O.T. : What Have We Done ... ?

[Arfa Daily]

LOL ! Cracker !

Arfa

[Stephen Howard]

Made me chuckle...

Regards,

[John Rumm]

a passe comment...

My reference was to the fact that the French attempt rigorously control their language, and resist attempts to extend it or allow it to evolve. Hence why they have to borrow English phrases to describe anything technical etc. Le email etc.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember geoff saying something like:

I think he's been sucking on it - again.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember PeterC saying something like:

And could screw you over.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember geoff saying something like:

Lady with large French chest, seeks polisher.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Dave saying something like:

Roonaboot Inverness, they used to talk dead clear, like. Gawd nose what it's like now, with the influx of southerners.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "Doctor Drivel" saying something like:

Will you sit down and be quiet, Drivel! Listen to your elders and betters and you might learn something.

[Alang]

I hope he doesn't. My mother was raised on Tyneside and spoke very clearly and distinctly in a local accent. Never lost it and was understood anywhere she went except by cockneys.

Now if you had said cockney and glaswegian...

And why do some people not pronounce the 'H' in herb and hotel? Apart from those raised in France.

[Alang]

Northern usage is correct. The habit of southerners in using a long 'A' so it sounds like Robert Newton doing Long John Silver is wrong.

[Bob Mannix]

For the first because they are merkins, for the second because it's "correct" not to pronounce it, which is why it's "an hotel" not "a hotel". Mind you it's a long time since I heard the "correct" pronunciation of Coventry as "Cuventry" on the tv.

A note at work yesterday refers to "fora" as the plural of forum. References are fairly united that, although "fora" is the plural of the Latin word, the accepted plural is "forums" with "fora" as an alternative. Which is "correct" today?

"Correct" English is, do the dismay of the ultra-conservative-with-a-small-c-(and-probably-a-big-C-as-well), a moving target. There would be few, if any, now, who would regard "Coventry" as the incorrect pronunciation, or, indeed, an aspirated "hotel" as incorrect or who would not find the use of "Cuventry", "'otel", "fora" etc not correct but merely perverse.

Regioanl accents and vocabulary OTOH are one of the things that make the nation interesting. Vive la difference! (as the continentals might say... or is it "le"?).

[tony sayer]

And that one on Channel 4 from somewhere north of Watford..

Thank gawd that BBC radio Four has the delightful silken voiced Charlotte Green:)))....

[Doctor Drivel]

Maxie, you are typing from an institution. Is this a new form of Workhouse? Maxie you are not quite in the gutter......yet. Maxie, I would still give you a fiver and not want it back. Maxie, I hope the pies are good where you are. Maxie, I still think you are fantastic. Hang on in Maxie, hang on in. It will get better.

[Doctor Drivel]

them.

[Doctor Drivel]

All appalling. Those Northern Irish accents which are everywhere, are grating. Must be got rid of.

[Doctor Drivel]

Is Richard short of fiver too?

[Doctor Drivel]

Maxie, this low-life would never lend you a fiver! I would give you the fiver.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

If you adopt a word into a language then generally the rules of that language apply. Hence 'le weekend' etc. Those who wish to use the Latin plural are simply trying to prove how clever they are. The exception might be where the original word that is adopted is already a plural.

[Doctor Drivel]

Such a sycophant. Fascinating.

[Tim Lamb]

To borrow a phrase, in Glasgow you may have to get them to spit it on the wall, wait for it to dry and then read.

regards