English for the Intrepid

[Shanazel]

Recently several of us were discussing the oddities of English. Thought the exasperated and merely warped amongst us would enjoy the following:
We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes;but the plural of ox became oxen not oxes.One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,yet the plural of moose should never be meese.You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice;yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.If the plural of man is always called men,why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?If I spoke of my foot and show you my feet,and I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?Then one may be that, and three would be those,yet hat in the plural would never be hose, and the plural of cat is cats, not cose.We speak of a brother and also of brethren,but though we say mother, we never say methren.Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,but imagine the feminine, she, shis and shim.Let's face it, English is a crazy language.There is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.English muffins weren't invented in England.We take English for granted.But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly,boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea, nor is it a pig.And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing,grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends, but not one amend?If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?Sometimes, I think all the folks who grew up speaking English should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?Ship by truck and send cargo by ship?Have noses that run and feet that smell?How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down;in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which an alarm goes off by going on. ~Author Unknown~ (but obviously spoke English)

 

[janaki]

Nice post

Hi Shanazel,

Very funny but true. My two boys ask about these things all the time. I actually asked my boys to read this posts and they are still rolling around laughing. They are going to print this and take it school I believe!! LOL It really makes people like me feel sooooo much better (english is not my first language). LOL. Nice post!!!!!

 

[Nat242]

That is without a doubt the funniest thing I have ever read. I'm in tears. Thank you so much for sharing! I can't wait to send this to other verbally insane people :clap::clap::clap:

 

[lizaj]

Great stuff.
Reminds me of the visiting German student we had staying with us and on a visit to the English Lakes.
"We don't have many sheeps in the part of Germany where I live"
"Er no it's sheep...
"Oh what is one sheep called then?"..
"Er a sheep"
"Oh why is that?"
S-I-L-E-N-C-E and much shrugging of shoulders...
Wonderful isn't it? What can you say?

 

[janaki]

Great stuff.
Reminds me of the visiting German student we had staying with us and on a visit to the English Lakes.
"We don't have many sheeps in the part of Germany where I live"
"Er no it's sheep...
"Oh what is one sheep called then?"..
"Er a sheep"
"Oh why is that?"
S-I-L-E-N-C-E and much shrugging of shoulders...
Wonderful isn't it? What can you say?

Hi Lizaj, that is funny!!!b

 

[Shanazel]

I used to teach English as a Second Language for Literacy Volunteers. The woman who did new teacher orientation said that whenever anyone asked "WHY???" we should just shrug our shoulders, smile slightly, and say, "Because it's English."

 

[Moon]

Shanazel that was wonderful!!! :lol::lol::lol:

I read a similar kind of poem in Dutch, many years ago. It discussed the weirdness of Dutch irregular verbs.

But I still think the plurals and stuff are not the worst thing about English. It's your pronounciation that seems at certain times to be totally unrelated to the way it's written. Why on earth doesn't "sew" rhyme with "few"? :wall:
As I spend significantly more time reading and writing in English than listening and speaking English, I might just as well give up on trying to pronounce things right

 

[Shanazel]

About twenty-five years ago, I learned to read enough Welsh to translate some old stories I was curious about. I never had a clue how anything was pronounced. Interesting language, but not as weird as Irish Gaelic. I got a language CD one time just to get a feel for the rhythms of the language (back to my roots and all that) and decided I did not have enough years left in my life to develop the muscles needed to speak Irish Gaelic.

I sang in choirs for many, many years. Here a while back, my husband and I were adding up all the languages we'd sung in: English, Latin, Italian, Spanish. Hebrew, German, Yiddish, all the weird low German and bastardized Latin that comes in Carmina Burana, Hawaiian, Portugese, and one attempt at Scots Gaelic that was probably not recognizable as anything remotely resembling Gaelic. Never French, oddly enough, unless you count a few folk songs like Clair du Lune or Dorma me blonde (misspelled, I know). No Scandanavian languages that I can think of. No Asian languages. BUT! When I finally after years of waiting got to sing Beethoven's Ninth with chorale, the stupid choir director decided he wanted us to sing in English! Quelle dumkoff es senhor, hmm? He was a bass and didn't have to try and sing a consonant on a B sharp. I never forgave him. Haven't to this day.

Well, Shanazel goes off topic again. Zing! Straight into the ether.

 

[adiemus]

Shanazel makes my day!!
I tried to learn esperanto once, failed abysmally. It's supposed to be easy.
Sign language now, that might be easier?!

 

[Moon]

One of the most cool languages to learn would be, IMO (not thinking about useful languages like Spanish or Arabic) Inuktitut or Kalaallisut. The way they write everything together really makes me want to know what it means :lol:
I actually found some very basic Inuktitut lessons online, but I have trouble pronouncing the q.

Shanazel, do you still know a lot of Welsh? I thought it was interesting they don't really have a word for "no". (and that's as far as my knowledge about Welsh goes )

 

[Shanazel]

No, I don't. I studied it briefly in the early 1980s and never had occasion to use it except during that particular period of writing. I can recognize words occasionally, but that is all. Alas.

 

[Sara]

Ooh, I can tell you bout welsh! Not an expert but I live in Wales, and my welsh friends could tell you loads!

You can use Dim for an offical no, and 'nah' as a sort of, 'no go away cause I dunt wanna dance with you' kind of no.

 

[Shanazel]

More English for the intrepid:


You Think English is Easy???

Can you read these right the first time?

1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm used to producegood produce.
3) The dump was so full it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert
7) Since there's no time like the present he thought it time to present the present .
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bassdrum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row .
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewerfell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
19) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
20) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

 

[Shanazel]

And more (too many characters for the previous post to handle!)

Let's face it. English is a crazy language.
· There's no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; no apple or pine in pineapple.
· English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France.
· Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
· We find quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square, a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.
· One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese?
· If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.
· In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?
· Ship by truck and send cargo by ship?
· Have noses that run and feet that smell?
· How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?
· You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which, an alarm goes off by going on.
· English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all. That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.

P.S. Why doesn't Buick rhyme with quick?





You lovers of the English language might enjoy this. There's a 2-letter word having more meanings than any other 2-letter word, and that's "UP."
It's easy to understandUP , meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP ? At a meeting, why does a topic come UP ? Why do we speak UPand why are the officers UPfor election and why is it UP to the secretaryto write UPa report ?
We call UPour friends. And we use it to brighten UPa room, polish UPthe silver, we warm UP the leftovers and clean UPthe kitchen. We lock UPthe house and some guys fix UPthe old car . At times the little word has real special meaning. People stir UPtrouble, line UPfor tickets, work UPan appetite, and thinkUP excuses. To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special.
And thisUP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP. We open UP a store in the morning but we close UP at night.
We seem to be pretty mixed UP aboutUP.To be knowledgeable about the proper uses ofUP , look the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4th of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions. If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many waysUP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may windUP with a hundred or more. When it threatens to rain, we say it is cloudingUP . When the sun comes out we say it is clearingUP .
When it rains, it wets the earth and often messes things UP .
When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP .
One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP , for now my time isUP , so... time to shutUP!

 

[Mosaic]

:lol: Loved the "oddities of English" My husbands Mother tongue is Cantonese and being Malaysian he also speaks Bahasa Malay and learnt English mainly at school. Consequently when we lived in Indonesia he picked up Bahasa Indonesia very, very easily, me the useless one at languages took forever ... Anyway hubby use to come up with the various oddities of English, which are rather confusing to the non native speakers and it gave me food for thought many a time. I use to get a good laugh at how he pronounced some words.

 

[karena]

More English for the intrepid:


You Think English is Easy???

Can you read these right the first time?

1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm used to producegood produce.
3) The dump was so full it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert
7) Since there's no time like the present he thought it time to present the present .
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bassdrum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row .
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewerfell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
19) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
20) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

Don't you find it amazing though just how many of them you can read straight off. I suppose it illustrates that you don't read every word of a sentence and second guess what will come up.

That up one reminds me of French and German prepositions though. The little words are so tricky. I think I use auf in German most of the time and a in French, as struggle to figure out which one. :lol:

 

[Moon]

Karena, I have the same when speaking English. When to use at, on, in . It's getting less and less though.

 

[Reen.Blom]

Hi Shanazel,

Very funny but true. My two boys ask about these things all the time. I actually asked my boys to read this posts and they are still rolling around laughing. They are going to print this and take it school I believe!! LOL It really makes people like me feel sooooo much better (english is not my first language). LOL. Nice post!!!!!

Hey Janaki What is yer 1st language? Just wondering, I would never believe it is not!!!

 

[Babylonia]

Shanazel makes my day!!
I tried to learn esperanto once, failed abysmally. It's supposed to be easy.
Sign language now, that might be easier?!

Sign language is great. My 5yo learned signs from watching tv and started using them with us. So my hubby and I took a sign language class. It's not hard and it is fun. The only real drawback is that there is no universal sign language so signing is different from country to to country and even regionally the words might be different. It's great to use if you need to talk across a noisy room.

 

[Moon]

My sisters and I sometimes used the sign language alphabet (we don't know real sign language) to talk about family members at boring birthdays :redface:.