23 Comments

"Let me know if there are any US dialects you find particularly difficult to understand..."

The "English" spoken in New York City, particularly Brooklyn, is hard for someone not of the area to understand. Sometimes especially reading it in print.

Expand full comment

You talkin’ to ME?! Fuggedaboutit

Expand full comment

And now Latin is being increasingly taught in schools in lieu of other languages first. For instance, my kids are learning it in elementary school and won't be exposed to other languages like Spanish anti middle school. This is the case for other children of friends I have in other arts of the country. It's even a plot point in one of the "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" series! It's back!

Expand full comment
author

Wow, I didn't know that was happening! I was presented the opportunity to learn a foreign language when I was 10, heading into sixth grade. I picked French over Latin or Spanish, and it was really easy to rule out Latin for being a "dead" language.

Expand full comment

Now, I'm from Denmark, I live in Germany, I have studied in English, but I certainly speak a good Spanish and a reasonable French. The English language has it simple grammar from the Danes (King Sven etc.). The Danish language, which is an utterly simple one indeed, almost (but not quite) as simple as Afrikaans, is the skeleton on which the English language rests. Since England was conquered by the Normans from France (Danish vikings who had learned to speak French) a lot of Latin words were introduced into English. However, the Englishmen never adopted the complicated grammar of French and Latin. They only absorbed the words. So the modern English language is a language that consists of 20% Danish words (Eye, Hand, Finger, Ear, Door, Window, House, Horse, Sheep, Swine, Water, Milk, Earth, etc.) and a mostly consequently simplified Danish grammar, and 80% Latin words (xospital, mutton, consequence, mobilise, interest, confound, sublime, sanguinity etc.). This makes the English language unique in the world. A Latin language with a simple grammer. Who would ever have though of that? Well, two persons actually did think of that in the 1950s: Gode and Blair, who invented the international language "Interlingua" which was intended to be a simplified version of "pure Latin". To be honest: Interlingua is a very nice language. It is immediately understandable by anyone who speaks Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian, Latin... or perhaps English - if that English speaker has had some further education. Now the question is: Is the new Latin (Interlingua) better than the new Laten (English). A very interesting question. I suggest you dive further into this question.

In my personal opinion English is just as good as Interlingua and certainly better than Latin.

The best international language is without doubt Esperanto. Esperanto can be learned by intellectual persons in less than one month and by normal persons in less than one year. In this time you will be able to speak it fluently. It is based on 65% French and 35% German (and some Slavic too).

Anyway, what I wanted to say is, English is actually a very good way of learning Latin. And it is difficult to find another language that would be more effective as an international language.

Expand full comment
author

I just spent a year and a half learning Latin, and I made a lot of observations while I was learning. One notable thing is that I felt like I could start to unlock Romance languages now, whereas before the experience listening to Portuguese in Brazil and listening to Italian in Italy were just a wash. Now, when I listen to either language, I can pick out at least some of the context. I've also been learning Portuguese, but quite apart from that, I can slowly start to make sense of Spanish, too.

I'll check out Interlingua! And, I'll throw out three other potential topics for our consideration: Hangul, Klingon, and American Sign Language.

Expand full comment

Spanish also has a lot of Arabic influence! But yes, all the romantic languages have many similarities. As a Spanish speaker, I can understand a good amount of Portuguese and Italian. (For some reason, French is harder for me.)

I was (wrongly) taught that English is a romantic language as well, but when you compare the actual romantic languages, the similarity is undeniable.

Expand full comment
author

I love the Arabic influence on what became Spanish. So cool to think about the multicultural meshing there - any time 3 or more continents get together and create a new culture, it's endlessly fascinating to me.

Expand full comment

If I had to do it again, I would consider linguistics as a profession. I chose to do computer languages (compilers) instead :-)

Expand full comment
author

Still a language!

Expand full comment

Why don't you tell us the real truth about the Tower of Babel and are instead inventing nonsensical "historical referenes" to explain the different languages. I thought you were a man of facts, Andrew.

Expand full comment
author

Valid point. I should have pointed out how King Babel built all those little hobbit holes for everyone to live in. He was such a cool king!

Expand full comment

What a bunch of babble.

Expand full comment

The Tower of Babel grew so high based on a unified language and culture that it threatened gods dominion so he (she?) squashed it splintering it into silos of language and culture that could no longer reach for the sky

Expand full comment
author

"Where I'm from, we don't reach for the sky. We raise the roof!"

Expand full comment

the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire!

Expand full comment

HAHAHA! Bloodhound Gang-- never expected that! :-)

Expand full comment

We don't need no water let the $/);* BURN!

Expand full comment

The rare instance where the edited version might actually be better than the original. (Plus the video's just fun.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Adgx9wt63NY

Expand full comment
author

All I can hear is this spinoff from the original saying:

https://youtu.be/lcCYU3EFYJE

Expand full comment

My name is Jimmy Pop, and I'm a dumb white guy. Do it like Wild Kingdom. :-)

Expand full comment

lol had to look up the rest of the lyrics

Expand full comment