on Mon, 20 Oct 2003 01:40:19PM +0200, David Jardine insinuated:
On Mon, Oct 20, 2003 at 12:56:37AM -0700, Erik Steffl wrote:
csj wrote:
[...]
Because everybody from the poor war orphan "Hey, Joe, eat!" to
the UN Secretary General speaks it, English has become a rather
tolerant language. But if the same standard for proper German is
applied to what one considers proper English, then yes, German is
easier to learn. It's a purer, therefore more consistent
language, than the French-infected English.
purity has nothing to do with it (not sure what you mean by
pure).
good point -- languages by definition evolve, and the notion of a
"pure" language is utterly ridiculous and meaningless.
not sure what your agenda is. english is a a lot simpler than
german,
in what sense? to learn? to master? to write basic sentences in?
to write novels in? to read novels in?
the usage of words is simple, the grammar is simple.
Depends what you mean by purity. By European language standards
it's fairly pure in the sense of not being cluttered up with things
like redundant inflections, but this is probably because it is
impure in the sense of having been knocked around by neighbouring
languages and dialects until there's not much left of it apart from
what's really necessary to communicate.
you're kidding, right? if i read you right, you're stating that