The Free and Happy Use of Words

[Elmira]

This very interesting video has inspired me to write a thread about language: the ins and outs of every day language, its peculiarities and its intricacies, as it applies to you, the reader. So, what form does your language take? Is it conditional, regional, a dialect common to the area where you were raised? Was syntax, rhyme, elocution reinforced to you as a child by over bearing Mothers and haughty school teachers to such an extreme that today you can't help yourself: you make the sound of a pompous ass whenever you open your mouth to speak and you can't help yourself: you've got to correct others' grammatical errors all the time, however slight they may be. Or was your language more developed over the years, did it have room to breathe and become unique to you, more expressive, more a signature of who you are, in the way that an artist's brushstroke is signature to his painting?

Have you reached a happy medium with your language, or does it shift according to X, Y, and Z? (I think it does for most everyone.) Can you say that, generally speaking, you speak in public using the same model of language as you use when sitting down to write a letter? Do you speak at home, as you speak in school, as you do when in the company of your close friends and acquaintances? Do you dumb down your language when around your friends? And why is that?

Are you fluent in more than one language? If yes, do you believe that affects the way you use your words?

Does language entice, or incite you? Do you enjoy language the same way as you enjoy dance, music, or film? Do you ever, "yoke impossible words together for the sound-sex of it?"


Not every single one of these questions need to be answered. I think answering any one of them would be a good starting off point for a healthy discourse on the subject. You may pick and choose, throw questions my way, or present a question of your own.

 

[Da_Funk]

Fucking artsy people man.


On a serious note, language is a means of communicating for me, nothing more. When around friends I don't dumb my speach down, but my vocabulary does change, this is a function of the setting we are in though. Mainly when with friends I will be getting drunk and chasing women instead of discussing/doing science. When writing a letter I tend to be much more articulate because I can read over what I wrote and make it sound better.

I want to at least learn Spanish.


What is it that you find so enticing about language?

 

[Duke]

Very interesting topic!

I'm a language man. I don't do well in math or physics. I'm not an exact science person.

Since your thread asks a lot of questions, I'll just give a proper reply to every one of them:


So, what form does your language take?

Whatever I want to.

Is it conditional, regional, a dialect common to the area where you were raised?

No. All of those factors influenced my speech in a way, but not in an usurping manner.

Was syntax, rhyme, elocution reinforced to you as a child by over bearing Mothers and haughty school teachers to such an extreme that today you can't help yourself

Not by my parents since I was good with words from the beginning. I do remember one elementary school teacher, a tall man, thing as a washboard, who insisted than we should pronounce "a hundred" with a ridiculous emphasis on the D's. Fuck, I was like 9 or 10 at the time and I already knew this guy was dead wrong.

you make the sound of a pompous ass whenever you open your mouth to speak and you can't help yourself:

Not really, I think. Though my use of "big", eloquent words does attract attention at times, either from my crowd or other people, but never in a bad way.

you've got to correct others' grammatical errors all the time, however slight they may be

This, I am guilty of.

Or was your language more developed over the years, did it have room to breathe and become unique to you, more expressive, more a signature of who you are, in the way that an artist's brushstroke is signature to his painting?

Definitely. Though I don't understand what the "or" at the beginning of your question has to do with anything. The developed language statement is not in any way mutually exclusive to anything you said prior to that, is it?


Have you reached a happy medium with your language, or does it shift according to X, Y, and Z? (I think it does for most everyone.)

I like to think it continues to shift in the broader direction as I'm always learning new words, ways of saying things, acquiring new accents, etc.

Can you say that, generally speaking, you speak in public using the same model of language as you use when sitting down to write a letter? Obviously depends a bit on who the letter is adressed to, but yes I suppose it'd be the same in general.


Do you speak at home, as you speak in school, as you do when in the company of your close friends and acquaintances?

No. Amongst friends, professional contacts (school, work) and family my language is different.

Do you dumb down your language when around your friends?

No, because most if not all of my real friends arent dumb. I also have a knack for explaining something difficult in easy terms, so I might use that regardless of who I'm speaking to.

Are you fluent in more than one language? If yes, do you believe that affects the way you use your words? Fluent in English, pretty good at German. I don't know my knowledge of English and German would influence my words other than the usual.


Does language entice, or incite you? Do you enjoy language the same way as you enjoy dance, music, or film? Do you ever, "yoke impossible words together for the sound-sex of it?" I'm not that much of a lingophile, but it can excite me. With equal-minded friends i can sometimes trail off on a half hour talk on some obscure word or whatever.


I pick languages up easily. I can see the contexts, the patterns, the sequences as some people can clearly see math equations. I have a knack for accents. I can do Scottish English, a whole variety of English-English and American-English, Australian-English, half decent at Irish-English (though its not much more than a half-assed typical Cork accent, though my Northern Ireland accent is getting better), English accent of most of the European languages. I have a whole range of Dutch accents I can use.

I speak Dutch, English fluently. 80% on German, 60% on Frisian and French. A few words of Spanish. I can read French quite well, Spanish and Italian are manageable in script (theyre Roman languages after all). I can read a tidbit of actual Greek and i can read the Greek alphabet no problem and get quite far in Cyrillic.

 

[Duke]

On a serious note, language is a means of communicating for me, nothing more.

I can tell. You wrote "speech" with ae.

 

[Elmira]

On a serious note, language is a means of communicating for me, nothing more.

That's like saying I have eyes to see, ears to hear with, and a nose to smell things with. Ok... Well, what do you see? What do you hear? What do you smell? And apply that to the language question. We use language to communicate, yes, that is the basic concept.

 

[S O F I]

I have no interest in answering your questions at this point as I'm drunk and only care about sharing my opinion on the first thing that popped into my mind.

When it comes to language, I'm a subconscious chameleon. I adapt, most of the time unknowingly, to the degree and form of communication that the other person is in. If I'm around my high school friends, I have a more urban vernacular. When I'm in school, it's more academic. When I'm talking to a person who doesn't speak English very well, I speak in "immigrant" mode by using a thick Slavic-type accent and sticking to most common nouns, verbs, and adjectives to describe situations and opinions in the most simple way possible, avoiding all rules of language. I do that without taking a second to think about why I'm doing it at that particular time, if it makes sense. Simply put, I cannot be in "academic" mode if I am talking to a person who has a foreign accent. I've given it some thought and I came to the conclusion, which is quite obvious, that I do that because it makes the people who I'm talking to, or at least I think so, more comfortable and easy to bond with me. Although I like debate and controversy, I'm still at the core a very non-confrontational person with people I don't know well. It's a disadvantage in some ways because people might notice and think I'm "dumbing down" for them and feel insulted because of it. But, the more cynical and asshole people, especially the immigrants, will try to compare their accent to mine and try to think that I'm not any better than them at speaking the English language, when I totally fucking am 90% of the time for the amount of time I've lived in the States.

Oh yeah, since it's kinda on the topic. I came to the States in late May so I was enrolled in 6th grade (5th grade is elementary school, 6th grade is middle school here) starting in September. As the result, they didn't know I needed ESL so I didn't have it. I managed just fine in English class without arousing suspicion of never learning English before, aside from some summer communication discussing brand-new Pokemon cards with Americans, but I told one of my counselors once that I didn't take ESL and so they suggested I sign up. I ended up taking the class for half a semester before realizing it was a waste of time and switching back to the normal English class all the others kids took. My English was more impressive in the first 3 years because I was at this "accent level" some 7 years ago. It's not that cool anymore when I've been here 10+ years. But I do still get some compliments on how well I speak from time to time. Most people assume I'm from Jersey and don't realize I'm foreign.

 

[masta247]

Yeah, I'm very good at Polish

I also tend to adapt but only to some extent. I might use a cuss word when I'm with my closest friends which is something I don't do on other occasions. I also modify my language depending on who I'm speaking with. Sometimes I dumb it down a bit.

I always hated learning grammar the way they usually teach at school - you know, all that "grammar in theory". Probably that's why I often confuse tenses in English as they work in a totally different way than in Polish. I don't really know Polish grammar in theory but in practice I never make mistakes. I always had "A"s from essays and I speak very fluent at all occasions. I speak clear, plain Polish. No regional dialects or other fixations. Or maybe it's a "Warsaw dialect" but that's what's considered to be "the plain Polish language" here that you see in the media etc.

However if it comes to English then I write much more often than I speak (partially thanks to Streethop). In real life I don't really have many opportunities to actually speak. So whenever I have to speak English it takes much more effort to speak fluently and use correct words; that's when I also focus on "trying not to make a stupid mistake, using a wrong word etc.".
It's because whenever I write I have more time to think about what I want to express. I still write whatever is on my mind at a similar pace but I always have that comfort of being able to correct something.
My English accent probably isn't exactly all great but I don't speak like a soviet too.

I also speak basic German and Japanese. I dislike German though. I'm still learning Japanese. Oh, I also used to know Latin, I still remember it to some extent but that doesn't really count as nobody speaks Latin.
There were a few languages I used to learn in the past but I barely remember anything. I guess I could communicate only in Polish, English and to a much lesser extent in German and Japanese (but enough to understand what's going on in Hentai vids )

Other than that I don't recall ever thinking about language that way.

If it comes to "over bearing mothers" then my mom used to spend a lot of time trying to force me to write properly and not make orthographic mistakes when I was a kid. I'm dyslexic.
edit: And thus I hated English words containing many consecutive letters and the letter "h" in words that derive from Latin or Greek because we spell them differently. Same with "ae" or "ea".

 

[Da_Funk]

I can tell. You wrote "speech" with ae.

Like I said...

That's like saying I have eyes to see, ears to hear with, and a nose to smell things with. Ok... Well, what do you see? What do you hear? What do you smell? And apply that to the language question. We use language to communicate, yes, that is the basic concept.

I guess what I was trying to say is that words, actually scratch that, plays on words do nothing for me.

 

[Shadows]

I never dumb down my langauge besides the internet. I tend to see the internet as a place to have fun, and when I create serious threads, I still don't truly emphasis on my words because I feel the person is there for the reason to escape their own reality for a bit.

When I'm with my TRUE friends, I don't EVER dumb down my langauge... when I'm with the other 80% of my facebook friends, I probably would. hahaha
When I'm @ work, I talk to the person as they talk. If they use words that are in top tier, I join in because I feel they set the bar to a specific height. When I see someone who has a small vocabulary, I don't dumb down my language. For all i know, that person is smarter than me in other ways. I don't understand other lanagues very well, but if I am able to communicate a little bit, and if I can get by, why dumb down my language? If the person requests it, then I will gladly use small words.

Even during sex, I won't dumb down my language because the girls I tend to fuck at least have a good mind... but my vocabulary changes a bit.

As for language inticing me....I love language when it comes to poetry or old sayings. I guess, i like that you can get a simple sentence, and turn it around using similar words. I.e "When you take things for granted, the things you are granted get taken."

"It's better to lose your pride, over something you love, then lose something you love, over your pride."

I can keep going, but my last one was a point that it's important in hip-hop too.


@Masta, whoa! Never knew you were dyslexic.

 

[Duke]

When I'm talking to a person who doesn't speak English very well, I speak in "immigrant" mode by using a thick Slavic-type accent and sticking to most common nouns, verbs, and adjectives to describe situations and opinions in the most simple way possible, avoiding all rules of language.

I have the same problem more or less. When I speak English to someone that doesn't speak English that well, I just can't be arsed subconsciously to put a proper accent in. Normally I'd speak RP English but if the recipient isn't getting all of it I just revert back to a Dutchish accent and use simpler words.

There's no point in sounding like a BBC newsreader when it's a wasted effort.