Leave our language alone

It seems the Americans have decided to add a new word to the English language. The new word is, "web 2.0". That's not even a word:cnfs:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8092549.stm

 

Our beloved language is in a continual state of change, new words and phrases are being introduced all the time whilst old colourful favourites go out of fasion, ad captandum vulgus!

 

Language changes and evolves all the time Clueless otherwise we would still be speaking in thees and thous but I agree with you about Web2 being the millionth English word. I don't think it's a word and I've no idea what it means.

 

Although I love new words-and am having a great time coming to grips with " txt spk ", and the acronyms my kids use like "brb" and what not, I honestly can't see myself using "web 2.0". I'm uncertain as to what you would be doing that would require you to use it, other than as a search on google ( now there's a word taking on a different meaning).

 

The thing is "web 2.0" can't possibly be described as a word, whether you would use the term or not. "web" is a word, but doesn't need adding because we've had that forever. "2.0" is a number, in this context a pseudo version number.

I blitzed my garden completely last year, and started again from scratch this year. Does that mean I can make up a new word like "Garden 2.0"?

 

Yeah, I agree with lolli. "Google" now means to search the 'net. Doesn't have much to do with search engine you use!

 

Wonder if you can decline the verb google?

I google
You google
He/She/It googles
We google
You google
They google

Actually, is it a verb?

Clueless, maybe Web 2.0 should have been classified as a phrase? You wouldn't think the world was short of news for them to have to use this "event" as a news item, would you?

 

Being a mine of useless information.......

A Google is a 1 with 100 zeros after it. It was 'invented' by a group of school kids when asked to think of the biggest number they could. Then some bright spark 'invented' the Googleplex which is a 1 with a Google of zeros after it...... and so on, ad infinitum...

I don't understand why the Americans think they speak / write English and why there's English (US) and English (UK). Is there French (Canadian) and French (French) ?

 

The ancestors of those we now generally refer to as Americans (ie white, 'English' speaking folks in the United states, who often forget that America is a continent and not a country) were British settlers (among a few others). They rejected Britain and all things British, yet kept the English language and even called it English. It's a bit of a puzzle to me

 

What to they speak in Oz - do they call it English or Australian?

 

Well what ever the language is that the USA speaks is called guess its a good thing its not totally different that Britain's language or the world would be speaking that today. More people speak "English" in the world than any other language and I do believe that is because USA kept that language.
Yep, there is Canadian French and French French, and in different parts of Italy, north and south the language is different as in other countries, slight difference are noted in different areas.
My dad spoke 8 languages, most from the Eastern European countries, and he could tell what area of Poland someone was from by their language. My cousin, who lives in Ohio, visits France 3 weeks a year to keep his French up to snuff, when I suggestion a visit Canada he said "they don't speak correct French up there.
I think it would be fun to find some of the lost words and try using them again.
As I am on two British Forms, I love seeing words used or phrasing used that we don't here.

 

America was colonised by the British while Britain was still the dominant force in the world. Had the early settlers binned the language when they declared their independence, the USA would not have developed as successfully as it has, because English was already the established language of international trade.

To see it from a more objective angle, if we take Spanish as a language we can more clear see this type of thing in action. The Spanish also had a period of conquest, taking a good chunk of South America. There are people still living in South American countries today who were raised to speak the various indigenous languages, but learnt Spanish side by side with their indigenous language, because Spanish is more widely used. Interestingly, as an aside, there is an authority (can't remember their name) that has endeavoured to standardise the Spanish language, but they had to split it into two halves, one for Spanish spoken in Spain, and one for Latin American Spanish. They had to do this because over the centuries in South America, local indiginous languages have become so entangled into the local dialects of Spanish, so now there are certain Spanish phrases that mean two completely different things depending on whether you say them to a Spaniard or a South American.

 

Ok, I know we were colonised by the British. Way back when as they were venturing across the ocean. Lots of folks still thinking the earth was flat it was only a matter of which country convinced what dictator that the earth was round. Or some big sea serpent would swallow up the boat. Wether or not at that time, world wide (except for America) the British had been everywhere to have a "dominant force in the world" that seems unlikely since much of the earth was still not discovered at that time. What I am saying it was just a roll of the dice which language colonised America based on many factors. It just so happened to be England. Say if you look at the China, who certainly are much more inventive than most cultures, it could have been them, if they chose to explore.

 

Back to language again...deja vu:hehe:

http://www.gardenerscorner.co.uk/forum/showthread.php/speaking-english-europe-22027.html

As you see from this thread, I was proved to be wrong when I said English is the most commonly spoken language; instead Cantonese and Mandarin Chinese are the most widely spoken, as a first language. But I'd still say English is the most widely used, and therefore, a world language.