, Spanish, Italian, the Scandinavian
>> languages, Hebrew, Yiddish, etc. (For the contribution of African languages
>> to the modern vocabulary of the English language, see my previous article
>> titled, ?The African Origins of Common English
>> Words?<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/09/african-origins-of-common-english-words.html>
>> ).
>>
>> Now, a language that has borrowed this expansively from other languages
>> (which has made the English language the most ecumenical language in the
>> world) can?t legitimately lay claim to linguistic purity, although there are
>> several misguided movements for Anglo-Saxon linguistic purism in Britain
>> now.
>>
>> But let us, for the sake of argument, agree that there was indeed such a
>> thing as the pure, pristine English language before its latter-day
>> contamination by ?horrible Americanisms? and by what George Orwell once
>> called ?exaggerated Latinisms.? Let us periodize this ?pure? English from
>> the mid 1550s to the early 1600s when what is called ?modern English,? that
>> is, the version of English we broadly speak today, emerged. This was the
>> period during which the works of William Shakespeare, unarguably the
>> greatest writer in the English language, appeared. It was also the time that
>> the King James Bible, one of the most decisive influences in the current
>> form and idiomatic universe of the English language, was published. This
>> book?s supreme significance to the development and standardization of the
>> English language is evidenced in the fact that it has contributed up to 257
>> idioms to the English language. No other single source rivals that feat. Not
>> even Shakespeare?s prolific oeuvre.
>>
>> Well, according to many linguistic historians, many of the distinctive
>> features that differentiate American English from British English actually
>> date back to early modern English. In their immensely influential
>> book, *American
>> English: Dialects and
>> Variation<http://www.amazon.com/American-English-Dialects-Variation-Language/dp/0631204873>
>> *, Walt Wolfram and Natalie Shilling-Estes point out that, ?Contrary to
>> popular perceptions, the speech of the Jamestown colonists [i.e., the first
>> English settlers in America in 1607] more closely resembled today?s American
>> English than today?s standard British speech, since British English has
>> undergone a number of innovations which did not spread to once remote
>> America? (pg. 93).
>>
>> For instance, during Shakespeare?s time, the most socially prestigious
>> English speech had a rhotic accent. That is, speakers pronounced the letter
>> ?r? wherever it appeared in a word?like Americans do now. But contemporary
>> British Received Pronunciation is now non-rhotic. Is that a ?bastardization?
>> of the language?
>>
>> Similarly, many words and usage patterns that are now regarded as
>> peculiarly American have actually been preserved from early modern English.
>> A few examples will suffice: the American usage of the word ?mad? to mean
>> angry is faithful to how it was used in Shakespearean times. In contemporary
>> British English, however, the word now chiefly means insane, mentally
>> unhinged. That?s a British ?bastardization.?
>>
>> And ?fall,? the American English word for the season when leaves fall from
>> trees after the summer season, is more ?authentic? than the British English
>> ?autumn.? In southeastern England, the cultural pacesetter of England from
>> where the Jamestown colonists hailed, ?fall? was the preferred term.
>>
>> Many idiosyncratic syntactic structures in American English that
>> contemporary British English speakers deride are also derived from early
>> modern, Shakespearean English. For instance, such American past participles
>> as ?gotten? (as in: I have gotten my share of his troubles; British English:
>> got), ?proven? (as in: He has proven to be right; British English: proved),
>> etc are preserved from the ?original.? Similarly, in Shakespearean times
>> ?don?t? used to be the contraction of ?does not,? NOT ?do not.? This
>> practice stopped only in the early 20th century. This sense is preserved,
>> interestingly, in African-American vernacular speech (now fashionably called
>> Ebonics) and in informal southern U.S English generally. When I first heard
>> Michael Jackson sing, ?it don?t matter if you?re black or white? in high
>> school, it grated on my grammatical nerves, but that?s how people who spoke
>> early modern English would have said it.
>>
>> But the most important reason why American English is not a bastardization
>> of the ?authentic? English, ironically, is that only the American variety of
>> the English language is continuing with English?s germinal ?bastard?
>> heritage. In more ways than any other variety, it is pushing the semantic
>> and lexical frontiers of the language and enriching it in the process. Many
>> international borrowings into the English language now come by way of
>> American English, precisely because America is the world?s most racially and
>> culturally diverse country.
>>
>> Think about this: Can contemporary British speakers of the language?or any
>> other speakers of the language for that matter? imagine speaking their
>> language without these words: ?OK,? ?movie,? ?radio,? ?teenager,?
>> ?immigrant,? etc? Well, those words are distinctively American and were once
>> derided as ?horrible Americanisms? by supercilious Britishers.
>>
>> After all is said and done, linguistic nativism is a treacherous betrayal
>> of the intrinsic hybridity of the English tongue. No variety of the language
>> is authentic. All English is bastardize
>>
>> *Related Articles:*
>> *1. A Comparison of Nigerian, American and British
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2007/09/divided-by-common-language-comparing.html>
>> 2. <http://www.blogger.com/goog_2036618659>Why is "Sentiment" Such a Bad
>> Word in
>> Nigeria?<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2009/12/why-is-sentiment-such-bad-word-in.html>
>> 3. Ambassador Aminchi's Impossible Grammatical
>> Logic<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2009/12/yaraduas-health-amb-aminchis-impossible.html>
>> 4. 10 Most Annoying Nigerian Media English
>> Expressions<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2009/12/10-most-annoying-nigerian-media-english.html>
>> 5. Sambawa and "Peasant Attitude to
>> Governance"<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2009/12/sambawa-and-peasant-attitude-to.html>
>> 6. Adverbial and Adjectival Abuse in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2009/12/adverbial-and-adjectival-abuse-in.html>
>> 7. In Defense of "Flashing" and Other
>> Nigerianisms<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/01/in-defense-of-flashing-and-other.html>
>> 8. Weird Words We're Wedded to in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/01/weird-words-were-wedded-to-in-nigerian.html>
>> 9. American English or British
>> English?<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/01/american-english-or-british-english.html>
>> 10. Hypercorrection in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/02/hypercorrection-in-nigerian-english.html>
>> 11. Nigerianisms, Americanisms, Briticisms and Communication
>> Breakdown<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/02/nigerianisms-americanisms-briticisms.html>
>> 12. Top 10 Irritating Errors in American
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/03/top-10-irritating-errors-in-american.html>
>> 13. Nigerian Editors Killing Macebuh Twice with Bad
>> Grammar<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/03/nigerian-editors-killing-macebuh-twice.html>
>> 14. On "Metaphors" and "Puns" in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/04/on-metaphors-and-puns-in-nigerian-media.html>
>> 15. Common Errors of Pluralization in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/04/common-errors-of-pluralization-in.html>
>> <http://www.blogger.com/goog_704080340>16. Q & A About Common Grammatical
>> Problems<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/04/q-and-about-common-grammatical-problems.html>
>> <http://www.blogger.com/goog_704080340>17. Semantic Change and the
>> Politics of English
>> Pronunciation<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/04/semantic-change-and-politics-of-english.html>
>> *
>> *18.** Common Errors of Reported Speech in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/05/common-errors-of-reported-speech-in.html>
>> *
>> *19.** **Broken English, Pidgin English and Nigerian
>> English*<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/05/broken-english-pidgin-english-and.html>
>> *20.** **Top Cutest and Strangest Nigerian English
>> Idioms*<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/06/top-cutest-and-strangest-nigerian.html>
>> *21. Back-formation and Affixation in Nigerian
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/07/back-formation-and-affixation-in.html>
>> *
>> *22. The Politics of Usage and Meaning in
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/08/politics-of-meaning-and-usage-in.html>
>> *
>> *23. When Food and Grammar
>> Mix<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/08/when-food-and-grammar-mix.html>
>> *
>> *24. Q and A on
>> Grammar<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/09/q-and-on-grammar.html>
>> *
>> *25. The African Origins of Common English
>> Words<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/09/african-origins-of-common-english-words.html>
>> *
>> *26. Reader Feedback and My
>> Responses<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/09/reader-feedback-and-my-responses.html>
>> *
>> *27. Top 10 Oxymoronic Expressions in
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/10/top-10-oxymoronic-expressions-in.html>
>> *
>> 28. The Grammar of Titles and Naming in International
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/10/grammar-of-titles-and-naming-in.html>
>> 29. Q and A on Nigerian English
>> Usage<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/10/q-and-on-nigerian-english-usage.html>
>> 30. Comparing the Vernaculars of American and British
>> Universities<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/11/comparing-vernaculars-of-american-and.html>
>> 31. Ebonics and Neologisms in American
>> English<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2010/12/neologisms-and-ebonics-in-american.html>
>> 32. Patience Jonathan's Peculiar
>> Grammar<http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2011/03/patience-jonathans-peculiar-grammar.html>
>> 33. Top 10 Words Nigerians Commonly Misspell
>> <http://farooqkperogi.blogspot.com/2011/04/top-10-words-nigerians-commonly.html>
>>
>>
>> 1 Park Place South
>> Suite 817C
>> Atlanta, GA, USA.
>> 30303
>> Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
>> Blog: www.farooqkperogi.blogspot.com
>>
>> "The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either
>> proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
>>
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