The syntax has morphed from Germanic languages, but with Norman vocabulary. Norman was a dialect of French from before the standardization of l'Académie Française.
The author is right to critique Cerquiglini. The French legacy is largely lexical. The syntax and the old, short words of English are Germanic. Its several influences drove the relatively large lexicon we have, and probably adapted English to be a globally adaptive language, borrowing words readily.
"English isn’t a dialect of French. The grammatical structure of English is almost entirely Germanic and no amount of sophistry can change that."
It might be seen as a dialect of German but with the heavy influence English had on the German language in the past decades it's more that German is like an English dialect now.
> The author knows this of course. His point is not to win the argument, but rather to give a new perspective on the traditional rivalry between the English and French languages.
> it was French that equipped English to become the language of international communication, _a state of affairs which should be celebrated as la francophonie’s greatest achievement_.
Imagine making this claim to a proud French language partisan. You'd have to rush them to the hospital.
One important thing not mentioned. English has no genders except in extremely rare cases. Other Indo-European languages are full of genders, like female tables, male autos, etc.
Trying to learn Spanish in high school, it was genders that confused me the most. Safe to say I just remember some words at this point.
Only half correct. English is roughly 50% French and 50% German.
The English dictionary is also about 50% larger than the French Dictionary. The length of the German dictionary is irrelevant because: Hottentotenstrottelmutterattentäterlattengitterwetterkotterbeutelratte
It is very frequent in English to use both the French word and the German word for the same thing in different situation.
> The English dictionary is also about 50% larger than the French Dictionary....
> It is very frequent in English to use both the French word and the German word for the same thing in different situation.
It's kind of like in genetics: if a gene gets duplicated, it creates the opportunity for one copy to evolve to do something else. Likewise with language: having two words for the same thing allows their meanings to diverge without loss to cover more shades of meaning.
> German dictionary is irrelevant because: Hottentotenstrottelmutterattentäterlattengitterwetterkotterbeutelratte
English has compound nouns too, you know: "Coffee table", "finance department", "wine cellar".
German dictionaries have very similar rules for including them as English dictionaries; they tend to include them when there's a common use that isn't immediately clear.
If it gets to the dictionary, English often has a corresponding word as well: "Handschuh" -> "glove", "Zahnarzt" -> "dentist", "Hausaufgabe" -> "homework", "Fussball" -> "football" (or soccer if you're American or Australian), "Sonnenbrille" -> "Sunglasses". Note that the last 3 have basically the same morphology as their corresponding English words.
As a native French speaker who reads a lot of English I can attest that the vocabulary thing is very real and quite annoying when you try to translate stuff.
There are many words that are just inexistant in French and a pain in the ass to translate conceptually even using multiple words (and/or composed).
Most Frenchs are incredulous about this because they somehow think their lang is the best thing around.
The fact is that, for a long time, British kings considered themselves kings of France as well - and even believed that France was the senior kingdom. The language they spoke reflected that attitude.
That said, as a Frenchman who has to speak English every day, I can assure you that English has long since become its own thing!
Recently, as my kid is learning to read and write Danish, while I've started to use English more and more, due to work. My observation is that English isn't that great a language, it's just very popular. The more English I speak, read and write, the more I appreciate my own native language.
It's really sad to see English language and words replace native ones, especially if your own language in many cases have better precision and quite frankly reads better. Recently I listened to a "Danish" podcast, about Charlie Kirk. I put Danish in " " because one of the hosts, a native Dane, struggles severely with expressing her thoughts and observation without the use of English.
English is easy to criticize. It doesn't have all the letters it needs. It doesn't have compound noun. A significant part of the vocabulary is just borrow from Norse, German or French (and pronounced wrong). It is however VERY popular, billions speak it, and that's a quality all on it's own.
There is no such thing as purity or correctness in language - those concepts are farcical. Every second of every day language evolves with the words and pronunciations of the people currently using it. If enough people spell or pronounce the "wrong" way, it becomes the "right" way.
French today is slightly different than it was yesterday, and the day before, and 50 years ago.
This seems to pay lip service* to Latin which was used in England for a thousand years before the Norman invasion and was still in use up to the 17th century. No, it wasn't used in the pub or the market, but it did influence the language strongly.
This is a linguist troll, by a French linguist. English is West and North Germanic, with Norman French, Latin, and Greek loans. In fact Latin loans are the same amount as French, 28% each.
None of the languages have their own static existence. Just like a river doesn't have a precise start location and end location, a language doesn't have a precise boundary in space and time. More so in time. Language can't be separated from culture, people and place. All of these - language, culture, people, and places change massively over time, to the extent of losing identity.
If English doesn't exist on its own, French doesn't either. Nor does Latin, Greek or Sanskrit. All of these are incremental variations or dialects of some other language.
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[ 4.5 ms ] story [ 55.9 ms ] threadIt might be seen as a dialect of German but with the heavy influence English had on the German language in the past decades it's more that German is like an English dialect now.
Englandbros - we ride at dawn.
Imagine making this claim to a proud French language partisan. You'd have to rush them to the hospital.
Trying to learn Spanish in high school, it was genders that confused me the most. Safe to say I just remember some words at this point.
The English dictionary is also about 50% larger than the French Dictionary. The length of the German dictionary is irrelevant because: Hottentotenstrottelmutterattentäterlattengitterwetterkotterbeutelratte
It is very frequent in English to use both the French word and the German word for the same thing in different situation.
Beef (French: bœuf) / Cow (Germanic) Pork (French: porc) / Pig/Swine (Germanic) Mutton (French: mouton) / Sheep (Germanic) Veal (French: veau) / Calf (Germanic) Venison (French: venaison) / Deer (Germanic) Poultry (French: poulet) / Chicken/Fowl (Germanic) Purchase (French) / Buy (Germanic) Commence (French) / Begin (Germanic) Inquire (French) / Ask (Germanic) Receive (French) / Get (Germanic) Odor (French) / Smell (Germanic) Aroma (French, positive) / Stench (Germanic, negative) Cardiac (French/Latin) / Heart (Germanic) Ocular (French/Latin) / Eye (Germanic) Dental (French/Latin) / Tooth (Germanic)
> It is very frequent in English to use both the French word and the German word for the same thing in different situation.
It's kind of like in genetics: if a gene gets duplicated, it creates the opportunity for one copy to evolve to do something else. Likewise with language: having two words for the same thing allows their meanings to diverge without loss to cover more shades of meaning.
English has compound nouns too, you know: "Coffee table", "finance department", "wine cellar".
German dictionaries have very similar rules for including them as English dictionaries; they tend to include them when there's a common use that isn't immediately clear.
If it gets to the dictionary, English often has a corresponding word as well: "Handschuh" -> "glove", "Zahnarzt" -> "dentist", "Hausaufgabe" -> "homework", "Fussball" -> "football" (or soccer if you're American or Australian), "Sonnenbrille" -> "Sunglasses". Note that the last 3 have basically the same morphology as their corresponding English words.
In the end, the word count of the German dictionary isn't so different: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dictionaries_by_number...
Most Frenchs are incredulous about this because they somehow think their lang is the best thing around.
That said, as a Frenchman who has to speak English every day, I can assure you that English has long since become its own thing!
It's really sad to see English language and words replace native ones, especially if your own language in many cases have better precision and quite frankly reads better. Recently I listened to a "Danish" podcast, about Charlie Kirk. I put Danish in " " because one of the hosts, a native Dane, struggles severely with expressing her thoughts and observation without the use of English.
English is easy to criticize. It doesn't have all the letters it needs. It doesn't have compound noun. A significant part of the vocabulary is just borrow from Norse, German or French (and pronounced wrong). It is however VERY popular, billions speak it, and that's a quality all on it's own.
There is no such thing as purity or correctness in language - those concepts are farcical. Every second of every day language evolves with the words and pronunciations of the people currently using it. If enough people spell or pronounce the "wrong" way, it becomes the "right" way.
French today is slightly different than it was yesterday, and the day before, and 50 years ago.
* see what I did there
If English doesn't exist on its own, French doesn't either. Nor does Latin, Greek or Sanskrit. All of these are incremental variations or dialects of some other language.