Open Source Beats Walled Gardens In Spoken Languages Too
from the what-do-french-and-aol-have-in-common? dept
Earlier this week, Webster's and the Oxford English Dictionary announced that it would include the word "google" from now on as an official word. But of course English doesn't have any one list of official words, there are just dictionaries that give their opinions about appropriate and established usage. And this is no trivial feature of the language. English's extensibility allows it to adapt to cultural and technological changes quicker than languages with centralized boards determining what words are appropriate, as exists for French (it wasn't until 2000 that French came up with an approved list of internet-related words so that speakers didn't have to use vile English ones). Of course there are some advantages to walled gardens; grammar and spelling rules are really consistent across French, unlike English's gangly mess that give kids fits in spelling bees. But this mess is a function of English speakers incorporating the best of what other languages and cultures have, and so may be one factor (among many others) of the language's success across the globe.
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Have you ever studied French?
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Nice try
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Spanish is another structured language
So much so, that I was able to teach myself to read and write it without needing any instruction. As a child I was bilingual in Spanish and English. Moved to the US while still very young, and learned to read in English. I retained the ability to speak Spanish, but never read it (my parents did not speak it). As an adult, I suddenly realized that I could read Spanish perfectly. Not only that, I could write Spanish words even if I had never seen the word written down, since the spelling always matches the pronunciation.
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Re: Spanish is another structured language
There also appears to be a large difference in the way certain letter-pairs are pronounced. Listening to native speakers pronounce 'll', I have heard at least four distinct sounds used, varying from a soft 'y' to a hard 'j', and sometimes like a combination of 'j' and 'ch'. I've even heard the word "calle" pronounced "cahd-jeh". Likewise, the sound for 'v' varies on a smooth continuum from a 'v' to a 'b'.
Since I am a musician, it's possible that I'm hearing differences that native speakers do not notice, or do not regard as being different.
Another explanation for this was given to me by a Columbian native. I listen to a Spanish radio station in the Dallas area, so I hear a lot of TexMex. According to the Columbian, TexMex is bad Mexican, and Mexican is poor Spanish.
At any rate, Spanish does NOT appear to perfectly phonetic.
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Re: Re: Spanish is another structured language
The word "exitos" is not proper Spanish. It's slang. Spanish spoken in Texas, and in most of Mexico is filled with slang. So that word is not a good example. Though that doesn’t mean you don’t have a point.
Spanish is not perfectly phonetic, but it is more phonetic than most languages in the world. Consequently, if you can speak it, you can probably read and write it. Maybe not perfectly, but certainly functionally.
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Then this means that Bush......
When he say stuff like, "misunderestimated."
Check out the President's Extensible English skills.
http://www.bestofgooglevideo.com/video.php?video=235
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Doesn't anyone remember the definition of Google?
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Re: Doesn't anyone remember the definition of Goog
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Re: Re: Doesn't anyone remember the definition of
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Re:
googol is 10^100
google is a search engine
Check it out for yourself. Google "define: googol" and "define: google"
=)
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Anonymous is correct
It is 10 to the power of 100.
Thanks Anynomous! My spelling is atrocious, it is why I am such a fan of the national speeling bee. I love watching good spelling since it is an art I never mastered.
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The
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Don't you mean...
also, the number 10^100 which you are referring to, is called a "googol", not "Google".
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Re: Spanish is another Structured Language
Are they teaching linguistics in music class now?
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Re: Re: Spanish is another Structured Language
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english doesn't have an official list
I'm working on a free "Web" corpus, but it's a long-term project, and I haven't finished refiing my corpus-crawler bot yet.
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