[OT] English language [was:Re: OpenOffice.org - how to install additional languages?]
On Sun, Apr 03, 2011 at 03:08:55PM -0400, Doug wrote:
>
> This is grossly off topic, but since it's here, i _must_ answer:
>
> Thank God there is no "English Academy."
As a native English speaker I entirely agree, but I can understand the
frustrations of others who are effectively forced to use our language as
a lingua franca and cannot find a single, stable definition of it.
> In France, their Academy
> has the force and power
> of law. It is _illegal_ to name anything public in English. If you
> have a store and call it by an English
> name you will be forced to change it to something French. The only
> exception I have heard of
> is "Le Drugstore." I don't know how they get away with it.
What populist propaganda have you been reading? How do they say
"Disneyland" in French?
> If English, either British or American, had such an academy, we
> would still be speaking the
> language of Henry VIII! And we would never have had the opportunity
> to get rid of the French
> spelling of things like "centre."
... or "table" ? Come on! A nationalistic dictionary compiler (anti-
British rather than anti-French) caught the mood of the times and you all
lapped it up. I don't know if England had its own xenophobic equivalents,
but I think the English would be less likely to accept changes of spelling
decreed from above.
> The French may hate everything English, but those of us who speak
> any variety of English
> appreciate its variety, and we wouldn't have it any other way.
But is it _our_ language any more?
Cheers,
David
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