Fogbow

Vowel shift-

keith wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 5:28 pm There are places in the U.S. of A. that pronounce and use words the way Shakespeare would have.

There is no such place in the British Isles.

Just sayin'

Yabbut rural Lithuania is apparently the best place to hear language that might be close to conjectured Proto-Indo-European!

much ado wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 5:07 pm

Grumpy Git wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 4:57 pm

noblepa wrote: ↑Tue Apr 04, 2023 12:37 pm As Henry Higgins put it, "The cold-blooded murder of the English tongue!".

It's not just Trump though, you colonials have been butchering our beautiful language for a few centuries now.

Hardhat on!

Yeah, but we have preserved the 'R's. What did the Brits do with them?

(Take that!)

As a choir director in the Midwest, that's not a point of pride.

I have to often spray the choir down with R-Be-Gone.

northland10 wrote: ↑Sat Apr 08, 2023 8:40 am

much ado wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 5:07 pm Yeah, but we have preserved the 'R's. What did the Brits do with them?
(Take that!)

As a choir director in the Midwest, that's not a point of pride.
I have to often spray the choir down with R-Be-Gone.

“An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”

- Gandhi

One minute after the Masters is suspended for rain, he’s banging out an election conspiracy/persecution post.

Trump with a devout, uplifting and inspiring Easter message for the faithful.

President of caps lock

He seems triggered. Perhaps he should read Junior's "book."

President Capslock and his uplifting message on this day that is Holy to most Christians. Did he attend mass? Didn't think so.

Attend Mass? No. He keeps it with him at all times.

He thinks everyone else should be attending him.

bill_g wrote: ↑Sun Apr 09, 2023 1:41 pm Attend Mass? No. He keeps it with him at all times.

Mass, not energy.

Donald spent the day playing Minecraft... but then Biden noticed something odd...

https://bird.makeup/users/ronfilipkowsk ... 4639084544

Ron Filipkowski
@ronfilipkowski@bird.makeup
Another Easter Sunday at Bethesda-by-the-Sea Palm Beach without their most famous member, who is holed up in his Xanadu with 6 Big Macs banging out World War III posts.

Grumpy Git wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 4:57 pm

noblepa wrote: ↑Tue Apr 04, 2023 12:37 pm As Henry Higgins put it, "The cold-blooded murder of the English tongue!".

It's not just Trump though, you colonials have been butchering our beautiful language for a few centuries now.

Hardhat on!

When I was but a schoolboy in London I once told a girl that I just loved her "English Accent". She snapped back, pretty hard, "It was our bloody language to begin with, you're the one with the cute accent."

Maths

('nuff said)

I say "Maths". I also picked up the habit of saying "I live in Baltimore Street" as opposed to "I live on Baltimore Street".

Two pet peeves......

Removal of required directionality in a sentence....

I write you, you wrote me, we wrote them..... NO!!!!!!!!

The sentence is a contraction of a full sentence such as " I wrote a letter TO you". You wouldn't say "I wrote a letter you", would you?

Saying "I wrote you" means you have written "YOU"...

Second, random failure to pronounce a required letter......this is American English, not French....... the word HERB is pronounced with a "H", not "erb", "herb".

It's not difficult, if you have an acquaintance called Herb, you say "Hey..... Herb", not " Hey..... Erb"..... The pronunciation is identical as it is for "horrible" not "orrible", "hard" not "ard", "homely" not "omely" etc.

In French the "H" may be silent because there is a partial glottal stop used instead of a hard H so the pronunciation sounds akin to "!airb"

Mr brolin wrote: ↑Mon Apr 10, 2023 9:11 am Removal of required directionality in a sentence....

I write you, you wrote me, we wrote them..... NO!!!!!!!!

The sentence is a contraction of a full sentence such as " I wrote a letter TO you". You wouldn't say "I wrote a letter you", would you?

Saying "I wrote you" means you have written "YOU"...

Double object verbs are an oddity! In BrE, as you say, there's usually two almost equivalent versions of the construction, one with one with a direct object and an indirect object, the alternative with two direct objects (ok, argue amongst yourselves whether they're technically direct, I don't care) which are inverted:
Fogfolk sent best wishes to poorly Foggy. → Fogfolk sent poorly Foggy best wishes.
AmE is similar but sometimes follows slightly different patterns, as in your example.

Why? My guess is that it is (as with many points of AmE grammar) immigrants imported the patterns of their first languages into their new English. The Scandinavian languages all have similar double object constructions, which can follow the same pattern, Norwegian:
Tåkefolket sendte beste ønsker til syke Tåkete. → Tåkefolket sendte syke Tåkete beste ønsker.
Whether this inversion is acceptable or not to a speaker depends on the language and the local dialect, as well as the verb and the nature of the objects. Dative objects (giving "to" somebody) are generally more acceptable for inversion.

Somebody tested the acceptability of inversion with preposition-dropping in Norwegian for verbs of creation (which probably includes "write"):
Han bakte gjesten en kake.
meaning
He baked the guest a cake.
and found that this inverted form is highly acceptable in northern Norway, but much less so in southern Norway.

Mainland Scandinavian languages don't accept dropping the preposition without the inversion. So Danish, Norwegian and Swedish would not accept:
*We gave the book the reader.
any more than AmE or BrE would (in the meaning of "we gave the book to the reader"). The island languages (Faroese, Icelandic), which I know little of, have more grammar (boo!), and more varied rules. Of course, their influence in America will be less because there have been fewer immigrants from those areas. Icelandic doesn't allow the form (I won't try to translate to Icelandic):
*We gave the book to the reader.
No, it's just:
We gave the book the reader.

So the rules and their applicability (both generally and for specific verbs and classes of object) vary by language and dialect.

So AmE acquired subtle adjustments to some grammatical rules and usages to which those rules apply. AmE has had very prescriptive authors of dictionaries and teaching (y'know, Webster, Strunk and White, etc.) so some AmE speakers have an exaggerated idea of "correct", which is less pronounced in BrE: Fowler's Modern English Usage (probably the closest equivalent to Strunk and White, but I am happy to be corrected) is more descriptive than prescriptive or proscriptive.

Some AmE has probably shifted almost unnoticed into BrE: older BrE dialects were not keen on sentential adverbs, as in
Hopefully Foggy's shoulder will be better soon.
Sadly I can't come to the dance.
but these probably came from speakers of German, which is happy with the pattern, so they used the pattern in English and it spread, because it's easy, useful and unambiguous.

I have pronounced "herbs" as "erbs" my whole life.

As to immigrants to the USA using forms from their native languages in their English, since moving to Texas over 30 years ago I have been regularly addressed by Hispanic people as "Mr. My First Name". This is just the Spanish form such as in "Don Juan" directly translated. They almost never address me as "Mr. Volkonski" in situations where a non-Hispanic person would.

I have noticed over the years that some non-Hispanic people here have begun to use this form perhaps because they hear it so often while growing up.

Volkonski wrote: ↑Mon Apr 10, 2023 12:10 pm I have pronounced "herbs" as "erbs" my whole life.

As to immigrants to the USA using forms from their native languages in their English, since moving to Texas over 30 years ago I have been regularly addressed by Hispanic people as "Mr. My First Name". This is just the Spanish form such as in "Don Juan" directly translated. They almost never address me as "Mr. Volkonski" in situations where a non-Hispanic person would.

I have noticed over the years that some non-Hispanic people here have begun to use this form perhaps because they hear it so often while growing up.

I too have always pronounced herbs as erbs, silent H. Unless speaking of a proper name for someone Herb(ert). Also too I get addressed by immigrants as Mr. _first name_ sometimes. Makes me feel uncomfortable a bit. I am not a slave owner. LOL